Remarketing is one of the most powerful marketing tactics in digital marketing because it has a consistently high ROI. Like search, remarketing targets consumers who have taken an action, visiting the advertiser’s site, that indicates a high interest in the advertiser’s products. Consumers that are targeted by remarketing are “hand raisers” who have actively expressed interest in specific products or services.
While remarketing works very well, there are some common issues that marketers should consider as they consider employing it as a tactic:
- Scale is inherently limited. The number of consumers who come to an advertiser’s site is relatively small compared to population of consumers online. Therefore the size of remarketing campaigns can only ever be as large as the population of site visitors, and in reality is often much smaller due to cookie deletion and other factors.
- Retaining data from remarketing programs is vital. Advertisers and agencies can — and should — have access to all information gleaned through a remarketing campaign. Remarketing, like search, is a high response-rate tactic, so there are lots of good consumer insights to be learned from converters that should be used to improve the overall marketing plan.
- Remarketing shouldn’t be run in a silo. Like search, remarketing captures consumer demand for an advertiser’s products, but doesn’t generate demand for those products. Therefore it is important that remarketing be viewed in the context of a larger, coordinated marketing strategy, which is usually impossible if remarketing is executed on a different platform or set of partners than the rest of the media plan.
- Effective remarketing requires transparency. Without transparency into details of media and its costs, there is no way to verify that remarketing programs are run in a cost-efficient and brand-positive manner. Transparency is also key to understanding how and where an advertiser’s data is being shared.
- Remarketing campaigns should have the right goals. Often advertisers are drawn to remarketing because it seems exactly like search, but with pictures. The problem with this analogy is that it often leads to having click-based goals (CPC, CTR, Click-to-Conversion) on a last-touch basis. Combined with lack of media transparency and multi-touch attribution, these goals create perverse incentives to create valueless clicks and impressions that drive no incremental revenue.
To optimize campaigns and run remarketing strategies effectively, marketers must take a holistic approach. Here are four tips to make remarketing campaigns work better:
- Leverage transparent solutions. Platforms that provide complete transparency into media and consumer insights provide advertisers with the peace of mind that their marketing dollars are being spent efficiently on brand relevant sites and in a way that supports their brand. Transparency also gives advertisers assurance that their consumer data isn’t being shared with competitors or others without their permission and that performance numbers aren’t inflated by fraudulent traffic.
- Use a programmatic approach. Programmatic media buying is the approach of using automated, smart systems to buy and target media intelligently. A programmatic approach ensures that the consumer is shown the right ad, at the right time and for the right price. This approach goes beyond showing the last item viewed or displaying static messages to a consumer and enables a comprehensive approach that optimizes to true customer value.
- Optimize to deeper metrics. By optimizing to revenue and/or multi-touch attribution, advertisers ensure that remarketing is working towards the numbers that matter — revenue and lifetime customer value — rather than last touch attribution credit. It also incents media and tech partners to optimize to goals that benefit the advertiser, rather than to attempt to game media metrics like clicks.
- Use insights from remarketing campaigns to inform other tactics. This is the key to expanding the reach of effective marketing. Remarketing converters are like a focus group — use them to inform media and creative tactics. Were conversion rates higher from consumers browsing fashion media verses news sites? Are your highest conversion campaigns from cooking enthusiasts? Utilizing the proper campaign metrics to alter future marketing strategy is money well spent. It also ensures brand image, inspires customer loyalty and fosters a better images of the online marketing community as a whole.