Remarketing Basics: Stop losing 98% of consumers that find you
6 Minute Read
We’ve all been there before, we see something we want online and visit that page at least ten times before actually committing to a buy, why? What pushes us as consumers to not commit the first time we find something we want? BECAUSE WE’RE NOT SOLD! But what are we waiting for, a coupon code in our e-mail or perhaps finding a better deal elsewhere on a competitors site? It all comes down to the holes in your bucket. A lot of money is spent towards companies online advertising efforts to get consumers to a particular product or service, but means nothing if those dollars spent don’t translate into dollars received right? Enter remarketing.
The sooner your business starts utilizing remarketing strategies EFFECTIVELY the sooner you can patch those holes in your bucket of conversions. Applying the three business strategies that twelve three uses, can dramatically increase your conversion rate. Have a plan, target an audience, and validate your results. The fact of the matter is nearly three-quarters of online shoppers will abandon their shopping cart before making a purchase and only a dreary 8% of them will return to buy with no remarketing efforts. So at this point you’re asking yourself, now what? How do I build an efficient marketing strategy that will entice consumers to buy this time around? They know I exist and have done some research at this point so let’s find out where they’re going.
In an average session, half of online shoppers will visit two or more sites before making a purchase. This gives you a massive pool of consumers to retarget and convert. Additionally, online buyers look for several factors when considering a company. First being, price, can I afford this? Secondly, does this company have a good reputation and will they provide a quality product or “do a good job” and satisfy what I am looking for. The biggest thing I see almost all companies forget often is to put themselves in the shoes of the consumer. “Be the buyer!” If you find yourself asking the question of what is in it for me and my company, stop! Rather try asking yourself the question, what is in it for my customer? Why would they buy anything from me? The simple fact is that only ten percent of people remember ten percent of what you say. In other words, we need to be reminded of things and the more it is put in front of us the more that impulse will take over and create a buy. Understanding the psychological aspects of online buyers’ behavior is another major advantage to have in your box of tools but we will cover that in another session. We are all busy all of the time and retargeting offers a little reminder for online buyers to finish what they started because having seen the ad a few times they are twice as likely to convert. Simply put, the more times a user sees an ad the more likely they are to buy. Now we come to the next step of what kind of ads work and which ones don’t.
First and foremost, plan! This is the most crucial part of the three step process to ensure retargeting efforts are not wasted. Knowing that an online buyer will shop around on a few sites before committing to a buy actually helps your retargeting efforts because even after they leave your site they are most likely going to do the same thing on a competitor’s site so don’t panic just yet. You have to think big if you want big returns, so targeting as many online buyers as possible is the key, once you have a better understanding of your audience you then move into native ads which I will cover after a bit more understanding. Reaching the maximum number of users is actually easier than it sounds. Facebook and Google Display Network offer the best reach. GDN reaches 90% of internet users worldwide and Facebook alone has over 1.3 billion users, a billion of which will log into their accounts today. A lot of people say Facebook is a waste of time and does not provide much value… WRONG ! A Facebook business page is free and creating content on your own time guess what, that’s free too ! In fact, news feed Facebook ads are 49 times higher in CTR and cost 54% less than traditional sidebar ads. Using Facebook and other social sites that incorporate a display of some sort costs you nothing out of pocket and works ! Now that you know where everyone is the next question is what type of tactics do I use? In a recent study conducted by eMarketer, 70% of users are more likely to convert through a display ad. We all want our business to thrive around brand recognition and offering our customers real tangible value and that is extremely difficult to translate into text. Building a brand around a small text ad a user will probably not even see the first time it is put in front of them can cause you to bang your head against the wall and question your entire existence.
This brings me to my next point, how to turn impressions into sales. First, know your audience! Targeting the right people at the right time can make all the difference and native ads are a simple and great way to execute as I mentioned earlier because it is a highly targeted form of advertising being that the ad placement is “disguised” as similar content a user is already searching for. Purchase intent is 53% higher with native display ads and generates 82% in brand lift. So what does all of this mumbo jumbo mean? Higher CTR and lower CPC. In plain English, lower your customer acquisition cost and increase the number of leads. I say leads because at this point in your sales funnel users are no longer just impressions or views these are actual buyers that have once visited your offering and are now back simply because of how the ad was presented to them. A great example I love sharing with people that put everything into context and anyone can relate to is listening to the radio. Imagine you’re in your car jamming to some tunes and when the song is over an announcer comes on and tells you about the all new Ford F-150 with leasing and financing for everyone, or how attorney John Smith can help you with your personal injury blah blah blah. You immediately change the station or turn it off. Yes, that Ford dealer and attorney got an impression but no one cares about those two examples unless you are in the market for a pickup truck or slipped and fell in a McDonalds and are seeking compensation, then by all means go for it. Now on the other hand if that song you were jamming out to sang about how cool Ford F-150’s are and a rap song about personal injury attorney’s then I am headed to the nearest Ford dealership and seeking compensation for a car accident that happened three years ago. Everything is relative, sorry for being boring but the age old saying “it is not what you say it’s how you say it” is very much applied to the world of digital marketing.
Finally, what to do with all of this new data you’ve collected, time to validate. So at this point, you know why you are losing 98% of users that find you, where they are hiding, and what tactics to employ under the supervision of Twelve Three’s three main business strategies (Plan, Target, Validate). Validating all of your data is the final piece to the puzzle of retargeting/remarketing. To conclude, having a lot of raw data can be overwhelming but breaking it down into simple categories can make all the difference. First, your advertisement will give you any number of Impressions, where are they coming from and where are they going. Next, knowing that a high percentage of users will not commit to a buy on the first visit, accepting that fact will help you reduce headaches from banging your head against the wall. Retargeting with display ads versus text because display targets a broader audience and is more engaging than a few words no matter how good you think they are. From there, monitoring your CTR from the retargeted Native Display Ads because we all love visuals. Congratulations ! You are on your way to higher conversion rates while using effective strategies and letting the remarketing cycle run its course. Impressions > Retarget > CTR > Conversion!