Making sense of retargeting as an effective marketing tool

The essence of advertising has changed in many ways over the last decade. Traditionally, advertisers have used print and broadcast media to tell their stories however, digital media has fast emerged as the new way of doing things and has also become a great way to market your brand. Whether you’re a large multinational corporation or a small business, advertising both online and offline have become a must today. In fact, the latest Nielsen Advertising Information Services report has shown a 55% growth in internet ad spending in Malaysia. There are plenty of benefits of advertising online such as lower costs, absence of time limitations and the ability of this medium to keep pace with the change that constantly takes place around us.

However, while the benefits are many, there are a number of challenges that advertisers need to work around. The greatest challenge for any advertiser is to ensure that the right ad is delivered to the right user. Many a time, problems surface in advertising when ads are not viewed by the right audience or in other words, by individuals who have not shown any indication of buying a product or service, leading to what is known as a wasted impression which negatively affects both advertisers and publishers.

What is retargeting

Retargeting helps to solve this problem. Retargeting put simply is a method of convincing a customer to buy i.e. complete an online transaction they began but didn’t finish, buy more of a previously purchased item, or buy a complementary item.  This is by far the most targeted means of reaching your audience through engaging messages seeing as you’re able to target customers based on specific profiling characteristics along with specific customer behavior for e.g. if I was looking at buying a BMW and I visit BMW’s website but drop out without signing up for a test drive, retargeting allows for a cookie to be dropped on my browser which will allow an advertising network to recognize me when I visit the sites within their network and to place ads offering the test drive prompting me to do something that I am already interested in. This ultimately helps the BMW test drive to remain on top of mind for me and drive me to take action!

The downside of this is that while many internet users understand that their online activities are being tracked and monitored for marketing purposes, it may still feel invasive and unnecessarily pushy if retargeting isn’t done correctly and hence, advertisers need to be especially careful with this.

Benefits of retargeting

One of the largest benefits of retargeting is its ability to get a client excited about a brand and retain this excitement throughout an organization’s marketing efforts. Online consumers hardly ever click and make an immediate purchase. Retargeting ads keep the client’s site and brand name top of mind with their target audience as they browse the Internet when trying to choose between competing brands and help to prevent your offer from losing steam during this stage. Ultimately, your message needs to be able to do two things:

a)       Reach out to prospective customers as soon as possible before they decide to buy the product or service from a competitor

b)       Repeatedly target them throughout the consideration phase

Retargeting also brings visitors back to the client’s site which helps to ensure better conversions and ultimately, the possibility of more revenue. Additionally, a lot of money is invested in advertising through other mediums such as the television or through online advertising which helps to bring the consumer one step closer to make a purchase and retargeting helps to ensure that those dollars actually turn into revenue.

Conclusion

Most marketers have learnt to recognize the value of re-engaging with an audience that has made a connection with a brand or product that has been promoted by a marketer as a result of which retargeting is becoming more and more popular. While your banner ads, search marketing and other offline efforts will do some of the work, retargeting will actually help to finish the job quickly and effectively, transforming browsers into buyers, buyers into repeat customers and repeat customers into faithful, lifetime customers.

How to get started – contact Innity to bring your customers closer to sealing the deal

Contact us to start retargeting your customers today – enquiry@innity.com