Remarketing works by using “cookies,” which are small pieces of data stored on a user’s browser when they visit your website. However, most third-party cookies now have restrictions, so it’s best to remarket on platforms that use first-party tracking instead. To execute remarketing campaigns, you will likely work with either a pixel tag or a remarketing list, depending on the data you have and the remarketing platform you use.
Pixel tags, which are also known as tracking pixels, are small pieces of code on a website that enable the placement of cookies onto a user’s web browser. When you create a remarketing campaign with a particular platform, it will give you a pixel tag code to add to your website. From there, the pixel drops a cookie into the user’s site browser, creating a trail of breadcrumbs you can use to serve tailored ads as they surf the web. This allows you to maintain connections with past visitors and engage with them long after they leave your website.
Remarketing can provide many benefits for your enterprise. However, the benefit will depend on the type of remarketing that is best for your enterprise. See the benefits below to understand which benefits suit the needs of your business.
Access past site visitors.
You worked hard to bring visitors to your site in the first place, whether through organic or paid campaigns. Few people are ready to engage with your brand when they first visit your site. That is why it’s important to access past site visitors to build deeper relationships with site visitors that eventually lead to future purchases. These users are likely to have higher brand recognition and could be further along in the buying process.
Remarketing enables you to serve tailored ads to these visitors, reinforcing their interest and encouraging them to return to your site to complete a purchase.
Recapture lost website traffic.
Website traffic alone doesn’t guarantee digital marketing success, but it certainly helps you promote your brand to more people. It’s normal for most site visitors to leave without taking action, but remarketing gives you the opportunity to recapture this lost traffic.
By displaying targeted ads to visitors while they browse other websites, you can gently nudge them back to your site for more interactions. As long as you provide valuable, personalized experiences on-site for these return visitors, they’ll eventually make their way through the funnel.
Encourage conversions.
Most site visitors aren’t ready to make a purchase or contact you when they first visit your website. With remarketing campaigns, you reconnect with these users after they’ve had time to do further research, increasing the odds that they will engage with your content or products. As long as you’re honest about how you use shopper data, remarketing can significantly increase conversions.
Remarket to customers across industries and verticals.
The great thing about remarketing is that it isn’t exclusive to a certain industry or vertical. It’s incredibly adaptable, which makes it suitable for a range of different applications.
Remarketing will work for you as long as both your business and customers are online. Both B2B and B2C companies use remarketing to promote products and services to potential customers, too.
Remarketing isn’t limited to one type of ad. Depending on the preferences of your target audience, you can create text-based, image, or video ads.
This high degree of flexibility means you have total creative freedom to design attention-grabbing ads that resonate with your audience.
Keep your brand top of mind.
They might not be ready to buy right now, but people on the receiving end of remarketing will certainly remember your business.
They’ll see your ads when they visit social media or when they look for information on Google. If they added an item to their cart, got distracted, and left, remarketing serves as a gentle reminder to finalize their purchase.
Preserve your marketing budget.
Businesses continue to invest in paid ads, and remarketing is a surprisingly effective strategy for making the most of your advertising dollars.
Click-through rates tend to be higher on remarketed messages because users are already familiar with you. Because click-throughs are higher, you’ll likely see lower costs-per-clicks, too. Remarketing also encourages bounced users and abandoned carts to convert, which helps you see more of a return on your investment.
Personalize ecommerce experiences.
Deloitte found that while 61% of brands say they personalize customer experience, only 43% of customers recognize their experience as personalized. This illustrates a gap between what customers expect and whether brands are meeting those expectations.
If you use dynamic remarketing or remarketing lists for search ads (RLSA), you can show ecommerce shoppers the exact items they viewed or left in their shopping cart. Displaying relevant products tailored to their exact search makes it much more likely that a shopper will remember their need for that product and complete the transaction.
A remarketing list is a record of visitors who visited or performed a certain action on your website. When a visitor goes to a specific landing page, the remarketing tool adds that user to your remarketing list. From there, your remarketing campaign will display ads to these users that include relevant content from that landing page. This enables hyper-personalized experiences that make remarketing campaigns much more effective.