Google AdWords’ “remarketing” is a part of its display network platform. A remarketing audience is made up of all of the visitors to your site, a specific page or a combination thereof.
I use remarketing heavily as an essential part of the marketing campaigns that I build with AdWords. Running a campaign without it is a recipe for lost traffic – goodbye, they’re gone.
How AdWords Remarketing Works
Without writing a bunch of techno mumbo-jumbo, I’ll just say that remarketing is based on a cookie that is added to the browser of a website’s visitor, which allows the marketing platform (e.g. AdWords) to “follow” a visitor around on other sites, with your ads.
You have probably seen this happen yourself.
What I have found over the years of using this tactic is:
- Most visitors do not take an action the first time they reach your website. They may come back on their own accord, or they may require a “reminder” in the form of your remarketing message, but they don’t typically act the first time they land there (those days are just over).
- Remarketing is a form of Brand Awareness for your business. If there is any truth to the notion that people need to see your marketing message a minimum of 7 times before they will buy – then remarketing is crucial to the success of your advertising.
- Using Banner Ads is almost always more effective for remarketing than text ads are. I’ve tested this over and over again – and banners have always won out.
- Removing visitors from your remarketing list when they have taken an action (opted in or purchase) reduces the “creepy factor” (as well as your ad-spend) by letting your marketing funnel take over the job of marketing to them.
- Limiting impressions to less than 10 impressions per day (per user) also helps to eliminate the “creepy factor” and reduces cost without effecting conversions.
How Visitors Make “The Leap” Into Your Sales Funnel
When a prospect sees your remarketing banner – more times than not, they won’t click on it (for whatever reason). But they WILL:
- Call your phone number (so make SURE it’s on your remarketing banners!)
- “Google” your business name, and come back that way.
- Type your URL directly into their browser.
When people who see your ad, return without clicking (and optin or buy) this is called a “View Through Conversion” (VTC) and it’s what I mean by “Making the Leap” into your funnel.
Why I Love View Through Conversions
Unlike bidding CPC (cost per click) I prefer to bid CPM (cost per 1000 impressions) for remarketing campaigns. The goal is to put our Banner ads in front of our visitors as much of possible during our typical buying cycle timeframe. For example, if customers tend to buy from you within a few days, you might not want to keep remarketing to people more than 10 days.
On the other hand, if your audience needs time to warm up to your product or service, then remarketing to them a little here and there, over the next 60-120 days, might be the perfect strategy for your business.
Either way, paying for impressions (rather than clicks) is a rewarding, and lower cost, way to see conversions come in as VTCs – “View Through Conversions”.
The graph above illustrates the impact of a new remarketing campaign I recently implemented to a very large list. We were initially getting 700-900 VTCs per day, until it settled into a consistent and steady 100-200 VTCs a day. The CPA (cost per action) is relatively low, around $1 to get a cold visitor back to our site – and into our sales funnel.
I don’t know how we would ever get this traffic back (and at this price) if it wasn’t for remarketing!
Get “Regular” Conversions Too
People still DO click on the Ads, just not as much, and this is how the graph looks for their “regular” conversions. These conversions are steady at between 30-70 actions per day – and they do not cost anything more for the click.
So the combination of Conversions and VTCs (C + VTC = Total Conversions) need to be taken into account when calculating your CPA (cost per action) because they both count!
A Few More Good Tips
If you are using a “general branding” banner for your remarketing campaign, use the winning copy from the top converting text ads in your main Search or Display campaigns. Combined with your logo, toll-free number, URL and a strong call to action – this is a powerful marketing weapon for your online advertising.
Try a few variations of these banners. Use different colors to alter the look/feel (within the boundaries of the branding) to see if one style out-performs the other. If they perform similarly, let them both keep running so as to help reduce banner blindness to your audience.
Try using different offers to get people back onto your site and into your funnel. One thing might appeal to one visitor while another appeals to someone else.
When done correctly, AdWords remarketing ROCKS. So be sure you are using it for ALL of your campaigns to help your customers make “The Leap” back to your site.
