- Reading time: 3 mins
- Topics:
- Advertising
Have you ever wondered how advertisements for websites you’ve looked at previously just happen to show up while you are browsing the web? Maybe you thought it was a little creepy, or maybe that ad enticed you to revisit that website—either way, this Google feature known as remarketing is a great way for businesses to put their image in the eyes of consumers who at one time expressed interest in their brand.
How does remarketing work?
Remarketing uses a small snippet of code to track which pages users are going to on your site. Your visitor’s cookie id is saved to lists you create on Google AdWords, and tell you what that visitor’s action was on your site. You can then target visitors with specific ads based on the page they viewed after they have moved on to a different website.
To start remarketing with Google, you need to place a tag on all pages of your website. You can find the code in your AdWords account. Once you have the tag in place, you need to create lists for AdWords to segment the people who visit your site’s pages. The final piece of the puzzle is to build an AdWords campaign based on your lists that will show different messages to the different audience segments.
Remarketing is a desired online strategy because it allows you to target people based on the actions they’ve taken on your website. For instance, if you create a list for people who have visited your e-commerce page on water bottles, but those people left your site without purchasing your product, you can create a water bottle specific ad targeting those visitors while they browse the Google Display Network (GDN), or as they do a keyword search for water bottles. You might also choose to show them an ad with a special offer for water bottles in order to incentivize them to return to your site if price was the deterrent.
It is important to note, though, that remarketing is not solely for e-commerce sites, even though they can hugely benefit from this strategy. Companies can also use remarketing to spread brand awareness or increase downloads or sign-ups on their site, through pointing past website visitors to the landing page that the call-to-action promotes. Greater versatility includes adding remarketing to mobile apps; this feature is selected through Google AdWords. As with other AdWords campaigns, remarketing has the benefit of reasonable pricing and free ad building.
If you’re not sold on remarketing, the best thing you can do is give it a try! Even with a limited budget, you can test remarketing lists and ads to see if they are effective for your brand. Also, remember that it often takes several messages for consumers to make a decision, so even if you don’t get consumers to click on your ad, you are still creating awareness for your brand.
