Shoppers are flooded with choices.
It’s easy for them to forget why they came to a store in the first place, and for them to quickly get distracted in favor of the newest, shiniest thing. It happens to the best of us. Because of this, ecommerce brands are tasked with winning back shoppers who have shown interest in their products in the past—and remarketing is a successful way to do this.
What is Remarketing?
Remarketing is a marketing strategy used to send targeted ads to shoppers who have already visited a website or product page without taking action. For example, if a shopper adds an item to their cart but doesn’t check out, remarketing uses that information to serve them ads on social media, Google, and other sites to encourage them to buy the product.
It’s called remarketing because you’re essentially “re”-marketing to people who have already discovered your brand and interacted with it in some way, whether that’s by browsing a product category, adding an item to their cart, or visiting a landing page without signing up for your newsletter. It’s a second chance to convert and a particularly useful method for re-engaging past customers and reminding them why they chose you in the first place.
How Remarketing works
Remarketing tracks user data to understand where shoppers have been on your site and what actions they have taken (or, more importantly, haven’t taken). It’s most commonly used to serve ads to consumers based on their previous browsing history, which can make campaigns incredibly targeted and personalized.
In simpler terms, remarketing works like this:
- Shopper visits your website.
- Shopper leaves your website and is tracked through their cookies (more on that below).
- Shopper sees your remarketing ads on other websites, on social media, and in their inbox.
- Shopper clicks on your ads and returns to your website.
- Shopper takes the action you want them to take.
Website visitors who are retargeted are more likely to convert by 43% and three out of five online users notice (and consider clicking) ads showing products they’ve previously viewed, making remarketing campaigns a powerful tool for online retailers.
Remarketing vs. Retargeting: What’s the difference?
You might see the terms remarketing and retargeting used interchangeably. While they are fairly similar in their end goal, there are a couple of key differences.
Retargeting is mostly focused on paid ads. It uses shopper data to automatically serve relevant ads on Google and social media.
Remarketing, on the other hand, collects customer information and uses that to create lists and send targeted emails. Landing directly in shopper inboxes creates a deeper, more personal connection and allows for more specific upselling and messaging.
Using Remarketing lists
Remarketing lists are lists of shoppers who have taken (or not taken) a specific action on your site. You can create a list of people who have visited a product category page, the checkout page, or even your homepage over a certain period of time.
When a customer visits each page on your site, they leave a cookie in their wake, which remarketing tools can use to collect their information and map out their customer journey. When customers land on your homepage, a product category page, or the checkout, their cookie is added to the remarketing list associated with the specific action they’ve taken.
You can create as many remarketing lists as you like and get as detailed as you wish, creating lists for highly targeted actions like visiting a specific offers page or product page. You’re then able to send ads and email campaigns to each of these email lists, personalizing the messaging to match their browsing behavior.
Using Remarketing pixel tags
Remarketing pixel tags are small pieces of code on a webpage that allow your site to place and track customer cookies (a.k.a. the crumbs left by past visitors—hence their sweet-treat name). This is possible because every visitor has an individual ID that enables their activity to be tracked.
The ad server or remarketing tool you use can access these unique ID codes and add them to the most relevant remarketing lists. If someone has signed up for your newsletter and made it through to the “thank you” page, they’ll be added to one list, and if they add an item to their cart but don’t purchase it, they’ll automatically be added to another list.
4 Types of Remarketing campaigns
Remarketing is a versatile marketing strategy. The way you use it will depend on what you hope to achieve, the type of customers you want to reach, and how you want to reach them. There are several ways remarketing can help you do this with four different ad types.
1. Standard Remarketing
Standard remarketing is the most common form of remarketing. It tracks and targets customers who have visited your website using pixel tags and their cookie data. For example, you can remarket to everyone who has visited your homepage in the past month via a banner or text ad on Google, an email, or a social media ad.
Fanatics showcases a selection of products to shoppers who have previously visited the brand’s website.
2. Dynamic Remarketing
Dynamic remarketing is particularly useful for ecommerce businesses. It drills down into the exact products a visitor has viewed on your website or added to their cart and serves them dynamic ads showing that particular product. To run this type of marketing campaign via Google, social media, or email, you need to submit a product feed to the platform you want to serve the ads on.
3. Display Remarketing
Display remarketing is a simple way to reach shoppers who have visited your site. It tracks customers who have shown an interest in your brand and products and serves them visual ads of your brand when they visit another website. Display ads can be shown on websites that are part of the Google display network.
4. Search Remarketing
Search remarketing is a quick way to grab the attention of past website visitors in search engines. It automatically customizes your search ads based on the past browsing behavior of website visitors. For example, if someone has visited a specific product page without purchasing, search remarketing will serve them PPC results that mention the product page.
Remarketing is a powerful online advertising strategy that targets users who have previously interacted with your website or brand. By presenting highly relevant ads to these users as they browse the web, you can increase brand awareness, drive conversions, and ultimately boost sales.
Our remarketing service has been proven to be highly effective for a variety of businesses, from small startups to large enterprises. We would love the opportunity to discuss how our service can benefit your business specifically and help you achieve your marketing goals.
