“By running retargeting efforts through a marketing automation platform you are able to create audience segments based on demographics, geographic, firmographics, engagement levels and areas of interest. This allows you to customize the retargeting ads that are displayed to each segmented audience, delivering a highly personalized and relevant experience for your clients and prospects.”

Have you ever noticed, that after viewing your online wish list of products from certain retailer’s websites, that you are then reminded, gently (everywhere you go online, including your favorite social networking sites) that the products you are longing for are just sitting there, waiting for you? Your happiness is simply a few clicks away should you return to the site and complete your purchase.

Chances are you have experienced this scenario, and thus have been introduced to the practice of retargeting. These ads have risen to fame because of their successful application to consumer marketing, primarily through online shopping, however, you would be selling them and the possibilities that reside within their use short, if you discount their application in the B2B marketing mix. When implemented correctly these ads can keep you top of mind with your clients and prospects by reminding them of your value propositions and competitive edge, even when they are researching your competitors; sounds pretty awesome, right?

You can include these in your marketing strategy without utilizing a marketing automation platform, but when given the option, managing all of your digital channels in place has significant benefits such as building seamless audience segmentation and user experience along with thorough tracking and analytics. Whereas using solitary providers is time-consuming, most platforms will not fully integrate (if they integrate at all), and you will be losing some pretty important functionalities. By running retargeting efforts through a marketing automation platform you are able to create audience segments based on demographics, geographic, firmographics, engagement levels and areas of interest. This allows you to customize the retargeting ads that are displayed to each segmented audience, delivering a highly personalized and relevant experience for your clients and prospects.

Marketing automation platforms will also track each users interaction with your retargeting ads along with all other touch points through your digital channels and include this data into your reporting as well as the lead scoring calculations.

When considering the nature of retargeting ads and how they essentially “follow” your users around, it is highly recommended to ensure the messaging and purpose behind the ad is consistent with your client’s or prospect’s interaction with your business. Marketing automation platforms allow you to build a structured funnel or user journey through your buying process, where all elements of your digital marketing campaigns can work together in unison; creating a seamless and smooth experience with your business.

Here are some great ways to utilize retargeting ads:

Retargeting for Outbound Marketing/Converting Prospects:

Combine a retargeting pixel in an acquisition/purchased edirect from a third party supplier or direct the users flowing through this channel to a customized landing page that will only be used for this specific channel (ensuring only their users will be targeted by these ads). This allows you to create a customized audience by cooking and continually targeting the records in their database that received your edirect, or website visitors who clicked on a website ad purchased on a supplier website etc.; prolonging their exposure to your offer and extending your reach past the initial media purchase; maximizing your marketing spend. You can utilize these audiences by:

• Redirecting lost prospects back to your lead generation page or to a new lead generation page with a new offer – providing you a second chance at converting them/capturing the lead.

 

• Redirecting lost leads (records you have already captured in your database) back into your funnel, at the stage they were lost – offering something new to help move them to the desired outcome.

 

• Targeting these audiences with customized ads and messaging that will directly resonate with their journey through your purchase process so far. For example, if you purchased an edirect from Association X your retargeting ads could say something like “Association X members receive an exclusive discount! Claim yours today!”. Segmenting by the individual channels allows you to name the original place where you picked up the user and/or also offer different discounts, pricing, promotions etc. per channel.

Retargeting for Inbound Marketing/Converting Prospects:

Potential customers or clients finding you (or in this case, your website) on their own, joining your mailing list or directly converting, is the business owners or marketing professionals dream come true. Chances are you work very hard at optimizing your website for search, building client relationships that will result in referrals, or writing content that will be shared etc. all with the purpose of obtaining organic traffic to your website. It can be very disheartening, looking through your website analytics and comparing your traffic to leads generated, ratio. Maximizing your chances of converting organic traffic or capturing “unknowns” into your database is another area where retargeting efforts rule, as without having captured contact information you have no other means of reaching these users through other marketing channels. You can utilize retargeting ads with the purpose of converting unknown users in the following ways:

• Targeting them with special introductory offers or free trial

 

• Promoting your value propositions and/or unique selling points; as during a quick visit to your website, they may have missed this information

 

• Promoting client testimonials for specific products, with the purpose of registering for your online brochure or to receive a brochure in the mail

 

• Informing them of upcoming webinars or live demonstrations that they can register for

 

• Promoting new content releases such as ebooks or your newsletter, prompting them to join your mailing list

 

Retargeting Ads Within Your Sales Funnel Or As Part Of Your Nurture Campaigns:

By building segmented audiences based on the stages of your buying process, you can employ retargeting ads to help you move prospects from one stage to the next or re-engage them within their current stage. You can even run accelerated retargeting initiatives within the later stages of your funnel, by increasing the frequency cap and budget, while displaying ads that feature messaging with a strong call to action and timed incentive (such as an expiring offer); which is designed to push the prospect over the edge, and close the deal. It is highly suggested though that you set a short duration for how long a cookied user stays in this campaign based on engagement. For example, if a user enters this accelerated campaign and performs no further engagement within 3 days, they would drop back into the standard campaign for the buying stage they were in. This will prevent your accelerated campaign from annoying a prospect who is not quite ready to purchase and prevent a negative experience with your brand.

 

Benefits That Marketing Automation Brings to Your Retargeting efforts

Most of these strategies can be achieved through a sole retargeting provider, however, it will require some heavy lifting to set up and monitor as you will need to build the audiences from scratch based off of single website pages they may visit and other targeting involved. It will also include additional tracking codes and pixels that will need to be added to your website(s), which will also need to be monitored to ensure any website changes do not affect the code or pixels ability to do its job.

Retargeting ads can still provide a significant positive impact and ROI on your campaign if they are run by an individual supplier but running them through a marketing automation platform will unlock the full benefits for your business, saving you time and money spent on advertising while unifying your user journey and digital marketing efforts – sounds like a win-win to me.

You can find part five of this series here: Reveal Your Hidden Treasure with Lead Scoring