You would be forgiven for thinking that Remarketing and Retargeting is the next big thing, everybody is talking about it but what does it really mean? Let’s be really honest, you are already seeing this working in your everyday online activities, no doubt you have searched for a product and then like magic the same company has adverts on every web page you go to over the following couple of weeks, there is no magic genie at play here, this is simply remarketing!

New marketing technology is now available which lets you market to people who’ve already come in contact with your brand. They may have visited your site, saw an advert someplace else, saw a PPC ad, or they actually filled something out.

These are warm leads, people actually interested in you, your business or the products and services you sell, you now have the capability to market to them again, and again and again. This is now more important than ever as recent research shows the average person is bombarded by 2400 adverts and brand positions a day, a day!

You now have the ability to target users already interested in your product or service. You can hit customers already in the buying cycle and you can create some incredible ROI. 

Remarketing vs Retargeting

Sound similar doesn’t it, but like much in life ‘same same’ is actually different. Today I am going into more detail to help you understand what all of this means, to really break down the barriers and to start to create certainty in an uncertain world.

Retargeting

Retargeting is most often used to describe online adverts and digital display adverts, until recently the domain of the big advertising agencies and companies with deep pockets but with massive changes at Google you can now get your adverts up and running in a similar way to how you previously ran keyword advertising. A user visits your website, a cookie is set by your website and you can now target ads to your visitors on other sites they visit, that’s what the term retargeting means in a nutshell.

Let’s use an example, let’s say you are a Mexican Restaurant, once a visitor sees your website you know they have an interest in dining the Mexican way, so now you then can follow them around the internet and remind them of your business keeping you point of mind when it comes time to purchase. To some degree this is the modern equivalent of using sandwich boards, constant repetition bears results!

Retargeting is very appealing as the network of sites you can advertise on has grown significantly in the past 12 months, even in Australia sites like SEN Sports Radio, Home and Garden and many more have display advertising available through Google, giving you the opportunity to reach users on millions of sites.

Remarketing

Remarketing is not the poor sister of Retargeting, it is however the misunderstood uncle. While you may hear retargeting referred to as remarketing, “remarketing” is typically used when email is involved.

You most likely may have seen this with online sales and ecommerce. It’s also often used when you started a process i.e. starting filling out a form online but didn’t complete the process Vistaprint in Australia do this particularly well, they upsell after you place an initial order i.e. 250 free business cards, Confused? Let’s try again, Remarketing is ’marketing to your existing clients and customers often through email or social media’ and is really about lifecycle marketing.