How is Re-Targeting different from Re-marketing?

Understanding Dynamic Re-targeting and Drip Re-marketing

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Marketers spend a significant portion of their budget to generate traffic to their websites. And yet, 96% of visitors who come to your website aren’t ready to make a purchase decision during their initial visit.

Your website may be attracting lots of traffic, but the fact is, the average conversion rate for first-time visitors is low.

A study from Episerver showed that nine out of ten consumers visited a brand’s website for reasons other than making a purchase, including product research, comparison of services, or store details. Even when they visited the website with the intent of purchasing, one-third of consumers never made a purchase.

This data clearly shows that online consumers are less likely to convert on an impulse than their in-store counterparts. An important takeaway from the study is that it takes more than one online visit to convince customers to convert. That’s where Re-targeting and Re-marketing comes into play.

While both the terms ‘re-targeting’ and ‘re-marketing’ are used interchangeably, there are stark differences between them.

Re-targeting and Re-marketing: Similar Goals but Different Tactics

Advertising managers are obsessed with driving traffic to the website and most of their paid ad strategies focus on generating inbound traffic. However, only a small percentage of ad clickers actually convert.

This is why it’s vital to tap into audiences who have already visited your website or interacted with your brand previously. Re-targeting and re-marketing, when done right enable advertisers to turn missed opportunities into potential sales opportunities and keep your brand at the top of mind when audiences are ready to convert.

However, both re-targeting and re-marketing constitute different approaches. While re-targeting primarily refers to online ad placements that strategically target visitors towards conversions; re-marketing involves re-engaging prospects and existing customers to maximize customer lifetime value.

Even though the goal of both marketing approaches is the same – reach consumers who have already demonstrated an interest in your brand; the tactics and channels that are used to address repeat visitors are different.

What is Re-targeting?

Re-targeting is mostly about serving ads to interested prospects based on cookies that track their online browsing behaviour and patterns. By adding pixels or a tracking code to your website, you can track the user’s actions through cookies placed in their browsers. This will allow you to oversee the specific actions a user takes on your site such as viewing a product page or a particular blog post and then display relevant ads that will help them continue their journey.

These ads are placed by third parties such as Google Display Network or Facebook that display ads on other sites that the visitors go to, reminding them about the purchase or website that they bounced off from.

Essentially, re-targeting cannot be done without the use of cookies or the trail of website activity left by visitors.

What is Re-marketing?

While you may often hear re-targeting referred to as re-marketing (thanks to Google), “re-marketing” is typically the term used to describe re-engaging customers with email drip campaigns. This process entails gathering information about your site visitors or existing customers and then sending personalized emails to persuade them to re-engage with your brand. Re-marketing generally does not involve using display ads or cookies that track visitor activity.

It primarily relies on first-party or enterprise data to curate re-marketing lists based on specific criteria such as purchase history, recent website activity, etc. Using this information businesses can then tailor marketing communication and messages to each re-marketing segment. This involves triggering personalized email campaigns based on account activity or inactivity.

In short, re-marketing is a more nuanced approach than re-targeting, allowing for personalized messaging to interested prospects and up-selling or cross-selling to existing customers.

When Should you use Re-targeting?

A re-targeting campaign can be planned and managed using display advertising platforms or other third-party ad publishers. Re-targeting provides you the opportunity to make a consecutive impression on your visitors, bring them back to your site, close the deal and maximize your PPC ROI.

Here’s how you can use retargeting campaigns:

• Capitalize on lost website traffic
• Reach people who have already visited your site and shown interest in your offering
• Target audiences who are more likely to convert
• Keep your brand at top of mind by strategically showing ads in various formats such as display, search, dynamic carousel and more to interested audiences
• Serve dynamic re-targeting ads that allow real-time personalization and optimization based on specific products or services the visitors viewed on your site
• Increase brand awareness with repeated exposure to your brand

When Should You Use Re-marketing?

Many companies end up focusing their efforts on reaching new customers and forget to nurture the existing relationships with current customers. Re-marketing enables brands to foster and strengthen customer relationships that maximize customer lifetime value.

Here’s how you can use re-marketing campaigns:

• Curate a re-marketing list comprising of visitors to your homepage over a specific period, social media followers, email subscribers, current customer database, etc. and re-market offerings
• Target inactive or dormant users to promote product adoption and usage
• Create cross-sell and up-sell opportunities
• Reduce shopping cart abandonment by sending a personalized email that reminds them to complete their purchase
• Re-engage existing customers and interested prospects with exclusive incentives and discounts that will encourage them to purchase
• Promote brand loyalty and advocacy with bespoke re-marketing campaigns targeted at customers based on their previous purchases and behavioural patterns

Re-targeting vs. Re-marketing: Leveraging Both Strategies in your Digital Marketing Arsenal

Both re-targeting and re-marketing are an important part of the digital marketing toolkit. Retargeting refers to paid advertising strategies using a variety of ad formats and channels targeted at prospects stuck in the top and middle of the sales funnel. In contrast, re-marketing involves the usage of customer lifecycle drip email campaigns targeting users who have reached the bottom of your funnel.

Leverage display re-targeting to increase top of mind awareness and email re-marketing to nurture and convert customers who demonstrate the strongest signals of purchase intent and brand loyalty.

The bottom line is that most PPC platforms use both terms interchangeably and have the capability to implement pixel-based re-targeting and list-based re-marketing campaigns in one single platform. As the boundaries between re-targeting and re-marketing continue to blur, marketers will need to essentially use an integrated digital marketing strategy that combines the best of both worlds.