Updated June 13, 2023
Social Media Retargeting Tools
A company advertises a product in mass media, many readers see it, some visit the nearest store to inquire, and many forget about it. And subsequent ads on TV or hoardings may prompt the prospective buyer to search for the product or recall the brand at a department store or a shopping mall. In online advertisements, getting back to a prospective consumer is possible through retargeting tools In simple terms; retargeting tools refer to serving banner ads to visitors who have already visited your site through a Cost-Per-Click campaign (CPC). Retargeting tools also happen through social media-Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook, LinkedIn, and other platforms. They are not limited to serving visitors to the site with banner ads.
6 Strategies
Here are 6 strategies for successful online social media retargeting tools :
1. Use CPC campaign in association with retargeting tools
One of the most frequently used online ads is CPC (Pay-per-Click) of Google which brings the target audience to your landing page or website. Buying or conversion does not happen linearly. Many visitors bounce off the site; others still register to get product information but don’t become customers. Such prospective consumers again search for the keyword on the web through display ads. It is available through cookies or pixels.
There are two types of retargeting tools available: One is cookies-based, and the other is list-based. In retargeting strategy, pixels or cookies are installed through a programmed Javascript placed on the visitor’s browser. The cookies enable tracking visitors’ moves across various sites and retargeting platforms to serve display ads. The advantage of pixel-based targeting is that it can be done instantaneously.
The other option creates a list of email IDs on responses received from the PPC campaign and retargets them through an email campaign or social media- Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin when the visitors sign in with the particular email id.
Both pixel-based and a list of retargeting strategies have advantages and disadvantages. In the retargeting strategy, the number of people retargeted at any time may be low, and it must be installed on all pages. The list targeting may not happen if more people use different email ids for various social media platforms.
If a company produces health, cosmetics, and wellness products, each product may correspond to a set of keywords and their related CPC campaigns. In such cases, it is better to have separate landing pages with different cookies so that retargeting tools are effective. For example, someone searching for nutritional products will be served with display ads related to it. At the same time, someone searching for cosmetics may see banner ads served through retargeting strategy.
2. Use retargeting tools with SMS
You have a website performing well in organic search for certain keywords and running paid campaigns (CPC). Suppose you have captured the mobile numbers through the registration form on landing pages. You can provide visitors discount offers, new product launches, festival greetings, or any news relevant to the customer. This enables the company to keep in touch with the prospect of multiple platforms and make the customer feel wanted. The advantage of SMS campaigns is that they are cheaper and enable more reach at affordable costs.
3. Retargeting tools with social media
One advantage of online advertising is its ability to use multiple platforms to engage the audience. A CPC campaign can bring potential customers to your landing page, which can be targeted through Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, and other platforms. This is because buying or sales conversion only happens sometimes, as mentioned at the beginning of this article. So your brand has to be visible across platforms to the targeting audience, influencing them to convert to your brand. Presently, retargeting tools are possible only on websites with more than 10,000 visitors daily, as Twitter feels the retargeting audience will be smaller for low-traffic websites. Similarly, Instagram has now partnered with retargeting companies to offer this facility.
4. Retargeting tools with email
When sending email campaigns, cookies are installed on each landing page. A cookie helps us know the anonymous reader who opened our mail. After that, it allows us to place display ads or text messages when he continues to search for topics or keywords related to our business.
5. Static vs. dynamic retargeting tools
Most often, the audiences in retargeting are served static ads, meaning all the visitors see the same ads. Product images, prices, and messages can vary in dynamic retargeting tools. This means there will be a set of creativeness in the retargeting tools to deliver according to a particular keyword, browsing behavior, or search criteria. Someone who comes to the company homepage can see ads that generate brand awareness, and those who go to product pages can see ads that promote products and offers.
6. Mobile retargeting tools
These days consumers may use a desktop at the office to search for data or information. Then while traveling, they may search-related details on their laptop and at home on their mobile. Some retargeting tools, such as Perfect Audience, use a tracking tag generated by Marin Identity Graph to make retargeting possible even if they switch back and forth between the three devices for browsing.
Banner ads for mobile are possible in 320 x 50 pixels, Interstitial Ads (320 x 480, 480 x 320). All ads must be in gif, jpg, or png with a file size of less than 70 kb. Animation is also possible.
The 3 Objectives of retargeting tools
The following are the objectives:
1. Increasing awareness
The CPC campaign and the description on the landing page or through your website have generated the first level of awareness. However, communicating with customers through different platforms heightened their initial awareness. Repeated campaigns help leave an imprint of your logo, trademarks, company information, products, and brands among the target audience. One disadvantage is that heavy targeting is done even on prospects who may be weak, having only visited the landing page once.
2. Sales conversions
The obvious result that a company investing in retargeting tools expects is sales conversion. When a visitor comes to a landing page and registers, their is limit for his access of the company and products. If you are in a competitive industry such as sports goods, innerwear, or kitchen appliances, further promotional messages through incentives- discounts, limited period offers can induce potential consumers to act. Sales conversion can also happen due to brand familiarity through multiple channels. Or retargeting strategy can also convert some consumers to apply for a free trial. Thus qualified leads can move one step closer down the buying funnel.
3. The increasing market size of the industry
A sustained retargeting strategy by major players in the vertical can help increase the industry’s market through increased awareness. This can work especially in new technologies such as dishwashers, home-cleaning robots, new clothing products, inverter A/c and so on. Even if enlarging the market size or turnover could mean the entry of more players, each player stands to gain from such expansion. It will also lead to innovation on existing products to retain market share.
How to implement retargeting tools?
Retargeting tools work better for companies whose websites have a daily visitor base of 10,000 and above. Landing pages should have a good design and text content that is appealing to visitors and prompts them to register or sign up. Pixels or cookies have to be installed on browsers used by visitors.
Considering the diversity of work (retargeting across platforms) and the intensity of it, companies need to use a targeting platform or tool to handle the task. Several retargeting tools are available, but the popular ones are Perfect Audience, Bizo, Adroll, and Retargeter. They are also possible through Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin.
The first step in the social media retargeting tools involves creating a list of the landing pages and other sources and exporting the file to Facebook’s custom audience manager.
On Facebook Manage Your Ads page, It is possible to segregate the audiences based on email, phone, or user ids. Adopt appropriate naming conventions so it is easy to find them later and track the results.
In the Create Ad section, it is possible to define the objective of retargeting strategy campaigns such as more website visits to the website, or sales conversions. The retargeting tools URL should have a UTM tracking code and a few words of text relevant to the campaign.
The ideal size of an FB Ad should be 1200 x 628 pixels, and text matter should not occupy more than 20% of the ad. It is possible to check it using an FB tool itself. It is possible to describe your ad with a limit of 200 characters.
The main advantage of FB ads is that it is easier to create than banner ads, and sidebar impression rates are up to 60% lower than CPM (Cost per Impression) promotions on search engines.
To make Instagram retargeting work, Install Facebook Pixel on your website using the FB Power Editor to make. For Instagram Retargeting, a custom audience has to be created using the Facebook Pixel tab. One criterion could be to target people who have visited the site in the last 15 days. Then the creative for Instagram can be created using the Ad Set.
According to reports, there is going to be more integration of Facebook and Instagram ads in the coming years. Mercedes was the first to use it in 2014 to launch the GLA model. An FB campaign was followed up by Instagram’s visual branding. This helped the company to drive 54% more visitors to the Mercedes website. Further, follow-up with a direct response ad resulted in a 580% growth in site visits. Instagram innovates with call-to-action buttons such as Sign Up, Register, buy now, etc.
Conclusion
The retargeting strategy is a recent phenomenon in digital marketing and still undergoing a lot of changes. Experts warn that retargeting strategy has limitations and may only help few visitors back to your website despite some successes reported. According to Retargeter, companies should adhere to some principles while retargeting. Overexposure can backfire if there are many target visitors. This can result in banner blindness. Negative feelings generated by frequent exposure can harm the brand.
Instead, there should be a cap on the frequency of ads the tagged or cookies visitor will be exposed to. The second major problem associated with retargeting strategy is bombarding an existing customer with more ads that could annoy them. Avoid this problem by implementing a burn code in retargeting. So that converted customers will not see further promotional material. Display ads only for products not bought by them or on the new launch of products by the company.
It is important to set the goals for the retargeting strategy and have budgets allocated at the outset. Some companies have reported a lesser click rate on retargeting compared to CPC on Google. The click ratio alone doesn’t matter if the goal of retargeting is only increasing the brand awarness. It is better to work with a single tool or service provider for retargeting, as working with multiple teams could result in each of the biddings for the same banners or slots on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. This will also drive up campaign costs. Every few months creatives should change as running the same ones for months could lead to decrease in clicks ratio. Just as in print ads, sufficient effort and resources should be devoted to having good creativity for banners as it is more suited for brand awareness.
The retargeting strategy should be specific as the visitors already are aware of the company and the product rather than generic. Websites and social media have low, medium, and high traffic seasons and an appropriate calendar for retargeting just as preparing an editorial calendar will help in a better return on investment (ROI).
Recommended Articles
This article is a guide to retargeting tools. It limitless to serving visitors to the site with banner ads but it can also happen through social media-Twitter, Pinterest platforms. These are the following external link related to retargeting tools.
