Effective retargeting campaigns are a powerful way to re-engage potential customers who visit your website or social channels to drive conversions and decrease cart abandonment rates. 

By following key steps and best practices, businesses can create compelling, personalized ads that boost their sales and maximize ROI. 

And do you know the best part? Retargeting ads see higher CTRs and conversion rates than regular display ads, making these a cost-effective marketing tool. 

Key Takeaways 

• For businesses of all sizes, retargeting provides an opportunity to maximize visitor touchpoints. 
• When applied correctly, using audience segmentation, personalized content, and continuous optimization, retargeting campaigns can be one of the most effective ways to drive growth, retain customers and increase engagement. 
• What gets measured, gets improved – testing and learning is vital if you want to improve your campaign results. 

6 Steps to Create Effective Retargeting Campaigns

First things first, what is retargeting? Why is it crucial for recapturing potential customers and improving conversions?  

Retargeting is a game-changer, the Joker in your pack of marketing cards, offering you a way to win potential customers who have shown interest in your brand. Want to know more about how to create a marketing campaign that makes you stand out? Read this!  

Whether you’re running an e-commerce shop or offering a service, retargeting helps you stay top of mind. Here’s how you can set up a killer retargeting campaign in 6 easy steps.

1. Understand the Fundamentals of Retargeting

Setting up ads shown across different platforms and retargeting helps remind these potential customers of how awesome you are and why they should come back and complete the desired action. If you need some more convincing about how useful retargeting is, here is why: 

• Increases conversions: People are busy, but by showing them a well-timed and well-placed advert, you could increase online sales by 20% (on average). 
• Boosts engagement: Don’t let them get away! Retargeting helps keep your business top-of-mind as visitors browse elsewhere, increasing the chances they’ll come back to you! 
• Reduces cart abandonment: E-commerce sites often see improved sales by reminding users about items left in their carts. Unless we are desperate, only about 2% of website visitors convert on their first website visit. Retargeting helps bring back your customers, giving you a second chance to turn browsers into buyers. 

2. Choose Your Retargeting Platforms

Your next step is choosing where to run your retargeting ads. Some popular platforms include:

• Google Ads: Reach users through the Google Display Network and YouTube. The Google Display Network reaches over 90% of global internet users, making it one of the largest platforms for retargeting campaigns. 
• Facebook and Instagram Ads: Target users on social media platforms where they spend most of their time. Tough Mudder, an extreme obstacle race company, used Facebook retargeting ads to reconnect with users who abandoned their ticket purchases. By retargeting, they reduced their cart abandonment rate by 33% and saw a 5 times return on ad spend. 
• LinkedIn Ads: Great for B2B businesses targeting professionals.

Start by selecting platforms where your audience is most active. You can run ads across multiple platforms for broader coverage or focus on just one to maximize your ad budget.

3. Define Your Audience

Now that you’ve picked your platform, the key to an effective campaign is defining the right audience segments. Here are a few common audience types for retargeting:

• Website visitors: People who visited your site but didn’t complete an action. You can add tracking pixels to your whole website or specific pages, allowing you to retarget through display ads almost immediately. 
• Cart abandoners: Have you ever received a personalized email saying ,’Hey, look what you forget?’ – well, give this a go yourself! Remind your customers on what they are missing.  
• Content viewers: If you know a site visitor has read your blog or watched a video but didn’t sign up or buy, you know they like your content, so just remind them of why they shouldn’t miss out on more. 
• Past customers: Users who’ve made a purchase and might be open to upsells or repeat purchases. You could use list-based retargeting for these customers as this requires some level of contact information such as an email address. Don’t have an email list yet? Read more about how to build a huge email database. This is handy when creating highly-personalized ads such as including their name, or what they bought last time they shopped with you. 

4. Create Compelling Ad Content

The message matters! Your ad creative should resonate with your audience and reflect their specific stage in the customer journey. Make sure your ad visuals are eye-catching, concise, and include a clear call to action. For example:

• Abandoned cart ads: Show users the exact products they left behind, offering a small discount or free shipping.
• Product reminder ads: Remind users about the benefits of the product they viewed or show them positive reviews. People believe in people, not necessarily in businesses. The Honest Company used dynamic retargeting to show customers the exact products they had previously viewed. This resulted in a 36% higher conversion rate.
• Loyal customer ads: Offer repeat customers exclusive offers or new product announcements. Make your customers feel valued, and they will return the favor through loyalty. 

5. Launch and Optimize Your Campaign

Once everything is in place, launch your campaign and track its performance closely. Testing and learning is a crucial part of marketing – track what is working or not working to optimize your performance. Most platforms offer detailed analytics showing how your ads are doing in terms of clicks, conversions, and cost-per-click. 

• A/B testing: Test different ad creatives, messaging, and CTAs to see what resonates best.
• Frequency capping: Limit how often someone sees your ad to prevent ad fatigue.
• Adjust bids: Optimize your bids based on performance. If a particular audience is converting better, you can increase the bid for that group.

6. Strategies for Continuous Improvement

To keep your retargeting campaigns performing at their best, monitor metrics closely. Worried about what metrics to focus on? Check out this guide on the most relevant marketing stats and adopt these best practices:

• Refresh your ads: Swap out creatives every few weeks to keep your ads from going stale.
• Segment your audience: Narrow down your retargeting lists. For example, create separate ads for users who abandoned their cart versus those who only browsed.
• Optimize landing pages: Ensure your landing page aligns with your ad’s message for a seamless experience.
• Use exclusions: Exclude people who have already converted so you don’t waste your budget on people who don’t need further retargeting.

The moral of the story is, whether you’re a small startup or an established company, retargeting can be a highly effective way to drive growth and boost conversions. It is a powerful tool for businesses of all sizes, helping you maximize every potential lead and conversion opportunity. 

If you want more business support, stay updated in a fast-evolving business world with weekly live coaching and Q&A with expert founders and real-human support from the Foundr business team for just $1 a month. 

You will also gain access to over 1000+ lessons that will accelerate your business growth and development! Get access here. 

FAQs: 

What is the difference between retargeting and remarketing?

The main difference between retargeting and remarketing is the audience they target and the channels they use: 

• Retargeting – Targets users using paid ads to reach new customers who have interacted with your website or social media but haven’t yet converted. 
• Remarketing – Targets users through direct channels like email or SMS who have already interacted with your brand, such as making a purchase or downloading an app. 

What platforms can I use for retargeting?

There are so many! Shop around and discover the best platforms for your business as each one will have its own pros, cons and pricing. 

How much does retargeting cost?

This will vary depending on the business. However, the average cost for remarketing on Google is $0.66 to $1.23 per click. In comparison, the average cost-per-click (CPC) for search and display ads on Google ranges from $1 to $2 for search ads and less than $1 for display ads.

How do I improve retargeting ads?

Personalization is one of the biggest wins you could implement. Personalized messaging is proven to boost conversations. You could also implement frequency capping – set a limit on how often users see your ads to avoid ad fatigue.