Before exploring retargeting best practices, let’s quickly recap what’s involved in this highly effective, yet often misapplied inbound marketing strategy. 

Retargeting — which is sometimes referred to as remarketing — automatically pushes targeted ads to specific prospects based on their previous interactions or behaviors, such as browsing web pages, watching videos, downloading ebooks, and so on. The purpose is to re-engage these prospects and pull them back into the customer journey. (For a more detailed look at retargeting, read our blog post.) 

However, not every business is reaping the rewards of retargeting. In fact, many aren’t seeing much of a traffic surge at all, and are pulling the plug on campaigns to cut their losses. Typically, this is not because retargeting was/is a mistake. It’s a viable and effective strategy that delivers ROI – but only if it’s developed and managed correctly, and integrates all of these 5 retargeting best practices:

#1: Segment Audiences 

As noted above, leads interact with businesses in different ways. Some browse certain web pages, others watch videos, download ebooks, check out infographics, and so on. Retargeting campaigns should exploit this data and push relevant ads out to different audience segments. For example, leads who watch a video featuring a product demonstration may get an ad that points them to another video in the series. 

#2: Write Effective Ads

This advice may seem like a no brainer – and therefore redundant for a list of retargeting best practices. However, on a daily basis our team comes across retargeting ads that aren’t compelling or creative. Some of the worst ones aren’t even comprehensible.

And so, it goes without saying (but we’re saying it anyway) that ads must be effective. This doesn’t mean that they should come across like over-the-top infomercials. However, they should be engaging and relevant, and of course, comprehensible and wrapped-up with a clear call-to-action (CTA). 

#3: Use Landing Pages

Unless there’s a compelling reason to send leads to a home page or other existing page on a website, it’s always a good idea to create landing pages that seamlessly align with ad copy. This creates a tighter “omni-channel” experience, and helps leads hit the ground running when they re-engage. 

#4: Set Retargeting Limits & Use Burn Pixels

There’s a difference between reminding leads and nagging them. Businesses avoid crossing this line by establishing retargeting limits, so that specific leads won’t be overloaded with ads (the limit can be set daily, weekly, monthly, etc.). 

Along the same lines, burn pixels are little snippets of code that un-tag leads who have made a purchase and therefore become customers. As such, they won’t keep seeing retargeted ads – and therefore won’t get annoyed that they’re being reminded to buy something they’ve already bought!   

#5: Test & Optimize 

Businesses should definitely run split (A/B) tests to see which ads and landing pages are getting the most traction. This intelligence can also be used to optimize current and future campaigns. For example, it may come to light that an ad pushed out to a certain segment is more effective early in the morning on weekdays than at any other time of the week. A business can then put the ad on higher rotation during that time to boost engagement. 

Learn More

As mentioned, retargeting can be a highly effective inbound marketing strategy, and we have achieved impressive results for our customers in a variety of industries, sectors and marketplaces (both b2b and b2c). However, it’s not a template-driven or “set-it-and-forget-it” approach. It needs to be customized and strategic, and integrate all of the retargeting best practices noted above. 

To learn more, contact the Leap Clixx team today and schedule your free consultation. When it comes to retargeting best practices, we know what gets results!

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