Marketing is utterly pointless if you don’t get your message in front of people who will actually respond to your message. You could throw thousands of advertising dollars down the drain if you don’t get your audience targeting right.

Gulp.

But guess what? There’s a solution for you! It’s called retargeting (or remarketing, if you’re using Google Ads), and it’s pretty awesome.

Retargeting ads show your ads to people who either have already visited your website or have completed similar actions (like viewing your inventory) that make them “likely to complete a valuable action” (like making a purchase).

Retargeting is one of the easiest tools in your marketing toolbox. Not only can it greatly increase your conversions, but it can also help you meet valuable key performance indicators (KPIs).

Let’s Talk (Re)Targeting

Before I can teach you how to retarget, we need to make it 1,000,000% clear what a retargeting group is and why you should chase these people down.

Also, I should note that “retargeting” is typically a Facebook ads term, and “remarketing” is typically a Google Ads term — but for the sake of consistency, I’m going to usually refer to this magical group of people as a “retargeting” group.

Let’s begin.

Retargeting is defined by Google as an ad targeted to a “group of users you want to re-engage because of their likelihood to convert.”

Think of these users as the most “bottom-of-the-funnel” group you can get your hands on. Based on their actions on the web so far (that have been tracked using cookies or the Facebook pixel), they’re showing signs that they’re close to closing the deal, either by making a purchase or by performing another valuable action, like signing up for a webinar.

These People Sound Like Gold!

They really, really are. One of our “secret sauces” in the kitchen of Facebook ads is to utilize dynamic retargeting Facebook ads, which essentially show the most relevant product to someone who’s already spent time on your site, looking at that product or something like it.

Think about all the times you’ve been shopping online, and then two days later, you see an ad with that same “Amazon’s Choice” that you drooled over for two solid minutes.

That’s what I’m talking about!

This type of ad is known as a dynamic retargeting ad in the Facebook world and a remarketing ad in the Google Ads world.

Don’t miss out, folks.

You can do all the “branding” ads you want. You can literally yell from street corners about how awesome your products are.

But if you don’t serve your ads to folks who are already primed to buy, guess what? They’re. Not. Going. To. Buy. And you just made yourself look like a crazy dude on a street corner.

Stop wasting your ad budget. Enlist the help of retargeting and remarketing to get the ball really rolling.

How to Set Up Retargeting and Remarketing Ads

These types of ads are so much easier to just do rather than describe, because they’re really just a few clicks in the right places.

To make sure I don’t confuse you too much (mostly because Facebook and Google tend to update things and move the buttons around), I’m going to give you a few best practices to keep in mind and then send you on your way!

What You Need to Know About Making a Retargeting Ad on Facebook

A couple of things to note if you decide to create a retargeting ad on Facebook:

• You must have set up a Facebook catalog to include your inventory.
• At the campaign level, you have to set the objective as “Catalog Sales.”
• At the ad set level, you’ll need to pick a product set. Then, when you scroll down, you’ll notice you can target people based on whether or not they’ve visited your site.
  • We typically target people who’ve been on the website somewhere between the last 14 and 21 days — but that’s something that’s worth testing to make sure you’re doing whatever works best for your audience!

Why Dealers Need Facebook Retargeting (and 4 Ways to Use It)

What You Need to Know About Making a Remarketing Ad on Google

Google likes to give you options, most likely because the more options you have, the more you’ll use its service, right? So you can either:

• Set up an audience list based off lists you’ve created in Google Analytics.
• Import a list of contacts and then re-engage with them through remarketing.
• Target people who put an item in their shopping cart but then abandoned that cart.

With so many options, how do you know what’s right for you? Well, you just need to stay focused on your KPIs and remember that you can run a variety of Google remarketing efforts at the same time.

Because of the variety of remarketing tactics you can use to accomplish your goals, I’m going to send you straight to the Google to get your questions answered. Here are a few other notes about the Google that are worth considering before you jump down the rabbit hole of remarketing:

• Be specific about your audience criteria. You have to indicate this when you set up the campaign. The more specific you can get, the better your results will be.
• Pair your Google Ads with your customer relationship management (CRM) system and Google Analytics. You need to bring in Analytics to pull the website traffic that Google Ads needs in order to retarget your ads. Adding CRM information gives you the opportunity to target even more specifically through list uploads.
• However you choose to remarket, don’t be afraid to try out a few things to find whatever’s best for your KPIs and your audience.

I know, it’s a lot to absorb. But I promise, retargeting and remarketing ads are worth your time and attention.

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Make Retargeting & Remarketing Ads Work for You

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