The do's and don'ts of remarketing

Only 4% of all people end up making a purchase or an appointment immediately. But that doesn't necessarily mean that the remaining 96% are lost. They just need a reminder or a little push. Enter the power of remarketing: after their visit, people are reminded of your site with an ad, their curiosity is triggered, and the desire to take action is likewise. "Sounds simple, but setting up remarketing requires a lot of knowledge of strategy and technology", says Linda Galle.

Remarketing is a subject that holds few secrets for Linda Galle. With more than fifteen years of experience as a Marketing Director in various sectors, she knows better than anyone what remarketing entails. She also knows that it is not easy. In her current role as Managing Director of Duke & Grace, Linda notices that remarketing is still unknown territory for many marketers. A pity, because this form of advertising is one that yields a high Return On Investment if you do it right.

Do: strategy, strategy, strategy

The principle of remarketing is not difficult, just about every marketer agrees. "Even twenty years ago, remarketing was done without all the digital gadgets. If you were at a trade show, collected a hundred business cards and called all those people afterwards, that was also a form of remarketing. You have made a first contact and then you build upon it", Linda explains. "But today the rules of the game are, of course, completely different. In the digital world we live in, the possibilities are endless. You can remarket much more efficiently: determine your objective and target groups more precisely, be more relevant for the end user ... That way, you’ll definitely get better results."

But to achieve that, you have to start at the beginning: your business and marketing strategy. "It's crucial that you think about your strategy before you set up your remarketing", Linda says. She lists a few questions that you should answer in advance: "Which target group do you want to approach? What do you want to achieve? And by that, I mean: how many leads or how many appointment requests do you want to receive, or how many items do you want to sell? That objective must be well established, because otherwise you do not know who to aim your arrows at and you will therefore not get the desired return. And that would be a shame, because it is a very powerful tool."

According to Linda, 50% of the work is in determining that strategy. But another aspect that really needs to be in place before you launch your remarketing, is your website. "Your online platform is actually the backbone of the whole. This should not only work well technically, but also provide a good user experience for your customers. If a visitor cannot find his way around your site and does not immediately find what he is looking for, you will lose him."

Do: play with the magic of remarketing

Strategy? Check. Good website? Check. "Then it's a matter of installing some technical tools on your site to track the activity of your visitors - taking into account the GDPR guidelines, of course - and then you're all set", says Linda Galle. Time to unleash the magic of your remarketing on those 96% who didn't buy anything right away. "The advantage of focusing mainly on this group and less on attracting new customers is that you no longer have to convince them. It costs you a lot of time and money to create awareness and make people enthusiastic about your brand. So, it's easier to start from the group that has already discovered your brand; they are already further along in the customer journey and have already thought about what you have to offer. The step to a purchase or an appointment is therefore smaller."

Using remarketing on these past visitors is interesting for just about every company in every sector, Linda believes. "Of course, you have to have a minimum of traffic on your website. But whether you are in B2B or B2C, large or small, a government institution, clothing brand or health insurance fund: it's relevant for everyone who clearly knows what their goals are. You can bring out the big budgets, but you also get great results with small amounts. That's what makes remarketing so interesting: if your strategy and website are good, you can really achieve great results with it."

The setup is key, and everything that comes afterwards is "playing with the magic of remarketing", as Linda puts it. "The nice thing is that you can adjust quickly. You can test, see what the result is and adapt where necessary. Via a dashboard that keeps track of all data, you can easily see whether you are targeting the right group of people. Or maybe you should switch to another channel? You can tweak it immediately and see the result of that action shortly afterwards", Linda explains enthusiastically.

Do: follow up and benchmark

Linda advises companies to follow up on their remarketing once or twice a week in order to be able to react as quickly as possible. But how do you actually know if your results are good? "Being able to benchmark is useful", Linda says. "But of course, as a company, you don't just have an overview of the results of others. At Duke & Grace, we have already assisted so many companies that we can - of course without naming them - compare very quickly whether the result of one company is worse, better or as good as that of a similar company."

Every company can set up its own remarketing process, but Linda still recommends leaning on a specialized partner. "Not only for benchmarking, but also simply because it requires some specific knowledge", it sounds. "In my career as a Marketing Director, I have often done the set up in-house and the learning phase takes a lot of time and effort."

Don't: bomb surfers

Of course, our goal is to let our clients benefit from remarketing. But not at the expense of the end customer. "We are not the kind of agency that is going to bombard people with advertisements. Yes, we want our own customers to get the most out of their remarketing. But it must also remain valuable for the website visitor. He should not feel like he is being spammed with things that are useless to him. We really want to deal with this in a sustainable way and give the end customer a good user experience by only showing advertisements of what is relevant to that person. In the long run, by doing so, results will be more sustainable and thus our customer will profit from that too."

It must remain pleasant for the surfer. Something that is perhaps too often forgotten in the endless possibilities of the online world. But, Linda emphasizes: "You really shouldn't be tempted to advertise at random. The tools to work in a targeted way are there, it can only benefit your brand to use them. And if you approach your remarketing properly, that is not only nice for you, but also for the end user. And that is exactly what we want to achieve at Duke & Grace."

Let people rediscover what they love about your brand

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