Retargeting Guide for Local Service Businesses to Re-engage Potential Customers

The marketing world is constantly evolving and adapting to best cater to consumers’ ever-changing needs and preferences. Unfortunately, it can be an incredibly challenging balance between helping potential customers to your business, building trust, and not annoying your audience.

This is where the concept of retargeting becomes important for marketing teams. Retargeting ads focus on how to best re-engage leads, which helps provide a more effective marketing experience, generate further brand awareness, drive conversions, and allow you to ensure you provide solutions for your customers — not annoyances.

This article will explore the marketing practice of retargeting and detail how you can implement strategies to re-engage your website visitors and other leads.

Understanding the Basics of Retargeting

Retargeting is a form of online advertising that reaches people based on their previous internet actions. In other words, retargeting allows you to reach people already part of a certain database (such as an email list or customer base for your business) or individuals who have visited a website before.

There are two primary methods of retargeting: pixel-based and list-based. In pixel-based retargeting, a small piece of code is placed on a viewer’s browser when they visit your website that notifies retargeting platforms to display certain advertisements (based on what they visited on your page) when the viewer begins surfing the web. 

On the other hand, list-based retargeting utilizes the contact information you have stored in your database from leads and customers to re-engage your audience. This type of retargeting allows you to customize your ads as you select which leads go into which retargeting lists. 

When it comes to utilizing retargeting for your business, you first need to realize where this practice fits into the buyer journey. The customer journey can be divided into awareness, consideration, and decision. In the “awareness” stage, the customer is experiencing a problem. Viewers who visit your website at this stage are good leads to retarget later in their journey. When the customer begins looking for a solution, they enter the “consideration” stage. You want to position your company as a potential solution at this stage. Finally, the customer reaches the “decision” stage. This is where you want to explain to the customer why your solution is the best option and how it can fix their problem.

So, where does retargeting fit into this journey? As mentioned above, you can build your lists of potential customers to retarget from those visiting your website during the journey’s first stage. Retargeting these individuals is to help them progress further down the sales funnel — in other words, remind them that you are a good contender for the solutions they are looking for and encourage them to complete their journey by selecting your solutions.

Retargeting Website Visitors

One of the most important parts of creating retargeting ads is to know your audiences and properly segment them. You do not want to include customers who have previously purchased from you in the same group as individuals who have only clicked on your website once or seen 3 seconds of a video advertisement on their social media dashboard. Different groups of leads require different types of retargeting advertisements.

Luckily, social media ad retargeting has come a long way, and many social media platforms and apps offer tools to help you create these groups. For example, Facebook and Instagram allow you to select a custom audience based on a contact list, website visitors, or app users. Then, based on your selected group, you can offer the most fitting and compelling retargeting ads. This may include offering ads that discuss recent improvements, new products, or even price changes when directed at existing customers. On the other hand, you may include more information about your business, products, and services for groups that may have just learned about your business.

Retargeting Video Ad Viewers

Video ads are becoming more popular since they allow viewers to see how a product or service works and better understand the business that is providing the solution. While videos can be more memorable and influential than traditional advertisements or blog posts, they may not move a potential viewer to buy your product after just one view. 

This is where retargeting viewers of these ads comes into the picture. Retargeting allows you to remind the viewer of your product when they think of a solution for their problem. As video ads are much more common today, you may have these types of ads not only on your website but also on social media (such as YouTube, Facebook, or Instagram). Each platform works slightly differently, but typically you can create a custom audience based on who views the ad. 

When retargeting from video ads, be sure to be clear and engaging, as this will remind the viewer of what your product is without boring them. You do not want to annoy or overwhelm your viewers, but you do want to encourage them to take further action in the buyer’s journey. 

Creating an Ad Sequence for Retargeting Campaigns

As a customer learns more, they progress through the stages of their journey. Because of this, it typically takes a few advertisements before a potential customer decides to buy something. This is exactly why having a consistent and engaging sequence of ads can be so beneficial. A good sequence of ads will tell a consistent story of the product or service. It may offer additional benefits or offers as the lead progresses through the sequence, which can encourage them to complete the purchase.

An example of a good ad sequence may begin with a general introduction to the product before progressing to why that particular product is the best solution and ending with an incentive — such as a limited-time offer or discount. Retargeting ads are a great way to help your leads progress through this sequence, as they allow you to re-engage leads that you may have lost otherwise.

Setting up Custom Audiences and Lookalike Audiences

A custom audience is a way to help you target a specific segment or selection of your broader audience. This allows you to tailor advertisement experiences to best fit these audiences, boosting your chances of re-engaging the lead effectively. Many social media platforms have different ways of creating these custom audiences. For example, LinkedIn allows you to pick audiences based on the pages they visit on your site, and Snapchat allows you to target users that have previously interacted with your ads on the app.

One of the most popular custom audience-targeting solutions is Facebook’s Lookalike Audiences option. This advertising system allows you to reach new people like your current customers. In short, this helps you reach new audiences likely to interact with your business.

Measuring Retargeting Campaign Success

Continual optimization and improvement are crucial for ensuring the continued success of your retargeting campaigns. Like any other type of marketing, knowing what to measure and how to analyze your performance is critical. You may include key performance indicators (KPIs) like conversions, cost per acquisition, and click-through rates for retargeting ads. Using these metrics, you can monitor the performance of retargeting ads and use this data to optimize these campaigns. 

When optimizing your ads, it is typically best to change things slowly and individually, as this allows you to collect the most accurate data. For example, rather than completely overhauling your ads, try changing just one aspect of them, re-analyzing their performance, and then changing another thing.