Google Ad Remarketing – Stalking Your Customers Around The Web

Have you ever wondered why, sometimes when you browse a product on a website, the very site you abandoned suddenly starts targeting you with adverts via YouTube, Facebook and other platforms you visit?

This is called “remarketing” and, if you own an online business, could be the answer to reducing cart abandonment and infiltrating the minds of potential customers.

How Does Google Remarketing Work?

Google Display Network’s “remarketing” program lets you create ad campaigns based on consumer/clickstream behaviour from your site. Basically you can target all visitors with generic or customized display ads based on the products/pages previously viewed at your site. The display network relies on “cookied browsers”, and whilst it is thought that approximately 30% of users clear cookies on a daily basis, there will still be a window for remarketing within the browsing session across the Google Display Network.

How Effective Is Google Remarketing?

Just how effective remarketing is, is difficult to gage. Personally I have found the perpetual marketing to be quite annoying. It feels a little too invasive at times, like you are being followed. But, that said, if I were shopping for a birthday or Christmas present, these adverts would serve as a positive reminder not to forget that I still needed to make the purchase. Remarketing is therefor a great memory jogger, a constant gentle push in the right direction.

Planting Seeds

A large element of success is about persistence, and many online businesses are using the “remarketing” model, which suggests many are finding it profitable. Often, however, success is difficult to measure, both in on and off line business. And one positive, yet immeasurable aspect of the remarketing model is its ability to infiltrate the sub conscious. For example, if I visit a fitness site to view some shoes that can make me lose weight, and I am then subsequently shown frequent adverts featuring the shoes, when I do want to lose weight, or know someone that is having trouble losing weight, the first thing that will spring to mind will be that shoes. This I refer to as “planting seeds”

It would be great to hear from anyone who had solid experience with the Google Remarketing model. Has it worked for your business? What are your click-through and conversion rates like?