Multiple Stages of Remarketing Explained

Remarketing, otherwise known as retargeting is a method of interest based advertising that is used by Google. Basically, you tag a visitor that comes to your website with a cookie and then that cookie is used by Google to serve your display ads to that user as they browse elsewhere on the web.

Multiple stages of remarketing is the process of displaying new offers, different messaging and even changing the frequency at which your ad is displayed. This tactic is based on the number of days since a visitor was last tagged on your site and is particularly helpful for businesses that have services or products with a long sales cycle. The longest time frame that a cookie can last for is 540 days, however, businesses can customize their cycle durations, which is recommended as you do not want to continue to display ads to users that are not interested.

Here are the 2 steps for how to create a campaign timeline for your remarketing:

The goal is to get the right message to the right users at the right time. To accomplish this, your sales cycle needs to be separated into stages and you need to determine what message and frequency you want to reach the user for each stage in your sales process. In the initial awareness stages, you want to build brand recognition and trust. As the user moves towards making a decision, you want to remind them of what you have to offer and finally, you can provide your best discount or incentive to try and close the conversion.

#1 – Create the Stages

To create a multiple stage remarketing campaign, you need to set up a tag for each sales stage that you have identified and create a remarketing list. This is a simple process where you can select the audience that you want to target and specify the duration. Ad groups are then created for each stage with the previous stage listed as a negative audience to ensure that messages and audiences are not overlapping.

Once this has been completed, upload your display ads to your ad groups with the appropriate messaging and call to action,

#2 – Control the Impression Frequency

How often your ads are displayed is controlled by the bid per click which is established in each of your ad groups. You want to control and limit the number of impressions as you don’t want to frustrate users or look like you are stalking. Experiment with your impression frequency by clearing the cookies and tag your own computer so that you can see how often your ads are popping up online. If you do not see enough, you can increase your bid or if they are being displayed too much you can reduce it.

As an internet marketing company, we have seen great success with businesses using a multiple stage remarketing strategy. To learn more about how to get high volume traffic to your website and increase your conversion rate, click here to download our free PPC eBook.