Ecommerce retargeting is a powerful but often overlooked strategy for e-merchants, big and small. If you're not familiar with it, we're talking about showing ads to people who have visited your site but don't convert on the initial visit. It will improve your conversion rates by targeting only those who've seen your product but didn't buy it.
Overall, the effect is efficient marketing that is more cost-efficient and increases return on investment (ROI). In this post, we will discuss where to set up retargeting ads on the major eCommerce platforms, a variety of examples and give you my top tips for getting the highest ROI.
Table Of Contents
- What is eCommerce Retargeting?
- Why Should You Use eCommerce Retargeting?
- The benefits of eCommerce retargeting
- When should you use eCommerce retargeting?
- How To Get Started With eCommerce Retargeting
- Types of eCommerce Retargeting Strategies
- Creating an eCommerce Retargeting Strategy
- 6 Common eCommerce Retargeting Mistakes and How to avoid them
What is eCommerce Retargeting?
Retargeting is a form of online advertising that allows you to follow up with people who have previously visited your website. Often, these people will be potential customers who didn't make it through the checkout process before leaving.
You can display ads on other websites and social media sites by using the right platform. Here, potential customers will see them and hopefully return to complete their purchase.
Retargeting is also often used as an email marketing strategy. For example, someone adds an item to their cart but then doesn't complete their order. You can use retargeting here by sending them emails designed to get them back on track with completing their order.
The main goal of Retargeting campaigns is to increase conversions because they allow you to target potential customers at different stages of the sales funnel. You can target people who have just visited your site or those about to purchase. Either way, retargeting ads will help you re-capture new leads while providing them with reasons to buy your products or services.
Why Should You Use eCommerce Retargeting?
Retargeting is a great way to turn more of your website's visitors into buyers, and it's also one of the most effective ways to increase your online sales.
In fact, according to a study by Dynamic yield, 71.7% of consumers who shop for products online abandon their carts before completing an order. If you can convince these shoppers to complete their purchases, you'll significantly boost your profits and customer satisfaction.
Here are some other reasons why you should consider using retargeting for ecommerce:
- It's easy to set up and manage.
- It involves less work than other advertising types like search engine marketing (SEM.
- It helps you to get more sales, especially if you're selling a high-priced product or service.
- It gives you more control over where your ads appear on Facebook and Instagram.
- You can see which products and pages of your website are most popular with potential customers.
The benefits of eCommerce retargeting
Retargeting can help you achieve a variety of eCommerce goals, including:
1- Increase conversions
More than 70% of shoppers abandon their carts, so retargeting gives you one last chance to convert them into customers. You can use this tactic on your homepage or product pages and in the shopping cart.
2- Reduce cart abandonment
Cart abandonment is a common issue for every eCommerce retailer. Most eCommerce marketers have found that retargeting is an effective way to lower it dramatically while also driving sales from existing customers.
3- Boost traffic and sales
The more people see your ads, the better the chance of buying your product. Retargeting marketing to reach potential buyers increases your brand awareness and drives traffic back to your website.
4- Reduce cost per acquisition (CPA)
Retargeting allows you to target specific users based on their past behavior, like visiting a specific page or adding an item to a car. The targeted behavior helps reduce wasted impressions by showing ads only to those most likely to convert into customers. You will eventually have lower costs per acquisition (CPA) for your products.
5- Increase average order value
You can increase the average order value by promoting high-margin items with large profit margins or cross-selling complementary products to existing customers.
6- Increase sales
You can increase revenue by selling products at different price points or offering discounts on products abandoned in a customer's cart for a long time.
When should you use eCommerce retargeting?
You should use retargeting for e-commerce if you experience one or more of the following in your eCommerce business:
- You have a product that sells well. Suppose a product has a high conversion rate and average order value. In that case, it's worth re-engaging with users who've already shown interest in it.
- You have a less popular product that could be selling better than it does now. Retargeting is an effective way to reach out to potential customers for products that aren't selling as well as they could be.
- Your visitors are abandoning their carts. It's common for visitors to put items in their cart and then leave without completing their purchase. The best way to recover these lost sales is through retargeting.
- You want to increase repeat purchases from existing customers by showing them similar products to ones they've already bought from you before (i.e., cross-selling).
- You have seasonal demand for certain products, but not all year round. Suppose there are certain times of the year when particular products sell more than others (for example, garden tools). In that case, promoting these during those periods may also help boost sales during off-peak times.
The biggest reason for using retargeting is to increase sales, so let's look at how you can do that with dynamic remarketing.
How To Get Started With eCommerce Retargeting
The first step for retargeting marketing is determining what products and services you want to advertise. You can achieve this through various methods, including looking at your current customer base, surveying potential customers, and market research.
Once you've identified the products and services you want to advertise, it's time to develop your retargeting strategy. The best way is to create a plan that outlines all of the steps in your retargeting campaign. Start with a list of target audiences and end with goals that can be measured and evaluated.
Types of eCommerce Retargeting Strategies
There are two common types of eCommerce retargeting strategies:
1- Audience-based retargeting
This strategy uses an audience that has already visited your website via PPC ads or organic search. If you are using Google AdWords for PPC, you can create a remarketing list from those users who have visited your site and then display ads to them using this list. The main advantage of audience-based eCommerce retargeting is that it is inexpensive compared to other forms. Retargeting doesn't require you to purchase new advertising inventory.
2- Cart abandonment retargeting
This strategy involves displaying ads to users who have added items to their shopping cart but then left without purchasing anything. The ads appear within 24 hours after adding them to their carts. The main advantage of this form of retargeting for eCommerce is that it aims at people who are very close to converting into customers and are likely to buy if given another chance.
How To Create an eCommerce Retargeting Strategy?
Here are what to do when formulating your eCommerce retargeting strategy:
1- Determine your audiences
First, determine which segments of your audience you want to target. You may want to focus on those who haven't made a purchase yet. Or those who have already purchased something from you before are now looking for additional products.
For example, if they bought a blue shirt and a black shirt in the same order, list both of those products as conversion goals in AdWords. When someone clicks on one of those ads, they see similar products they are yet to purchase.
To sell more products or services to people who have visited your website but made no purchase, create a particular audience based on the pages they've viewed.
2- Identify your best-performing traffic sources
It helps to know which audience segments are most valuable and what kind of messaging you should use. You can use Google Analytics or another platform to identify which channels send you the most qualified traffic.
Start by identifying all traffic sources that bring in the most sales or leads for your business. Then, segment them into categories based on the kind of customers they are:
- brand new visitors versus returning customers
- high spenders versus low spenders, etc.
You can create a list of keywords and phrases that these visitors use to find your site. Then, create ads that use these terms in their copy and descriptions to show up when people search for them on Google or other platforms like Bing or Facebook.
3- Build custom audiences with specific interests
Once you know who is most likely to buy from you, it's time to build custom audiences based on their interests. If they were shopping for shoes last time on your site, then offer them shoes this time around by adding "shoes" to their list of interests (or any other relevant products).
You can increase conversion rates by upselling products already relevant to them. Rather than just hoping that they buy something else from your store later down the road.
You can also use custom audiences to boost revenue by targeting customers who have viewed specific products but haven't purchased them yet. For instance, if someone views a pair of shoes but doesn't add them to their cart, you could create an audience of people who have viewed those shoes in the past month and send out a unique discount code.
4- Consider retargeting lookalike audiences
Lookalike audiences are people who share similar traits with an existing group of customers. They aren't exact replicas of those customers since they will be some differences between them. However, they share enough commonalities to be considered similar enough for marketing purposes.
The easiest way to create a lookalike audience is by using an application like Facebook's Custom Audiences or Google AdWords' Customer Match tool. These applications allow you to upload lists of email addresses or phone numbers and then create an audience that matches those criteria.
It's important not to get overly specific with this process, though, as doing so can lead to low engagement rates from the new audience members and poor performance overall. Instead, try creating more significant segments and then narrowing them down based on results over time until you find the sweet spot where performance meets cost-effectiveness.
6 Common eCommerce Retargeting Mistakes and How to avoid them
How you structure your eCommerce retargeting campaign can hugely impact how much revenue it brings in. If you're not careful, your efforts can quickly go to waste.
Here are some of the most common retargeting for e-commerce mistakes and how to avoid them for maximum ROI:
1- Focusing too much on shopping carts
Retargeting is not just about getting people who abandoned their carts back to your site. The people who abandon their carts often do so because they are not ready to make a purchase. They may need more information, or they may be looking for reviews from other customers before deciding. You can use retargeting ads to reach out to these people by promoting your blog posts and landing pages that help them make informed buying decisions.
2- Lack of personalization
Retargeting is about showing the right message to the right person at the right time. You can do this by adding personalization to your retargeting ads and emails. It can be as simple as including their name or email address in an email or asking them a question based on their previous browsing history.
3- Using generic images
Generic images don't resonate with customers and don't capture their attention as quickly as custom images do. A picture is worth a thousand words, but if that picture isn't related to your product or service, then it could be worth nothing at all. Make sure your retargeting ads have unique images that speak directly to your target audience and are relevant to your product or service offering.
4- Not testing different audiences
Some people will respond better to your ads than others, so it's essential to test different audiences to see which one performs best for you. Doing this will help you determine which products or services appeal to specific demographics. You can use the information to tweak your messaging accordingly.
5- Not using cookie-based retargeting
Cookie-based retargeting is one of the most efficient ways to advertise online. It allows you to follow users around the web and show them relevant ads based on their previous behavior. The best thing about this type of advertising is that it helps marketers build trust with potential customers by showing relevant and useful ads.
6- Not optimizing your landing page for conversion
One of the biggest mistakes eCommerce sites make is not optimizing their landing pages for conversion. The goal of a retargeting ad campaign is to get visitors back into the sales funnel by offering them a discount or other incentive, so they convert at a later time. If those visitors land on a page with no information about what they are buying or how much it costs, they will likely leave without inquiring. Make sure your product pages include all relevant information (including pricing). It should be easy to buy a product immediately on the landing page without going back through multiple information pages.
Automate Cross Channel Ecommerce Retargeting
To sum up, e-commerce retargeting is a great way to keep your brand in front of your customers and convert more sales. It can be a little tricky to set up at first. but the right automation tool like Converted.in will make e-commerce retargeting an effortless experience. Convertedin uses customer insight to distribute personalized ads across channels. Once you've set up cross-channel retargeting marketing data once using Convertedin, it automatically does so across other marketing channels. The more channels you can set up retargeting in, the more return you'll see from your efforts.
