Remarketing, also sometimes called retargeting, is a form of marketing that involves addressing the same individual more than once – potentially many times in a row. More specifically, it involves targeting people who have already shown an interest in a specific product or service that is being offered.

This is achieved through the use of cookies. These are small files that are saved on a user’s computer through their browser when they visit a website. It’s thanks to cookies that you’re able to stay logged in on Facebook and other sites.

But cookies can also tell a website that you’ve been on a specific page or site. That in turn means that the site can make some assumptions about you. Thus, if you’ve spent a lot of time looking at holiday houses lately, then it might show you ads for holidays in that region.

The Limitations

But while remarketing has some clear and obvious advantages, it also has drawbacks. One is GDPR. GDPR is a new policy implemented by the European Union that affects the way we collect and use data collected about customers and visitors. 

This means that if you’re a marketer, you now need to let your visitors know that you’ll be collecting their data to use in advertising. This simply means asking the user to consent to your use of their data through the form of a pop-up or similar. But it is a limitation as it of course impacts on your relationship with that customer.

Mistakes

Pexels Anna Tarazevich

While the idea of remarketing is to reach people who have been considering buying from you – simply to push them over that edge and help them make the ‘right decision’, it’s worth noting that it doesn’t always go down that way.

Sometimes, your marketing will fall on deaf ears by targeting people who have already bought your product and don’t need it twice.

Sometimes it will target people who were shopping for friends for Christmas – meaning that they actually have no interest in the product themselves.

Finally, you might be remarketing to people who have shown already that they aren’t interested in the product by leaving! 

The good news is that most of these issues won’t cost you money – as you only pay for PPC ads if someone actually clicks on them. The other good news, is that you can mitigate these issues by using smarter and more specific cookies and events. Just be sure to keep these issues in mind when designing your campaign.