3 Tips for Dominating Retargeting Advertising

In the world of marketing, retargeting campaigns turn “window shoppers” into real paying customers or, in the franchising world, into quality leads. 

While franchisors would love to live in a world in which a majority of online visitors became leads, the truth is that the buying process is extremely complicated. It's possible that the reason prospects didn't purchase was because they weren't interested in the offer. However, it's also entirely likely that they just got interrupted or distracted. Retargeting helps you win back these visitors — turning them into leads.

The greatest benefit of retargeting is that franchisors can market to exactly whom they want to. Brands know they’re a potential lead because they’ve visited the website already. These people are considered “warm prospects.” Without retargeting campaigns, only a small percent of callers and website visitors actually convert into qualified leads or tangible business.

Here are five tips for acing retargeting advertising. 

Segment the Audience

Poor segmentation is one of the main culprits of low performance in a retargeting campaign. Once segmented, brands can target each group of visitors with creative content that’s most relevant to them. Franchisors can set up basic URL segments with audiences defined by specific pages they visited while on their website. 

For example, those who have only visited the brand’s consumer homepage are in the upper-funnel, while those who specifically looked at the franchise development page would be considered mid-funnel. For those mid-funnel prospects, users can be retargeted with a general ad for that opportunity. For very high intent users, or “ghost leads” who may have requested more information and then fallen off, retargeting ads can re-engage them through enticing offers.

Leverage Email

Email can be easily incorporated as an inventory source for retargeting — and the best part is that the inventory is free. Sending an email as part of a retargeting campaign doesn’t require bidding on ad exchange for a placement. It does have some limitations; for example, brands shouldn’t send out more than one email to a specific prospect per day.

Following up with email is a great way to revive a dead lead and remind them of a specific franchise opportunity or to keep an active lead engaged in the funnel. For example, AdRoll discovered that when running both traditional email and email retargeting, email retargeting produced three times the open rate and six times the click-through rate.

Optimize Your CRM

With CRM retargeting, brands can market to customers from their CRM database using display ads on social media websites, blogs and other anywhere else prospects may be browsing. This has a few advantages over email retargeting, including the ability to increase the frequency of messaging. CRM retargeting also helps a brand stay top of mind as customers browse the internet, not just when they look at their inbox. Franchisors can even upload a lead list of prospects and target ads directly at a specific segment that’s not in their CRM. To be effective, web retargeting uses a combination of tailored messaging and targeted ad placement that capitalizes on the intent signals found on the website. 

Once brands create segments from existing prospects and customers and define where they are in the funnel, they can then use retargeting software to reach those segments with web ads. Whether brands are storing contact data in an email platform, already leveraging a CRM tool, or just storing customer purchase history in a spreadsheet, CRM data onboarding allows the flexibility to use multiple data sources to re-engage contacts with relevant content.

All in all, retargeting should be a core aspect of nearly every franchisor’s approach. These tips should help franchisors get even more value from their retargeting campaigns, incorporate new innovations and maximize the return on investment.