What is Retargeting?

Retargeting (also known as Remarketing) is a feature that lets you reach people who have previously visited your site, and show them relevant ads when they visit other sites on the Google, Facebook or LinkedIn Display Networks. When people leave your site without buying anything, for example, retargeting helps you connect with these potential customers while they browse other websites. You can even show them a compelling message or offer that will encourage them to return to your site and complete a purchase.

For example, a person comes to your site, looks around and might be interested in what you have to offer but gets distracted, runs out of time, etc.  In the past, you could only hope this person remembered you and came back. 

Retargeting puts a "cookie" on that visitors browser so as they surf the internet, they'll will see ads from you specifically targeted to them.   After seeing these ads for a while, they may come back and become your customer. 

Retargeting is very powerful because you are advertising to people who have actually visited your site.  In addition it is often very cost effective because you are only showing ads to those people and not to everyone.

Retargeting is easy on the surface but in reality a bit complicated to strategize the best way to set it up.

Watch this video for a nice summary: