What is remarketing?

So what is remarketing? That is what I hear from a number of small businesses.

Remarketing is targeting those people who have already visited your website that may not have finished an action.  Have you ever been to a website and then start seeing their web banners everywhere? That is remarketing. That company sets up a tag so you can be tracked. Remarketing is effective because often you are not ready to buy when you first visit a website. You might just be researching. If you follow them around with your name and number, you are more likely to present your information at decision-making time and get a call. Your potential customer will be impressed by the fact that you are "all over the internet".

Google remarketing is an ideal tactic especially where the sales process is long and considered and competitive. Executed in the right way it can be a powerful tool to improve sales conversions and to raise your brand profile.

What do I need to be aware of?
There is a minimum threshold of 100 cookie ID's on each remarketing list before a campaign can become active.

The remarketing ads can be delivered in either or both text and image display formats. The ads are managed in Google AdWords and are shown on web pages visited by your target audience that accept Google advertising placements

To be successful it's important to a) make sure your ad is highly relevant to what you know visitors are looking for and b) contains some form of enticement to encourage them back to your website. For example you could display a special discounted offer on that item.

If your aim is raise brand awareness then you can create ads that achieve exactly that by displaying your brand to visitors over a period of days, weeks or months. And as remarketing is part of Google AdWords you will be able to track outcomes through normal conversion tracking.

The optimum remarketing is showing your ad 5 times per day. You don't want to annoy the potential customer but you want to be clearly present. Here is Google's remarketing information.