Ever wondered how you can keep the interest of visitors who have left your website? It’s called remarketing, or retargeting. Most websites are only able to convert 2% of their visitors (Source: PPCMode), so remarketing is a way to stay in the hearts and minds of potential customers, even when they’re on other websites.

Remarketing works by placing a cookie on an individual’s browser. This small piece of code allows advertisers to follow a user as they visit subsequent websites targeting them with adverts catered to their interests or buying habits. Orwellian, right? But when done correctly, it’s a great way maintain awareness about your product or service.

Here’s how to keep the conversions rolling in.

1. Keep it relevant

Relevance is key to a remarketing ad campaign. The more targeted, the better. Think about how you can design ads to engage existing potential customers – what are they doing on your site, and why are they leaving? A great way to remind people of what they like about you is to show them the product pages they visited, or items from their abandoned shopping cart.

2. Make sure the timing is right

If you are a bricks-and-mortar store with an online store too, you can see how it would be annoying for a customer to look at an item online, purchase it in store, and still be bombarded with remarketing messages for that product. It’s also a pointless activity for you, as you’ve already scored the conversion, albeit in person. To avoid this, cap your adverts at certain timing lengths. Test these out to see what works best for your brand.

3. Add buttons

Remarketing is pointless without a call-to-action, and that’s where buttons on your images come in. This helps the customer to see the benefit in what you’re offering and be persuaded to visit your site. To create a sense of urgency around what you’re offering, add a succinct time-sensitive offer to your message.

4. Design with your audience in mind

When it comes to the actual look of your ads, there is a fine line between branding and creating adverts that really encourage potential customers to click through. Of course, you want to make sure your ads are immediately recognisable as ‘you’, but you need to leave room for any other important text or design features, like animations.

5. Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3

Like any digital marketing activity, it’s crucial that you test and optimise! This is something you should be constantly doing to make sure that your ads are reaching their full conversion potential. This is the only tried-and-true way to understand which ads are working best for your brand.

Remarketing is effective because it presents your messages to people who are already familiar with your brand. If you need a hand setting up your remarketing ads, get in touch – Sodafizz rock at Google AdWords.