Retargeting has taken the advertising world by storm. No longer do advertisers have to hope that an audience they want will be found at a particular publisher. They can chase audiences everywhere based on some signal of intent, independent of publishers. Not even Waldo can hide.
The problem of course is that ad stalking can be creepy. It’s creepy not just because the ads are persistent, it’s that the ads are tone-deaf. They don’t take any context into account.
Browse a red-and-white striped sweater and ads for that red-and-white striped sweater will stalk you across the Internet. Even if you already bought the sweater somewhere else. And even if you browsed the sweater on a lazy Sunday and are now reading a business article on a work day and aren’t in the mood to shop. The sweater ad won’t leave you alone.
As John Battelle put it recently:
“Fast-forward to today, and programmatic has torn audience away from its contextual roots. Using programmatic tools, a media buyer can identify almost any audience segment they want with pinpoint precision – down to the exact cookie or data segment that matches a customer target. And for various reasons, including price, those audience members are targeted mainly on who they are, independently of what they are doing. Put another way, we buy audiences, but we aren’t buying the show they’re watching – we’re ignoring where that impression is served.
“This is nuts.
“After 20 years of chasing click through rates as a core metric for branded display advertising, we’re finally realizing that CTR is a race to the bottom. The ecosystem optimizes for clicks, and we lose the value of branding in the process. We’re making a similar mistake with audience buying. Exercised without context as a key signal, it’s a bad habit, one we need to change if we’re going to build brands using programmatic media.”
Stalking audiences with retargeting is done in the name of more relevant advertising. But we’re in an awkward adolescent stage of understanding what messaging is truly relevant. To be really relevant, messaging will have to factor in context.
Advertisers will have to think outside the cookie.
(Marketoonist Monday: I’m giving away a signed cartoon print. Just share an insightful comment to this week’s post by 5:00 PST on Monday. Thanks!)
Emily King says
Unfortunately, based on recent conversations I’ve had with other marketers and business developers, you may be hard pressed to convince them that ad retargeting is creepy and potentially anything but convenient for customers.
Allen says
Oh so true.
I am currently the object of some re-targeting by the company of an acquaintance whose website I visited, more out of courtesy than anything else, and now his lousy banner ad pops up all over the place.
I rang him to let him know he was wasting money, but some slippery ad salesman had locked him into a contract, and he seemed to believe that even if the money was wasted on me, there were others similarly targeted who would succumb to his banner ad entreaties.
Seems common sense has deserted us in favor of the loonies who seem now in charge.
Mary Cole says
Good point. Just because we CAN technically do something does not mean we SHOULD. My marketing efforts are B2B so my sensitivity has been to catch people WHILE they feel the need, not to create a need which is so often the point with B2C. “Creepy” is the perfect word for it.
Stacy Beers says
Retargeting is so powerful in branding becuase it focuses your advertising spend on people who are already familiar with your brand and have recently demonstrated interest. We’ve seen this be so effective in health care marketing given those that are searching health care topics are looking for answers to their health care concerns. The balance is not being so “creepy” that we lose the ability to connect with them on a compassionate level.
Michael E. Zimmerman says
Most consumers I’ve talked to find retargeting ads about as welcome as bedbugs (and even harder to get rid of). Examined under the light of Permission Marketing, retargeting looks more like a violation of trust than a brilliant marketing strategy. After all, the unsuspecting web visitor never gave permission to be followed. Retargeting stands in sharp contrast to Google’s +1 button or Facebook’s LIKE button or the SHARE functions on LinkedIn and Facebook – all of which are voluntary – as well as to the many apps that facilitate social sharing within limited groups. Personally, if I want to follow an advertiser, or to be followed by one, I’ll ask. If I want to be creeped out, I’ll watch another episode of Law and Order: SVU.
Kevin Embree says
Remarketing and retargeting can be extremely effective for B2C and B2B business – and it is – and it’s why Adwords, facebook, twitter and many other ad platforms support it. Remarketing can also be setup and managed badly by an inexperienced team and thus considered to be “creepy”.
Remarketing is not audience buying – it’s audience leveraging – as the remarketing audience contains only people who have expressed interest in your offerings and visited your site through various channels.
Consumers (B2C) and business people (B2B) are extremely busy and a responsible remarketing campaign reminding them of your brand and your products/programs is an effective and great way to keep your brand warm – especially if you have an amazing brand and you run remarketing campaigns in a thoughtful way.
Consider the brands that build remarketing audiences all year round and yet only run a few remarketing campaigns during their peak seasons – and it drives their revenue to record levels? No one would consider that creepy as it would not be responsible to ignore the effectiveness of this new marketing lever.
Best practices for remarketing & retargeting will vary based on your organization’s goals & outcomes – and when used responsibly, it can provide a large ROI for your comprehensive marketing plan and advertising spend.
Angie McKaig says
Michael hits the nail on the head with his mention of Permission marketing. Really, the reason why content marketing has not only such “buzz” today but also real and vital value for the marketer is because you have to create something the user wants to see in order for them to engage with it.Following people around the web is high creep factor for anyone not in marketing. Mind you, the same could be said for *many* marketing tactics. 🙂
Deb Strickland says
Targeting your potential buyers should stay on the channels they frequent (which you know from your own research), and not stalk them with no (easy) way to escape. Remarketing is definitely stalking, and it’s disrespectful. You will forever wish you never touched up that red and white striped sweater. Next dancing gifs will make a reappearance.
Connie says
Kevin, I think you hit upon the difference in remarketing – you want to keep the BRAND warm, not a specific item. There is nothing more annoying than finding Amazon stalking me for a history book because I wanted to check a price out one time, not actually wanting to buy it.
But I don’t mind if Amazon reminds me that they have awesome books, because then I remember them the next time I need to price check a book and hopefully purchase.
@Tom – I think your point about context is spot on. But there also is such a thing as retailer context too. As a purchaser, there is nothing more irritating about getting a remarking trail and then going “Yeah, I want to buy that!” and getting the dreaded SOLD OUT. All that work that the retailer paid for and then they not only lose the sale, they tick off the potential customer too.
Stephanie C. says
Retargeting draws high conversion rate, visitors from a retargeting ad tend to be more sticky to our website. The CTR is similar to contextual banner ads, and it attracts quality clicks.
It may be annoying to see the same ad everywhere. But we’re used to it. If we’re not luxurious brands, i think it doesn’t harm the brand image much. We’re all used to see ads nowadays. Seeing an ad in a surprising place may even be more eye-catchy, and it reminds you have been looking for something before. If we’re doing the same media buy method as offline ads, it make digital marketers no difference.
We think seeing a diapers ad in a business magazine is odd probably because of stereo type and it conflicts with how the advertising world used to do, which may not be always right, too.
David Chalklen says
Smart marketing involves different cookies at diferring points in the conversion funnel (ie. Shopping cart bounce ). Knowing also when to switch on/off re-targeting to ensure the user doesnt feel stalked. Ie. Wait a week; switch on to infer co-incidence and then switch off again. Wait and repeat.
Its here and agree its adolescent; but its also laziness by media planners and lack of clients willingness to pay creative agencies to build multiple ad units to ensure the same message is not overserved. The alternative purpose of a cookie is to determine at what point of the brand message you’ve received. Why re-show a red striped sweater over and over; when after a week we can show a blue-striped sweater or maybe vertical stripes.
And yes; im a digital director
wetchi says
As a common consumer, I find this type of marketing annoying and intrusive. That social media such as Facebook participates in it as well means it has become ubiquitous on most users computer screens. On occasion, I have intentionally chosen not to solicit said businesses because i find this advertising obnoxious.
Martyn Brown says
I know this is an older post but I came across it when using content curation software.
I have recently joined a Facebook Group all about learning to work online advertising and retargeting strategies for your clients.
Pretty well all of the people in this ever-growing group are beginners although they are involved with some form of Internet Marketing already.
A number of group members have tried retargeting strategies for their clients but only small-time with no major paying customers.
We are being trained to perform this task correctly using our newly learned skills and judgement but, above all, we are going to be using new software that controls how each campaign runs.
This will wipe out the laziness of running retargeting ad-hoc and creating the ‘creepy’ experience, which we, clearly, don’t want.
Hopefully retargeting won’t go the way that QR Codes have gone here in the UK with so much trash at the end of each scan that, nowadays, few people bother to use the facility to its full potential.