If you are not incorporating retargeting strategies into your digital marketing plans, you are missing out on a chance to reach customers and improve your conversion rates at the same time. If you have been battling to see an increase in engagement through your digital marketing strategies, you are not seeing any increase in clicks, open rates or followers, or you are getting more unsubscribes or unfollows than you should, retargeting may just be a strategy worth considering.

Also sometimes known as remarketing, retargeting allows you to promote your products to customers that have already visited your website or entered your database at some stage. To use an example, a customer may have visited your website at some stage and browsed your collection of duvet cover sets for kids. Using retargeting strategies, you may show highly targeted bedding ads to that same customer on social media or you may develop a lead funnel for email that showcases your kids' bedding to the customer. Retargeting typically takes the form of online advertising, but it can also be implemented across other channels for a better chance of engagement.

Before we share our tips on how to use this strategy to boost engagement, it is useful to understand the differences between re-engagement and retargeting.

• Re-engagement focuses on targeting customers who have not engaged with your brand recently. You may develop a strategy to re-engage a customer who has not made a purchase, visited your store, read an email, clicked on any links or completed an offer in some time. Re-engagement strategies are designed to bring customers back or engage with your product on some level, whether that means reading your newsletters, actively making a purchase or connecting in some other way.
• Retargeting focuses on engaging those who have visited your store. This could include those who have browsed your store without making a purchase, those who completed registration without placing an order and those who got all the way to checkout only to abandon their cart. The aim of retargeting is to retarget a customer on a separate channel in a way that triggers them to visit your site and engage.

The differences are subtle, and, sometimes, retargeting and re-engagement may overlap to some degree. There is a significant difference in the goals, approach and strategy, however. An example of a retargeting campaign may include an abandoned shopping cart email sent to a customer who has left products in their cart or a once-off promotion targeting those who have viewed specific products without making a purchase.

You could run a re-engagement campaign at the same time, targeting customers who have not made a purchase in the last month. An example of this type of campaign could include a 'we miss you' type email series that encourages customers back to your store.

Messaging, segments, lead scoring and other metrics will differ for each type of campaign. Understanding the differences between the two campaigns is key to ensure that your retargeting strategies are carefully planned and orchestrated in a way that accurately targets customers.

Now that you have a better understanding of how this approach works, how can you use retargeting strategies to boost your engagement? Let's have a look.

Retargeting Strategies to Boost Engagement

Some of the most effective retargeting strategies to consider for increased engagement include the following:

‍Fine-tune your email campaigns

‍Email is a powerful channel for retargeting, allowing you to create highly personalised, targeted campaigns. This is also a great way to begin your retargeting campaigns, casting a wider net. You could send emails advertising sales or newly launched products that are similar to those that have been purchased or viewed. You could create personalised emails offering useful information on how to purchase at your store. You could even offer exclusive resources or links to additional channels.

‍Target your unsubscribed audience

‍If you have an audience who has unsubscribed from your emails, you can still reach them, even if you no longer send them email. This can be done by search ads and Facebook ads. This also applies to those who have not completed their registration or signed up for email but have entered their details or finished basic registration on your site. This approach helps to keep your product top of mind, which may prompt a return to your mailing list or finalisation of email subscription, or even a return to your store.

‍Use email data wisely for highly targeted messaging

How do you use email data to target customers? Clicks, open rates and downloads are all important. All behaviour provides you with information that can be used to retarget customers. For example, if you have sent out an email promoting an event, which has a low open rate or a low clickthrough rate, you may consider an ad placed on Google or social media. When these ads run alongside your email campaigns, they can be especially effective in prompting people to interact.

‍Reactivate dead leads

‍When your messaging becomes stale, annoying or no longer relevant, there is a far greater risk of unsubscribe rates increasing. Many companies end up deleting inactive records after long periods of inactivity. This data can be incredibly useful, however. Before you remove dead leads, you could try a retargeting campaign to determine whether any of them can be converted through channels outside of email marketing. You may find that seemingly lost leads suddenly become viable once again.

‍Fine-tune your lead nurturing efforts

‍You can also incorporate retargeting into your lead nurturing campaigns. You can easily integrate a retargeting message into your lead funnels in a subtle way, displaying products or offers that have been viewed without purchasing. Done correctly, this can be a powerful, surprisingly simple way of driving engagement.

‍Perfect your customer retention efforts

Once potential customers become purchasing customers, it is all too easy to assume that you have reached your engagement goal. There are still many ways to engage current customers, however, helping to turn them into brand advocates and increase order size and value at the same time. To use our bedding example, say a customer has recently purchased a kids duvet set. You may offer deals on pillows, duvet covers, mattress protectors, sheets, blankets or even beds, depending on your range.

‍Improve your sales funnels

‍If you are experiencing any blockages within your sales funnel, you may find that retargeting helps to streamline the process. By targeting leads with messages that are developed according to their current stage, you can keep the funnel moving without the risk of lost leads.

All in all, retargeting offers a number of benefits that can help take your engagement to the next level.

To find out more about you can use a digital marketing platform such as Grapevine Interactive to perfect your retargeting strategies, get in touch with our team today to organise a demonstration.