You spend so much time, effort and budget drawing people to your website, and what happens? They visit a couple of pages (if you’re lucky), click a link or two (maybe), but then they jump away again.
They come. They glance. They go. Lost in the vast internet.
You aren’t the only one seeing that happen. According to Google, only 2-4% of the people who visit websites actually perform an action companies want (downloads, inquiry requests, newsletter subscriptions, purchases).
Well take heart. That’s where Remarketing Lists for Search Ads (RLSA) come in handy. RLSAs were launched by Google in 2013 to make their AdWords remarketing option even more powerful.
Pinpoint previous site visitors searching for your products
Remarketing is where companies place a “pixel” on their website that tags visitors so they’ll see the company’s display or search ads when they visit Google partner sites or search online. It’s designed to keep products in front of potential customers after they leave a site.
RLSAs were created to make your remarketing efforts even more focused. Traditional remarketing will activate a display ad or search term for tagged users based only on the criteria that they visited your site.
Yet RLSAs only pinpoint previous visitors who are Google searching for specific keywords you are bidding on. That means your AdWords campaigns only appear to a qualified audience you know is looking for your type of product or service.
Not only is that more affective, it’s more cost-effective. You don’t waste money on people who may not be interested, even if they did visit your site at some point.
RLSAs refine your targeting to specific visitors and searches
You can apply your RLSAs to your existing AdWords campaigns and ad groups once you add the remarketing codes to your site. Then you can adjust them whenever you want or create new lists and ads for different keywords.
Keep in mind they won’t activate until at least 1,000 unique site visitors have been tagged with a cookie. Also, the membership time limit for each list is capped at 180 days, which is much shorter than the 540 days with general remarketing.
On the plus side, RLSA’s let you refine your lists even further to only focus on certain visitors based on activity. You can then adjust keyword bids accordingly by decreasing as much as 90% or increase up to 900%.
For example, you can increase your bid for people who visited your site very recently or spent a considerable amount of time on your site. That way they see your ads while you’re still fresh in their mind.
Limitless possibilities with lists and ads
You can also create different lists for visitors who placed items in a shopping cart, but left before purchasing, or target visitors who viewed certain pages on your website by showing ads that apply to the content on those pages.
Even better, you can exclude visitors who have already completed a desired action on your site. If someone already submitted a request for information, your RLSA will prevent your ads from appearing to them.
You won’t waste ad budget on someone who is already in your lead funnel.
The possibilities are limitless with RLSA strategies. All it takes is creativity and planning to unlock their full potential.
The remarkable remarketing strategy
Are RLSAs right for your digital marketing plan?
On average, Google handles over 40,000 searches every single second. So you need all the help you can get drawing those searchers your way.
RLSAs help you increase the chance of successfully attracting previous visitors back to your site so you can convert them to customers. Think of them as the remarkable remarketing strategy.
Need help determining how AdWords remarketing and RLSAs can help your company? Contact us today.
Our search marketing team can work with you to develop a strategy, demographic targeting, and messaging you need to help capture the leads that got away.
