Remarketing Platform Bill of Rights: Simplicity Matters

Remarketing (retargeting) continues to grow in the digital advertising space. This means more services are popping up, each with their own “special sauce.” The diversification is great – this drives innovation. As I have the opportunity to use more of them, I keep coming back to one thought: “Simplicity matters.” But not just simplicity. Transparency and results matter, too!

Some remarketing services get it. Self-service rules the day, particularly for savvy marketers. Make it easy to set up, from tagging all the way through to reporting, and customers will flock to your service!

Who Gets It?

Google AdWords and Google Display Network (GDN) remarketing:

• The barrier of entry is low and should be familiar territory for any AdWords user.
• Reporting and control over settings are second-to-none.
• You are limited to just the GDN, but there is significant ad inventory to be had.
• Tagging and audience management are a bit hidden in the Shared Library, but ultimately are easy to use.

Perfect Audience:

• So. Easy. Display, Facebook Exchange (FBX) – it’s all there.
• Truly a self-service product that creates a simple process across all the layers of remarketing: tagging, audience segmentation, campaign creation, bid/setting management, and reporting.
• Better yet, it works.

Who Doesn’t Get It?

AdRoll:

• Don’t get me wrong, AdRoll has its place and many happy users. But…
• It’s billed as a self-service offering, but nearly all settings for optimization are not customer-facing. You have to manage CPMs and impression capping through a rep.

FetchBack:

• As a pioneer in the space, FetchBack has some street-cred. But I have personally not had any success with their service (and I’ve heard similar stories from others).
• Simple is not in the equation here. You are forced to work through a rep and this can slow things down and/or frustrate those of us used to and capable of managing campaigns on our own.
• Be prepared to manage the rep relationship instead of campaigns.

Remarketing Platform Bill of Rights

1. Make website tagging management clear and concise.
2. Make audience segmentation clear and concise.
3. Billed as self-service? Make it truly self-service.
4. Let us manage bids. CPM, CPC, or other.
5. Let us manage impression capping.
6. Make reporting clear and concise.
7. Let us manage site exclusions.
8. Don’t suck.

Remarketing is here to stay (well, as far as I can tell) and these services are only going to grow. The least they can do is grease the wheels and make their remarketing platforms easy to use. There is a reason books like Don’t Make Me Think were written or phrases like “Keep It Simple Stupid” exist. Yes – simplicity matters!

Image courtesy of Hey Paul Studios on Flickr.