Most people who land on your website won’t buy on their first visit. They look at a product, compare prices, get distracted – and they’re gone. Retargeting gives you a second chance: it reminds them of your offer when they’re back online. We’ll show you how it works, which types exist and how to set it up so it helps sales without annoying people.
What retargeting is
Retargeting is a form of advertising where you reach people who have already interacted with your business – they visited your website, viewed a product, added it to their cart or gave you their email. Since they already know you, they’re closer to buying than a complete stranger.
Google Ads traditionally calls it remarketing, while Facebook and Instagram call it retargeting. In everyday use, the two terms are synonyms. We explain the principle in more detail in our article on how remarketing works.
How retargeting works technically
A tracking code is added to your website – for example the Google Ads tag or the Meta Pixel. With the visitor’s consent, it records that the person was on the page and what they looked at. The ad platform builds audiences out of these visitors, which you can then show ads to.
An important detail: without consent to marketing cookies, you can’t add a visitor to an audience. That’s why it pays to have a properly configured cookie banner and, for Google, Consent Mode. We cover how to measure results as cookies disappear in our article on the end of third-party cookies in practice.
Types of retargeting
- Site visit retargeting – ads are shown to people who visited your website or a specific part of it. It works in Google Ads (Display Network, YouTube) as well as in Facebook and Instagram ads.
- Dynamic retargeting – the ad shows exactly the products the person viewed. You need a product feed for this, meaning a list of products with prices and images, and it’s best suited to online stores.
- Email retargeting – automated emails, such as an abandoned cart reminder or a reminder about a product someone viewed. It only works for people who gave you their email and their consent.
- Search retargeting – for people who’ve already been on your website, you can raise your bid or show a different ad in Google Search when they look for your type of product again.
With email, it pays to start with automations that run on their own. You’ll find inspiration in our article on 5 email automation flows for online stores.
How to set up a retargeting campaign step by step
- Set up tracking. Make sure the Google Ads tag and the Meta Pixel are running correctly on your website and that conversions – actions like a purchase or a submitted form – are being tracked.
- Segment your audience by behavior. Someone who only read your homepage needs a different message than someone who had items in their cart. Typical groups are product viewers, cart abandoners and post-purchase customers.
- Exclude people who’ve already bought. Nothing is more annoying than an ad for something you already have at home. Show customers complementary products instead – or nothing at all.
- Set a time window. With cheaper products, people decide quickly; with a kitchen or a vacation, it takes weeks. Match the audience membership duration to how long your customers take to decide.
- Watch the frequency. If the campaign type allows it, cap how many times one person can see your ad. Otherwise, keep an eye on frequency in your reports, and if the numbers get high, change the creative or the audience.
- Prepare a clear message. Remind people of the product, address a common objection (shipping, returns, warranty) and add a call to action (CTA) – a specific instruction telling people what to do, such as “Complete your order.”
- Rotate your creatives. The same ad stops working after a while because people start tuning it out. Prepare several variants and switch them regularly.
The most common retargeting mistakes
- The same ad for every visitor, regardless of what they did on the website.
- Ads shown to people who’ve already bought.
- A time window that’s too long – people still see your ad months after they lost interest.
- Aggressive discounts right from the start. Customers quickly learn that all they have to do is abandon their cart to get a better deal.
- Retargeting without campaigns that bring in new people. When there’s no one left to remind, your audience shrinks.
How to measure whether retargeting works
What matters most is conversions and their cost, not the number of impressions. Keep an eye on:
- Click-through rate (CTR) – the percentage of people who saw the ad and clicked on it.
- Number of conversions and cost per conversion – how many orders or inquiries the campaign brought in and how much each one cost you.
- ROAS – return on ad spend, meaning how many euros in revenue each euro spent on ads brought you. You can calculate it quickly with our ROAS calculator.
- Frequency – how many times, on average, one person saw your ad.
Retargeting tends to take credit for purchases that would have happened anyway, because the person would have come back to your website even without the ad. So also compare your total revenue and number of orders before and after launch, not just the numbers in the ad platform.
Frequently asked questions
What’s the difference between retargeting and remarketing?
In practice, almost none. Google traditionally uses the word remarketing, Meta uses retargeting. Sometimes remarketing is used more narrowly for email, but in everyday use, it’s the same thing.
Is retargeting GDPR-compliant?
Yes, if the visitor has consented to marketing cookies and you’ve stated it correctly in your privacy policy. Without consent, you can’t add them to an audience.
Do I need a lot of traffic for retargeting?
Ad platforms have a minimum audience size below which they won’t show ads. With very little traffic, it’s better to invest in campaigns that bring in new people first.
How long should someone stay in a retargeting audience?
As long as your customers usually take to decide. For cheaper products, a few days to a few weeks is enough; for bigger purchases and services, it can be several months.
Want retargeting that reminds people of your offer at the right moment without being annoying? See how we do Google Ads, or drop us a line and we’ll look at your campaigns together.
