When someone visits your site, you want to connect with them and convert them. At least, that’s what would happen in your perfect marketing world. But, without their email address and other data, it can be hard to make that connection, especially if they don’t take some sort of action on your site.
That is, unless you use email retargeting. You can use this practice to engage with a variety of people:
Whether you’ve never heard of this marketing term before or are just starting to implement it into your strategy, you’ll find what you need to know for every step of the email retargeting process.
Here’s what we will cover in this email retargeting guide:
Without further adieu, let’s jump into what email retargeting is, why you should consider using it, and how you can start enjoying the benefits it offers for your business.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrwXkq_pVao
Email retargeting — or email-based retargeting (EBR) — is the practice of sending emails to people based on information about their behavior and interests. With retargeting, you can:
Retargeting uses technology (like cookies or cross-device ID) to identify website visitors. A browser cookie places a small file into their browser when they visit a site in the same way Amazon does to keep items in a user’s shopping cart.
Once they are identified, those visitors are matched to a partner network database of contact records (with opt-ins), and the end-user is sent email addresses of people. This is the type of information you can see once you have their email address:
With email retargeting, unlike with display retargeting, the end-user pays once and owns the contact record forever. And as long as there’s an opt-out link in the email sent to these contacts, the end-user can email that contact record for as long as they want to.
Here’s an example of what email retargeting looks like:
After a browser cookie records their website activity or they spend a certain amount of time on a page, you can use their collected email address to contact them. Email retargeting works behind the scenes and is a practice most businesses can easily add to their email and direct mail marketing strategies to grow customer acquisition.
That’s the basic concept for how email retargeting works, so let’s dive into why you should consider adding this tool to your marketing strategy.
Whether you run a business, head up marketing, or are a blogger looking to grow your subscriber list, there are ways email retargeting can benefit your efforts. Here are just 10 of them:
The more comfortable you get with using email retargeting, the more benefits you can start enjoying from it. But don’t just take our word for it. Moz says that compared with a normal ecommerce conversion rate of between 2 percent and 4 percent, the rate for email retargeting conversions can be as high as 41 percent. Let that sink in for a minute.
Ready to start enjoying those benefits with your marketing efforts? Then it’s time to add email retargeting to your website.
The exact steps to add email retargeting to your site will depend on which platform (like Retention.com) you use. However, the general setup process includes:
But when should you use it? There are a few different scenarios where email retargeting can have the biggest impact when you:
There’s really not a bad time or place to use retargeting. The purpose is to follow up with visitors who haven’t fully engaged with you to (hopefully) convert them in the future. Or, you could use it to nudge old customers who drop in that you haven’t seen around in a while.
When you try out something that’s completely new, it can be difficult to tell if it’s working or not. It’s only natural to want to see a positive ROI for using email retargeting. To do that, you need to know how to get the most from your retargeting efforts — and what to avoid if you want the best results.
Here are three mistakes people make that hurt their retargeting efforts:
By avoiding these mistakes, you’re making the most of your email retargeting strategy — and setting yourself up for the best ROI.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plYr3NwUdOY&list=PLO-1NFZxoPmb7WYhWte5OK6F4d8I5acGU&index=6&t=0s
Now that we’ve covered some of the no-nos associated with email retargeting, let’s talk about what you should be doing to reach your goals with some of the top best practices.
Reach out to them ASAP. If you’re using retargeting to trigger an email campaign, send the email as quickly as possible — like within an hour. That way, they remember they visited your site and will continue with their activity and/or engage with your brand. You don’t want them to be confused about who you are when they see your message pop up in their inbox. (And people have short memories these days, so don’t wait to send it!)
We can’t stress this enough: Reach out to the contacts you’ve acquired several times. Sending them one email about your product isn’t enough. You need to put them in a welcome series campaign (like three or more emails) to nurture this new lead. Check out this welcome email example from NetGalley that covers all of the basics:
Here’s an example of a successful email frequency that one of our clients uses:
That’s going to give you the type of ROI you’re after. You have to put in the work if you want to see positive results. Not sold on sending so many emails? Just remember the rule of seven in marketing:
People need to interact with you at least seven times before they act.
No matter your industry, products, or services, there’s a great (and simple) message to send to the contacts you’ve collected right off of the bat. And here’s that winning subject line for that email:
It tells them right away why they are getting your email and reminds them they did, in fact, visit your website. No one is going to get mad about a subject line like that, and it isn’t creepy in the least. After that, your subject lines should tell exactly what the email copy will be about. Maybe you’re sending them a quiz, recipe, or fun activity.
As for the email body content, stick to email marketing best practices:
This email from Krispy Kreme is short, (definitely) sweet, and straight to the point. The CTA is front and center, and the fonts and colors matched what was on their site at the time this campaign was sent.
Whatever you offered them in your email content, make sure it’s exactly the same on your landing page. You want the landing page to deliver on whatever you promised them in the email. Again, it’s all about consistency.
This landing page from Impraise matches the design for the guide, as shown by the cutout image, and the text matches what was advertised in email campaigns.
The more traffic you drive, the bigger your email retargeting program can be. However, the higher quality traffic you drive, the better your email retargeting program can be. And we all want great traffic sources, right?
To do that, try to show your email retargeting script to high-quality traffic. That means adding the script to places like:
When you’re ready to take your email retargeting game to the next level, start incorporating these techniques.
Marketers who use segmented campaigns note as much as a 760-percent increase in revenue. So, there’s no denying how beneficial segmentation can be for your marketing efforts. And that’s true when it comes to email retargeting.
One of the best places to put the script to segment the contacts is on the Cart page. Then, you can send them a Cart Abandonment email (more on that below). Or if you’re a publisher, you could add the script to the highest threshold of engagement.
Another good way to segment (and follow up) is if they visit a product or offer page. You can then send them:
Whatever page is the furthest visitors can go on your site without converting (that’s practical) is a good place to start to segment them. Then, you can expand your reach from there once you start seeing the ROI you’re after.
You should also remember you’ll collect both new and old email addresses during email retargeting. Make sure you don’t treat them the same. You can exclude your current subscribers from the campaigns you send out to the new addresses you collect, focusing on the ones who look like they are about to make a purchase — and offer them a no-brainer incentive so they follow through.
Cart abandonment obviously is a major issue. The average cart abandonment rate across all industries is 70 percent, and ecommerce sites lose about $18 billion in sales revenue each year because of it. Wouldn’t you like to see those numbers go way down? You can use email retargeting to do just that.
When you add the script to your Shopify store, for example, you can target visitors who, for whatever reason, didn’t complete their purchase. When that happens, you can send them an email reminding them there’s an item in their cart and then provide them with the link so they can buy it immediately. Make the process as easy as possible to improve the chances of them converting. The fewer hurdles there are to make a purchase, the more likely they are to do it.
Now that you have a better idea of when and how to use email retargeting, let’s cover some examples of what this practice actually looks like. Here are examples of email retargeting campaigns and which segments to send them to.
Who doesn’t love a discount or something free? Offering a free gift to someone when they leave your site is a great way to reel them back in, whether they are an anonymous visitor or haven’t engaged with you in a while. Target your offer to what they viewed on your site, like in this example from Wayfair that offers free shipping:
We’ve already covered why this one is important, but it can’t be overstated. You don’t want to miss out on a hot lead who abandoned their cart. Send them an email letting them know they forgot something in their cart, or send them a discount if they buy it now (like free shipping).
If someone has bought from you in the past, they are more likely to buy from you again. You can send a series of product upsell and cross-sell emails soon after a purchase. Here’s an example from Grammarly:
Now that you’ve finished reading the guide, you have everything you’ll need to know:
Still have some questions? Check out our frequently asked questions section below.
Email retargeting is pretty new to the scene, so you’re sure to have some questions about how it works. Here are five of the top questions we hear:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FStza7C9Txw&list=PLO-1NFZxoPmb7WYhWte5OK6F4d8I5acGU&index=3&t=0s
Now that you have a better understanding of what email retargeting is and how it can benefit your business — from ecommerce to publishers — all that’s left to do is pick an email retargeting platform and get started!
