There are many benefits to online advertising. However, if the wrong people are seeing your ads, you probably aren’t benefiting much from your investment. Identifying your target audience and where they are active is going to be important before you dive in.
Google Ads provides four ways to reach your audience based on where they are active online, how they’ve interacted with your website, and even where they are in the research process.
People Searching
People actively searching on Google is going to be your easiest audience to start with. So you’ll want to figure out which search terms you want to show up for.
Is it something specific like auto loans, checking accounts, or just general banking terms?
Once you’ve figured out what groups of similar themes you’re working with, do some keyword research. There are tools and services available which can show you exactly what people are typing in or even saying to Google to get results back.
You can then bid on these terms so that your ads show up if someone searches those specific phrases.
Past Website Visitors (Remarketing)
As much as 96% of website visitors will leave your site without taking any sort of action. They need time to make a decision. They’re comparison shopping, procrastinating, and they’re constantly distracted. Therefore, it’s unlikely they’ll reach out to you on their first visit.
You need a way to stay connected with them after they’ve left your website. Remarketing Ads allow you to do this by keeping your brand and messaging in front of these audiences while they go back to do more searches on Google or browse around on other websites.
Each person who’s been on your website can be cookied or tagged. This adds them to a list of users that have viewed your website or certain pages on it. Now they are eligible to see your ads based on this activity.
An easy example of Remarketing is if you’ve been shopping online for shoes, but then stopped and have moved on to check your email or read some articles. But now, you’re noticing ads for the shoes you were just looking at. Those ads have appeared because of Remarketing.
In-Market Audiences
“In-market” audiences are essentially groups of people who’ve been identified by Google as being highly interested in a product or service. They have been actively researching or comparing products and services online.
Google collects this data on a person and puts them into a pool or list of users who are in-market for something. There are many lists you can choose from.
For home loans, you can target audiences interested in just “mortgages” or get more specific with interests in “mortgage refinancing”, “home equity loans”, or “home purchase loans”.
Imagine being able to target people who are nearly ready to contact a financial institution but are still searching on Google or are browsing around the internet. These people do not have to be past website visitors or have made any contact with you to be eligible to see your ads. It’s great for getting your brand and promotions in front of a new audience.
People In Your Target Location
The targeting methods just outlined are excellent, but if you’re a credit union with a small membership area, you need to make sure your ads aren’t blasted across the country. It doesn’t make sense for someone in California to see your ads if your membership area is 30 miles around a small midwestern city.
Avoid this by setting your ads to show only in areas that matter to you. It can be set by:
- Radius
- Cities
- Counties
- States
- Zip Codes
Anyone who is in your designated area and is searching or browsing online can be eligible to view your ads. Anyone who is outside of that, shouldn’t see your ads.
Which of these targeting methods have you tried? If you’re interested in receiving a keyword research report or seeing which in-market audience options are available, contact us for help!
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