Replay to Targeting and Marketing

While surfing for a birthday dress for me from e-commerce sites, my friend received an email from American Swan, a fashion e-commerce site, to remind her of the abandoned product that was lying in the cart since half an hour. And guess what, on seeing that dress again and finding that still better than the others, she bought that and closed all other tabs.

Companies earlier just used to target and market their products on the digital platform. They have always worked their best to woo the consumers using social media promotions, advertisements, e-mail marketing, SMS marketing, ad campaigns, colourful bright posters and many other ways. But this doesn’t seem enough as 98% first time visitors to an e-commerce site leave without buying anything. Consumers may analyse everything but may forget about the product or may not consider the brand good enough or may not like the deals being offered. To not let the consumer go away without buying, these sites are now-a-days taking a step forward towards re-targeting and re-marketing. Even you must have noticed some ads following you once clicked because of the cookie it had stored in your browser with the click.

Now what is re-targeting and re-marketing? Re-targeting includes focused ads for the consumers who had once shown interest in a specific product via search or site visit while re-marketing is using email and SMS to bring back a consumer to complete an abandoned purchase in a shopping cart. Sites feel the need to chase the consumer mostly for consumer accession. They consider the consumer as an asset which cannot be let go off so easily. It is similar to the shopkeeper trying to persuade you to buy his product even after you’ve rejected it once. He may then show you its better benefits and even lower down his deal to end you up with product. Same is the strategy being followed through the digital platform. Consumers are chased not only for acquisition but also to create better brand awareness and retain consumers for a longer time.

The initiatives which could be seen on a rising bar are of a creative spectrum from discounts on next purchase to registration/birthday/anniversary incentives. Amongst the online retailers, sending information about offers and share social media feature works the best while for offline retailers, not only information offers but also reward points and discount on next purchase work to give appreciative results.

According to Octane Marketing, 45% of the consumers readily buy using e-mail offers till the time they are not bombarded with multiple untargeted mails. Firms like Lenskart.com saw 25-30% rise in their summer festival campaign which was again a re-targeting initiative, Bewakoof.com increased its purchases by 2-3% via SMS and e-mail marketing, similar results were observed by American Swan and so many other e-commerce sites. Maximum benefit is drawn within an hour’s time of re-targeting and re-marketing and the buyer conversion rate could then be increased by 5-25%.

So the next time you are being re-targeted and re-marketed, try understanding the marketing strategy of the firm and don’t be fooled like my friend to buy a dress being sold at Rs. 3000 at myntra.com but bought at Rs. 3700 from American Swan, just because it re-targeted you.

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