Facebook Remarketing Vs Google Remarketing

As digital marketers, knowing which channels to assign our budget to and how much to assign to each channel, is one of our biggest challenges. 

You may have heard about remarketing and its effectiveness in increasing conversions, improving brand recall, reducing loss, and offering sophisticated audience targeting options.  There’s no denying that remarketing is effective, but with a number of options available for running your remarketing ads, knowing where to start can seem overwhelming.

The two main options for remarketing are Facebook and Google. Facebook has over 2.2 billion users, while Google Display Network has over 2 million sites and reaches over 90% of Internet users. 

While they are both essentially offering remarketing services, there are significant differences between remarketing on Facebook and on the Google Display Network that advertisers should be aware of before choosing one for their remarketing campaign.

What is Facebook Remarketing?

Facebook remarketing offers advertisers a way of reconnecting with Facebook users who have visited their website. This is done by installing a pixel on the website that sends information back to Facebook. As long as the user is signed in to their Facebook account while they are browsing online, they will be eligible for retargeting.

Key statistics for Facebook:

• Facebook has over 2.2 billion monthly active users. Over 1.5 billion of these are daily active users, which means that by choosing this platform for remarketing, your business can reach a huge portion of the world’s population. 
• 81% of 18-29 year olds use Facebook, which makes this the most common age bracket. If your business is targeting this age range, Facebook may be effective. If not, you can always select the age range that you want to target with your ads.
• Timing: As an advertiser, it can be useful to know the popular times on Facebook. The highest traffic on the platform is between 1 and 3 pm during the week.  This may give your business the opportunity to reach more prospects, however, your competitors are also likely to be aware of this and as such, the cost-per-click and cost-per-impression will likely increase during this time.
• Days of the Week: Engagement on Facebook is on average 18% higher on Thursdays and Fridays as people are happier towards the weekend. This can be applied to your advantage in your campaigns.
• 50% of 18-24 year olds check Facebook when they wake up. Running ads at this time can mean that your business is the first thing these users see in the morning. But, is that necessarily a good thing? They probably don’t want to be advertised to as they are scrolling through their news feeds in the morning, unless your products or services are particularly interesting or relevant to them. While users may be more active in the morning, they are typically more engaged in the evenings, so it can be beneficial to A/B test campaigns throughout these times to find out which are the most effective for your business.

What are the Benefits of Facebook Remarketing?

Facebook remarketing is the chosen option for many digital marketers for the following reasons:

1. Mailing List Integration
   

Facebook remarketing campaigns can be created from business databases such as mailing lists. This can be done by creating a custom audience and importing your mailing list to that audience.  Facebook can then match up the email address with the profile so that your business can market to people who are on your list that may not be aware that you have a Facebook page.

2. Increased Conversions

Facebook remarketing generally drives more conversions.  It is particularly effective for companies in competitive industries, where a customer will browse a number of sites before they decide to purchase. After they leave your website and are considering their options, they may forget your business and what it offers, which means that you will have lost the sale. If they see your business again on Facebook, they are more likely to remember your brand, which increases your chances of converting them into a customer. With Facebook, you also have the ability to exclude users who have completed a sale by filtering those who visited your ‘thank you’ or ‘checkout confirmation’ pages, which increases the conversion rate of your campaign.

3. Create Lookalike Audiences
   

Facebook lookalike audiences are a secret weapon for remarketing. This feature lets you track the people who have converted on your website to build an audience. You can then use this list to create a lookalike audience, which is a group of Facebook users with the same characteristics and attributes as the people who have converted. The theory is that because they are similar to your existing customers, they are more likely to convert.

4. Social Proof
   

Facebook is an ideal platform for capitalising on social proof. Satisfied customers will share positive comments and engage with the content that is posted, which can act as reinforcement for potential customers. If a potential customer sees social proof in the form of positive feedback, it can significantly increase the chances of conversion.

Limitations of Facebook Remarketing

With Facebook, it can be difficult to remarket based on users performing an event on your site (for example a download) unless they are being redirected to a thank-you page. There are technical ways around this, but they are not particularly easy to implement. In addition, as Facebook’s organic reach is decreasing significantly ads are likely to become more expensive. A further consideration is that with the introduction of GDPR and recent privacy concerns over Facebook’s user data, targeting options have become less expansive and reach has gone down. 

Google Remarketing

What is Google Remarketing?

Like Facebook remarketing, Google remarketing gives advertisers the chance to re-engage someone who has been on their website by showing them ads as they browse the web. Instead of showing the ads on Facebook, these ads are displayed on other websites in the Google Display Network, which comprises more than 2 million sites. 

In order to use Google remarketing, advertisers have to install a small snippet of code on their website. When the user visits a page with this code on it, they are ‘tagged’ with a cookie that allows advertisers to follow them to other websites with their ads.

Key statistics for Google remarketing:

• Businesses using Google make an average of $2 for every $1 spent, Using remarketing to boost conversion rate can increase this ROI.
• Users who have seen an advert for your business on the Google Display Network are 70% more likely to convert on your website.
• A study from ComScore found that retargeting adverts generated a 1,046% lift in branded search.
• A significant percentage of Google’s total revenue comes from display advertising. This means that the search engine will continue to develop the opportunities for advertisers using the platform so that advertisers get better results and spend more. 

What are the Benefits of Google Remarketing?

As the dominant search engine with one of the largest advertising offerings online, there are definite advantages to using Google Display Network for your remarketing campaign.

1. Lower Costs

On the Google Display Network, the cost per click is typically lower than it is on Facebook. In addition, remarketing ads will have a higher click-through rate than other online advertising campaigns as the targeted users have already been on your website and as such, are familiar with your product or service. 

2. Creative Options
   

While many marketers only use Google for keyword focused search ads, the Display Network opens the opportunities to increase your brand awareness through the use of image ads. Google offers a number of options for creative that can help improve your brand awareness, such as standard images, gifs and video.  It is best practice to use an image, short copy and a call to action that lets customers know what to expect if they click-through. To make the most of a remarketing campaign, use messaging that is likely to entice someone back to your site, rather than generic text that you would use for someone who has never interacted with your brand before.

3. Ease of Use

Google makes significant income from its advertisers, so the search engine makes it easy for advertisers to set up campaigns.  All you need to do to get started with remarketing is to add the remarketing tag to your website so that you can start building an audience.  This can be done with minimal HTML knowledge. Then, you can start creating ads in the formats and sizes specified by Google and set up the campaign. 

4. Placement Control

Comprising over 90% of websites online, Google Display Network is not short of places to show your ads.  There may be specific placements that you want to spend more on, while some are completely irrelevant for your audience. Google gives advertisers the ability to review what websites their ads are displayed on and optimise the campaign accordingly. For example, if there is a website that is serving your ads but not generating clicks, you can exclude it from the campaign. 

Limitations of Google Remarketing

The main difference between Google and Facebook remarketing platforms is that the session times tend to be much longer on Facebook. Google directs traffic, while Facebook is its own hub with a significant amount of traffic. In addition, with Google’s quality score metric, it can be difficult for advertisers to get their adverts on websites that do not directly relate to their product or service or bid on keywords that are not necessarily specific to the core product or service. Facebook also outshines Google in its targeting abilities with its detailed database of user’s demographics, behaviours and interests. 

Make sure your business stays ahead of the game this year by focusing on remarketing If you need help with your SEO strategy get in touch with a digital marketing agency Auckland. The team at Digital Squad can help you with Remarketing, Facebook Marketing Auckland, AdWords Marketing Auckland and SEO Auckland.