The hurdles were high but now – for the first time – mobile retargeting on a global scale has become a reality. Simon Wajcenberg, Global CEO of Clash Group, the leading New York and London based full service digital media company, explores what this ground-breaking development means for marketers and their brands.
Retargeting – the ability to get back the 98% of shoppers who look but don't buy or the 60% who leave their shopping basket agonisingly full but fail to checkout – has finally come of age for mobile. Advertisers have been able to retarget consumers on desktop for some years, with much success. Now, new technology means that this success can be translated to the growing brigade of mobile shoppers. 2013 is going to see mobile retargeting seriously taking off.
The speed of mobile’s crusade against the PC has been so rapid that many marketers have been left reeling. But while the web took fifteen years to disrupt everything, it has only taken the smartphone five. During these five short years 45% of all American adults have acquired a smartphone and 18% a tablet. These figures are only set to rise: Analysts are predicting that in two years, 90% of mobile users will own a smartphone.
New technology, enhanced opportunity
M-commerce – the purchasing of products on smartphones and tablets - is booming, as all the sales figures over the holiday season 2012 proved. We found that click through rates on mobile ads rose 23% over Black Friday and Cyber Monday in contrast to a 5% rise in click through rates on desktop ads over the same period. Importantly, we have found that retargeted mobile ad campaigns generate, on average, an impressive 40% conversion rate from previously abandoned leads.
Until now, mobile retargeting has been impossible due to strict mobile privacy regulations. However, there is now new mobile retargeting technology that has been developed in compliance with privacy regulations. It securely maps anonymously held keys to a given user. Supporting this technology are five servers handling 85 million user records and processing thousands of queries per second, per server, at an average query time of five milliseconds.
Advantages of retargeting and mobile provide real RoI for advertisers
So, while adhering to the highest privacy standards, mobile retargeting enables advertisers to re-engage consumers who have previously shown an interest but never actually committed. In fact, it is estimated that just two percent of online shoppers make a purchase on their first visit to an e-commerce site. With mobile retargeting, marketers can take advantage of location tracking and RTB, to retarget relevant ads at the right time and place, to the right audience, and on the right device.
The hard facts are that now brands can target and retarget mobile users in 220 countries resulting in a potential 60 billion monthly impressions. And at Clash, we charge on a results only basis, so ROI is furthered increased.