You get your morning coffee, turn on your computer and decide to see what is front-page news in the Toronto Sun – and alongside the weather and sports scores on the home page is an advertisement for a mortgage broker.
You get your morning coffee, turn on your computer and decide to see what is front-page news in the Toronto Sun – and alongside the weather and sports scores on the home page is an advertisement for a mortgage broker.
Out of curiosity you click on the ad, then go back to your daily routine.
Later that day you open your browser to check out your favourite baseball team, or do a Google search to buy flowers, or attempt to find a better price on an oil change – and there is Jessi Johnson Mortgage Team once again.
“That is the power of Google, and how you can take advantage of ‘retargeting,’” says Burt Campbell, a freelance marketing consultant based in Calgary, Alta. “Someone clicks on the ad, and Google places a cookie on the site, and later on when that client looks at other pages, the ad reappears again.”
The advertisement for Surrey, B.C.’s Jessi Johnson Mortgage Team is just one example of a broker taking advantage of Google Analytics, advertising Johnson told MortgageBrokerNews.ca is working well.
“There are many benefits to using Google Analytics,” says Johnson. “I love being able to measure results of on-line marketing through their tracking systems and knowing what keywords are used to find you is priceless.”
Utilizing Google Analytics and tailoring advertising using the Display Network platform is a powerful tool any mortgage broker can take advantage of to maintain visibility, says Campbell, so that the repetition of the advertisement becomes embedded in the search psyche.
Just so long as it isn’t overused, he points out.
“It can be very effective, but it can become annoying,” he says. “You’ve got to pace yourself; you do have control over the frequency and the sites that your advertisement appears on.”
Retargeting through a Display Network is different from having what people are more familiar with, the Google Adwords on the Search Network.
“There you are matching the intent style,” says Campbell. “You type in mortgage broker, or moving van, and the term and occupations associated with it are placed at the top or on the side of the page, followed by the natural search results.”
The cost to have a retargeting advertising can be as inexpensive as $200-$500 a month – and for Campbell, starting off small is probably the best way to go.
“I wouldn’t spend $5,000 up front and spin the wheel and hope for the best,” he says. “Start small, and then see where the people are going – and definitely do the tracking; you have to see where the people are going, what they are looking for, or you are just wasting your money. If it is done right, it can be an investment, not an expense.”
Campbell likens people who create business web pages, who then sit back without analyzing and tracking the data of those visiting the site, to pouring water into a bucket with holes in it.
“Businesspeople don’t have trouble getting people to a page – the real problem is getting them to take action once they are there,” he says. “You’ve got four seconds to convince people you have what they are looking for, and to then click further and deeper into your website. But you need to know if you are succeeding at this by using analytics. Without Google Analytics, it is like driving without looking in the rearview mirror.”
