How behavioral targeting can work for you

Which is more valuable: an advertising campaign that reaches a lot of people, or one that targets people who are more likely to become customers? The latter, of course, brings a much better ROI (return on investment). With the increase in online traffic has come an increase in online advertising. Many consumers click only on ads that are particularly relevant to their interests and needs. Behavioral targeting, or behavioral marketing, helps advertisers target consumers who are already searching for information to advertise to based on their online behavior. It also helps them tailor their advertising messages for these consumers. It lets advertisers aim for quality over quantity in their advertising.

How behavioral targeting tracks behavior

To sell products or services, we need to know what consumers want — not just the products and services themselves, but what types of features and presentation appeal to consumers. Online technology provides the means to collect information and profile site visitors.

Ad click-through rates and page views show a lot about consumer behavior. While some people click on quite a few ads, other people are more particular. When they're really interested, they go back to those ads or to the pages they link to. Targeting people who have clicked on an ad or visited a page previously, maybe more than once, is likely to produce a better ROI than advertising to the general public.

Site searches provide details about exactly what site visitors want to find. They give us information about visitors' interests and degree of interest with the words they search with and the number of times they search. Part of behavioral targeting is to track the pages that visitors viewed and the search terms that brought them there.

Tracking codes (cookies) track what sites visitors come from, what content they view, and for long. The sites that visitors access our sites from provide information about those visitors' interests and may indicate what their gender probably is. In addition, IPs can also be tracked, and they show where visitors are geographically. Even time of day can be relevant. If visitors are surfing during business hours, they may be searching for products or services related to their jobs.

If the site has different types of content or ads, data about what visitors view aside from the main content type help create a more detailed profile of each visitor. Visitors who go from health information to car seats, for example, probably have a young family to raise. Those who research different types of high-end products are likely to have disposable income. Compared to people raising children, they may be more interested in prestige than practicality.

All the data collected can be analyzed to classify visitors into demographic groups. Ads targeting their demographic group are shown when visitors surf the site.

Behavioral targeting and the consumer buying process

Consumers go through four phases when buying: need recognition, information search, evaluation of options, and purchase decision. Once they become customers, they often become repeat customers.

Behavioral targeting monitors consumers at all of the above phases. It creates profiles of repeat site visitors, and it allows advertisers to speak directly to the targeted consumers' interests and needs.

By using behavioral targeting, we can not only convert more visitors into customers, but we can also study patterns over time to help retain customers as repeat customers.

How to use behavioral targeting in advertising

Online behavioral targeting is possible because of the technology that has been developed for it in recent years. A search for "behavioral targeting" produces advertisements for technology providers that gather information, create profiles, deliver targeted content, and more. Here's some of what they do:

Identify the right audience. They may not be exactly who you think they are, but there are probably segments of the population who will be particularly interested in your products or services once they know about them.

Learn what appeals to that audience. Are they looking for convenience? Status? Efficiency? A combination of features?

Develop messages to target each audience. Create advertisements and content that will appeal to each type of person and will trigger their impulses to buy.

Tailor the messages according to when they'll be seen. If you're launching a new product, ads generating interest will be different from the ones you use just before or after you launch your product. And people who have already visited your site are at a different point in purchase decision-making than those who haven't been to your site before. When profiles are used to identify visitor goals, the right content can be shown at the right time.

In addition, some behavioral targeting technology vendors offer search engine optimization, email campaign management, and other related services.