How to Implement an Effective Targeting Strategy that Yields Conversions

Seasoned affiliates have the ability to produce amazing creatives and write alluring ad copies. But, the truth is that building a great campaign requires deep knowledge and understanding of the targeting settings you have available.. 

By implementing the right targeting strategy, you can give your campaign a nice boost in the conversion department while reducing expenses. But, putting together a winning combination of filters can be challenging, even for the most seasoned marketers.

This article will discuss a few tips that will help you deploy a targeting strategy that keeps costs low while reeling in more conversions.

Why Do All Affiliate Campaigns Need Intricate Targeting?

While the concept may be simple, there are small details that can make or break any affiliate campaign. Even if the creatives, ad content, and offer page are on point, you have to pay attention to your audience’s time zone and language as these may sabotage your campaign.

Once you have all the information you can collect about your audience, targeting allows you to set the parameters that help show your ads to the right users. If not, your adverts will be displayed to all consumers, which will produce less-than-stellar results. 

Instead, you can toggle the targeting settings and choose to show your ads based on location, device, and other parameters.

Types of Targeting Available

Depending on the platform you use, there are many different targeting settings you can choose from. At ActiveRevenue, we allow affiliates to target their audience based on:

• Geographical location
• OS
• Device
• Browser 
• Carriers
• Keywords
• Interests and More

How to Implement an Effective Targeting Strategy that Yields Conversions

Although targeting is an essential skill for most marketers, it’s also extremely difficult to implement. If your targeting settings are too lax, you’ll lose out on budget and performance. If you opt for narrow settings, you may cut your traffic volume and reduce your ROI.

The key to establishing a sustainable targeting strategy is to find balance. You need to look for the combination that helps boost conversions while allowing you to identify the parameters that don’t improve performance.

In order to implement an effective targeting plan, you have to:

Look at the Offer You’re Working With

Even before accepting it, you should look at the offer and figure out what type of targeting you can implement. In most cases, the offer will determine the language, age group, geographical location, device type, keywords, and interest you’ll be looking for.

Define Whether You’re Targeting Mobile or Desktop-Only

Most offers will dictate whether it’s for desktop or mobile, so this is pretty straightforward. But, you should be careful because launching a campaign with the wrong format can be a costly mistake.

Start By Filtering Locations

The first step in your strategy should be to target certain locations based on the offer requirements. In case you know about specific cities or regions that perform well, you can set these up from the beginning. 

And, if the offer doesn’t have defined locations, choose the areas based on the language. For instance, offers in english should always target the UK, US, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, and other markets that speak the language, unless stated otherwise.

Move on to Keywords and Interests

Again, whatever users get as part of the offer will determine the keywords and overall interests you’re targeting. For example, if the offer is about sporting equipment, you should already have a good idea of the keywords and browsing habits you’re after.

Combine Device, OS, Carrier, and Browser Targeting

The device, OS, and browser types are usually related, so you’ll want to toggle these at the same time. There is no silver bullet solution, so you have to study your audience and figure out which devices, operating systems, and browsers your targets prefer. You’ll also want to consider the carrier targeting at this stage, if applicable.

Regulate Frequency, Optimize, and Remarket

Finally, establish the frequency that you want your ads to show. There are very few cases where you want your ads to run around the clock, so take your time and figure out which schedule works best. Once you collect enough information, optimize your targeting and develop a retargeting strategy for users you’ve already interacted with. 

Beware of Going too Narrow!

We mentioned this briefly, but it’s worth going over it again: be very careful about narrowing your targeting settings too much. This will only hinder your campaign and won’t allow enough traffic to optimize or remarket properly.

Find Out More About Our DSP

Polishing your targeting skills will allow you to reduce expenses and increase the amount of conversions you generate. That said, you also have to learn how to use the different filters in unison and avoid narrowing your setting too much.

To learn more about our targeting options or our DSP, contact us today and our team will be glad to help.