Mobile and Cross-Device Retargeting Remain Priorities for B2B Marketers

According to AdRoll’s recently published “State of the Industry” report, about 57 percent of B2B respondents are currently focusing on mobile and cross-device retargeting as part of their marketing strategy.

AdRoll defines retargeting as bringing shoppers back to your website so they can make or complete a purchase. Retargeting allows marketers to customize their content to serve people based on how they have interacted with the company website in the past. The results are based on a survey of 1,000 marketers across a wide variety of industries.

The research showed that social media is the single hottest topic in retargeting, with mobile and cross-device targeting coming in close behind. Instagram and Pinterest were the top two sites where marketers would like to see additional retargeting. Survey responses validate recent reports published from other sources, including news coverage on KoMarketing this past week.

Approximately 70 percent of marketers say they use retargeting for brand awareness, while 60 percent said they do so for social engagement. Nearly 58 percent said they use it for customer retention.

But where does the need for retargeting come from? Where is the marketing ineffectiveness?

A Kink in Content Marketing

A study released by Forrester Research, the Business Marketing Association and the Online Marketing Institute back in July titled, “The BMA/Forrester/OMI Benchmark Study 2014” showed that only 1 in 7 B2B marketers saw their content marketing efforts as “very effective” within the past 12 months.

About 51 percent of respondents said that their content marketing was “somewhat effective,” and researchers concluded that content production is not always optimized for the buyer’s full journey.

“Survey results tell us that B2B marketers are strongest at connecting content themes to the brand, business objectives, and customer concerns,” wrote the authors of the report. “They are also pretty good at getting this content in front of buyers. However, they are weakest at developing content that builds relationships with buyers, garnering enterprisewide support for and compliance with content strategies, and demonstrating a meaningful correlation between content production and business results.”