Dmitriy К. Google Ad Expert

Why geotargeting is needed in contextual advertising and how to make best of it

Geotargeting is one of the required campaign settings. With it, a business finds an audience for its advertising in the right city, area, state or even on a specific street. What tasks does geotargeting solve and how to set it up correctly so as not to waste the budget on a non-target audience we will analyze in the article.

Geo-targeting shows ads to users who are located in the area specified by the advertiser. Without geographic targeting, an ad can be shown everywhere and it will be seen by all users, even where the business is not represented. For the advertising consumer, geotargeting provides the most relevant offers, those that are available to him, because they are nearby.

Advertising systems determine the user's location by the IP addresses of desktop computers, cell towers that track mobile devices, and cookies. Applications and desktop versions of advertising systems exchange data, so with the help of geotargeting, you can show ads to a person who lives in one area, but often visits another.

What is geotargeting

Depending on the area of ​​advertising display, geotargeting can be:

1. Extended, it shows ads with offers in the city or area specified in the request, even if the user is located in a different location.

2. Local, where the ads are shown within the same city or region. Suitable for offline businesses, such as auto repair shops, shopping malls, beauty salons.

3. Hyperlocal (supergeotargeting) is the most accurate targeting, which is usually tied to a specific address or point on the map. Shows ads in a specific area of ​​the city with a given radius or exact outline on the map.

When setting up supergeo, you can set the behavioral characteristics of the audience and find:

- those who are now in the indicated place;

- regularly there, for example, works nearby;

- was some time ago in this place.

How geotargeting improves campaign performance

1. Shows ads to the right audience. This setting largely determines the results of campaigns: even the best and most attractive ads will not bring interested users from New York if they are targeted at Miami.

Geo-targeting will also be needed if the advertiser works in different cities under different conditions or launches local promotions in them. In such cases, it is better to run separate campaigns with appropriate geotargeting and create more targeted ads with cities and conditions.

2. Allows you to optimize rates. The cost of placement in different regions often differs due to competition and demand for a product or service. If an advertiser works in several cities with different rates and launches one campaign, then the CPC in all cities will be the same i.e. the maximum. That is why, in order to optimize advertising costs, it is necessary to launch campaigns targeting different regions.

3. Helps manage bids based on conversions. The division into campaigns by region also makes it possible to manage bids depending on the level of conversion for users from different locations.

Cons:

- With the wrong settings, you can greatly narrow the audience and miss potential customers.

- Ads can appear intrusive and make users feel like they are being watched.

5 tips for better geotargeting

1. In search ads, use an add-on with an address so users will immediately see where you are and, possibly, become your buyers. You can also write down famous landmarks nearby: a metro station, a popular shopping center, or a street.

2. Calculate the budget for each region separately, as competition, key phrases and bids may differ in them.

3. For supergeo, use not only a branch of your company, but also crowded places and points of attraction nearby such as restaurants, parks, theaters, festivals. For example, if your coffee shop is near the train station, you can offer a discount on coffee to everyone who is just from the train.

4. Combine geo-targeting with other targeting, such as temporal and interest-based. For example, the same coffee shop can offer breakfast ads to those who walk past it to work.

5. Stop in time: fine-tuned segments, such as only one address, rarely drive a lot of traffic, and therefore do not bring good results.

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