According to a recent study, many marketers see personalization as the most important capability to the future of marketing. We also just happen to live a world where the Internet knows more about you than the coworker sitting next to you.
For the last several years, paid search has been all about targeting the right set of keywords to find customers who may or may not be in-market for your products or services, but this strategy can have a lot of flaws. From generating trivial clicks and insignificant site visits, PPC can become very expensive if your keyword strategy isn’t on point. Even if you’re targeting the most relevant set of keywords, your volume might be so low that you’re not reaching nearly enough searchers to generate new business.
If Google knows so much about each and every user, why is it so hard for businesses to find the right audience? For one, Google prides itself on protecting user information. But Google also knows what advertisers want, which is why they introduced Customer Match in September 2015. Customer Match allows the advertiser to upload a list of contacts you already have and target them through search. This feature is also available with Facebook and Twitter, and is essentially making search and social become more like email marketing by serving ads to people who are within a certain stage of your purchase funnel.
For example, you’ve captured a list of emails from a recent conference on inventory software. You can now target these people on Google, Twitter, or Facebook with relevant offers. In 2016, PPC will likely become more personal, which is why businesses must start promoting these new strategies such as Customer Match, to connect with prospects and customers with messages catered to them.