Understanding Geofencing

Using geofencing as a location-based advertising strategy is a great tactic that works well in the modern world, but many businesses aren’t taking full advantage of it. What follows is a geofencing guide to get you started the right way.

What is Geofencing?

Geofencing is a method of performing actions based on the location of an individual. A specific geographic area is digitally “fenced” and actions can be taken when the person is inside, outside, or changing from one position to the other.  For example, when prospects are in a basketball arena and looking at the web or apps on their mobile phone, all the ads they see can be “fenced” to display for a local restaurant trying to attract the fans.  All prospects are tracked by GPS so it’s very easy for the marketer to relate to the client how many people went to a location based on the GPS tracking triggered once the prospect visited the ad.

Geofencing Best Practices

The simplest strategies for running a geofencing campaign include geofencing a mall and sending an advert for a particular store within the mall to the user. Similarly, if a person is in a particular store, an advert can be sent for a competing store that sells similar products.

The key factors in building a successful geofencing campaign include the number of geofences you create. If you only create one, you may be missing out on potential customers, but also won’t have great supporting data. If someone is only briefly within your geofence, can you infer buyer intent? Probably not – but if you have several geofences set up, you may find they spend more time in one than the others.

A Geofencing Guide to Markets

Depending on your market, you don’t always have to send an advert immediately – some markets take time to make decisions and keeping them reminded of your business can be beneficial.

While a geofencing guide can’t tell you how to find customers, building a model of your ideal customer is helpful. If you sell products that appeal to people who visit coffee shops, geofence as many coffee shops as you can to advertise to the people who are most likely to be interested in what you do.

With that in mind, make sure that your geofence covers the coffee shop, but maybe not the street outside – passers-by aren’t your target. However, people parking in the parking lot for the coffee shop are your target!

The type of ad you show may also need to reflect your audience. Certain demographics respond better to static ads, while others simply love video.

Markets such as vehicle sales will benefit by geofencing competitors, as will restaurants – but remember, people are hungry before they reach the restaurant, so a larger geofenced area can work well.

Law firms and legal practices might do well to target hospitals (especially the ER) while healthcare businesses may gain benefit from targeting hospitals and other care providers to give customers a choice.

Consider All Options

A geofencing guide can only be complete when non-geofencing data is also looked at. If you can layer data from multiple platforms, including services like Facebook, you can build a complete picture of your customer and target them more effectively.

Effective targeting reduces advertising costs, which is always beneficial no matter what kind of campaign you are running.