Retargeting

Often a misnomer applied to the practice of stalking consumers across digital properties with ads for products shoppers seemed interested in.

Say Carla, who identifies with she/ her pronouns, is looking for both a new chainsaw and Swedish Fish, and she visits Amazon. She just had her Invisalign aligners removed, so she buys a case of Swedish Fish (great move, Carla) but holds off on the chainsaw. She wants to check Consumer Reports first and is running late for her meeting with Fred Wilpon about joining the New York Mets front office. After she meets with Wilpon, she returns online to find Amazon ads everywhere pushing the last chainsaw she viewed. What did Amazon do to Carla? Amazon targeted her. It did not retarget her. She was never targeted in the first place. She couldn’t be retargeted. A better name: Quicksanding. This is when you step in a marketer’s trap, and the marketer does everything in its power to lure you back in. You either succumb or escape.