Geofencing advertising is a location triggered digital marketing pre-programmed action when a mobile device or RFID tag enters or exits a virtual geo-boundary known as a geofence.
To create geofencing advertising you need to establish a virtual geo-boundary in GPS- or RFID-enabled software like a 200-meter circle on Google Map as specified using APIs when developing a mobile app. This virtual geo-boundary will then trigger geofencing advertising action when an authorized device enters or exits that area, as specified by the administrator or developer.
A geofence is most commonly defined within the code of a mobile application, especially since users need to opt-in to location services for the geofence to work. Geofencing isn’t just for mobile apps – it’s used to control and track vehicles in the shipping industry, cattle in the agriculture industry, and – you’ll see this topic pop up in drone discussions.
With the rising use of mobile devices, geofencing also sometimes synonymous with hyperlocal marketing has become a smart choice for small businesses. Once a geofence boundary is identified, the opportunities the possibilities to target end-customers are manifold and it is becoming more and more useful in social media and digital marketing.
Here are some other common geofencing applications:
Geofencing is a very powerful way to engage consumers based on “hyper-local” location. You can do a lot to trigger immediate sales if set up correctly. Also, you can collect data to understand the mindset of different shoppers. Geofencing should be included in your marketing plan.
Geofencing campaigns can be set up across many types of online advertising campaigns. This includes search engine advertising, display advertising, remarketing, online video advertising, and all social media campaigns.
To set up geofencing advertising with Google Ads, select the campaign you’d like to manage, then go to the Campaign Settings. Google Ads allows you to geofencing on, search, display, and Youtube campaigns. With geofencing in Google Ads, there are quite a few options.
A Country, State, City, DMA, Metro, Zip Code, and Radius. You’ll want to pay attention to the exclusions. In Google Ads, geofencing and geo-targeting are called Location Targeting. Geofencing with Google Ads should help your quality score by serving more relevant ads to local users.
Once you select Locations you can expand the geofencing options in the Google Adwords campaign. Your top geofencing and geo-targeting options are the following:
via Google Adwords
For most local geofencing advertising campaigns, select the option of entering a location. You can use the search feature to start typing in a location to target. The tool will give you options that match the location you searched for.
In the following example, searching for Dallasbrought up several options. It returned a match, as well as the possible Reach for each of those geo-targets. Reach, in Google Ads, is the estimate of how many people are nearby. The target or excluded location of the geofencing or geotargeting settings in your campaign find Google users nearby.
via Google Adwords
To select advanced geofencing options, select Advanced search.Once you select advanced search, you can select to add or exclude geography based on your selections. If you exclude a location in your targeting, then your ad will not serve to people in the exclusion settings.
The Radius targeting options in Google Adwords are either by the number of miles or kilometers around a location. When I’m running a campaign that has extremely tight geofencing or geo-targeting settings, I prefer to select a kilometer radius instead of a mile radius to have tighter location targeting.
To select radius targeting, select the Radius option on your geotargeting. In the example in the screenshot, I’m doing a one-kilometer radius around my physical location. Downtown in the small city of Shreveport, LA). For a Lawyer or Law Firm, this type of targeting can be very helpful if you’re running display ads around a hospital. The number of ways to leverage this tight geolocation targeting is endless.
via Google Adwords Radius Targeting Options
via Facebook Ad Manager
To drill down to a very specific local area, select the geography that you’d like to target. In the following example, you can select “Drop Pin” on the exact location that meets your targeting parameters, then select the radius to target around the desired location. This screenshot shows a 1-mile radius near Highland Park in Dallas.
Via Facebook Advertising platform
To drill down further with your location targeting since polygon targeting is not available on Facebook, additional targeting exclusions can be set to block in your geofencing even closer than a mile around the location pin drop.
Once you set the location that you’d like to target, to drill down to closer than a one-mile radius with geofencing, then you want to start building exclusions around the radius that you’ve set to target. In the following example you can see the original targeting with the location pin drop, and then the location exclusions built around the target location to make the geofencing and geotargeting even tighter than the one-mile radius. This is how you build a geofence on Facebook advertising.
Geofencing in itself is a pretty powerful advertising tool, but it becomes even more powerful when you go hyperlocal. While basic geofencing can create that virtual boundary by targeting an entire zip code, a set of IP addresses from your customer database or all phones within a certain triangle of cell towers, hyper-local geofencing dives deeper than that. By using established GPS coordinates—along with the location-based tracking enabled in many apps and mobile devices—hyper-local geofencing is able to precisely target customers on the go. A hyper-local geofence can be as small as 150 feet. (That could be just one aisle of a store!). Ultimately, this type of hyper-local advertising can allow for much more targeted messaging and strategy, in the end, a higher ROI and more sales as a result.
So how can advertisers actually use hyper-local geofencing?
Once you’ve established a GPS-based boundary, you can create campaigns that directly target mobile users within that area. You then set up “triggers,” which send those users text messages, email alerts, app notifications and more right to their mobile device when they enter the “fenced” area.
Here’s an example: Let’s say you run a coffee shop. When someone enters your block and is presumably walking down the street in your area, you can send a push notification that alerts them of a special deal—maybe a free donut with the purchase of a coffee or 10 percent off their bill.
Whatever it is, you’re: 1) Raising their awareness of your brand, & 2) Giving them immediate incentive to buy from your business.
You can even make the deal good for a future purchase, so they can come back at a later date if they’re strapped for time.
Hyperlocal marketing advertising like this can also be used in other ways—including in retargeting and contextual campaigns.
Hyperlocal advertising is also a great way to beat your competition out of potential business.
The idea’s pretty simple: Use your competitor’s GPS coordinates to offer shoppers deals on products they’re on the hunt for in real-time. Give them deals, discounts, or special offers that entice them to leave that competitor and visit your location instead.
You can also target consumers in the vicinity of your competitors, like those at nearby convention centers or tourist spots.
At the very least, if your hyper-local geomarketing doesn’t work, it gives you information to boost your next campaign. You’ll know where consumers were and what message they saw, and you can refine and polish until your results improve. You can also use that data in retargeting efforts.
Though the idea behind hyper local targeting is pretty simple, the execution of such a campaign is not. If you’re thinking of getting into this type of advertising, you’re best off with enlisting a pro agency that can help get your feet off the ground.
Here are a few other tips from hyper local mobile advertising experts:
