Geofencing Conversion Zones: What Are They & How to Use Them
Geofencing conversion zones might sound like a topic and tactic reserved for high-level technical marketers. But the truth is geofencing conversion zones aren’t all that complicated or difficult to set up, and they come with a variety of benefits that can effectively drive new customers to local businesses.
Let’s look at what geofencing conversion zones are and how you can use them even if you think they sound a little intimidating.
What’s Geofencing?
Before you can understand what geofencing conversion zones are, you need to know what geofencing is.
Geofencing marketing is the process of using GPS technology to create virtual boundaries around specific geographic areas. You can create a broad boundary around a city or neighborhood, or you can create a more specific boundary around a business or event location.
Once you create the virtual boundary, you track mobile users who enter or exit the boundary and then send them messages via display ads on their mobile devices.
Geofencing marketing creates opportunities for local businesses to reach the customers most likely to visit their business based on where they are.
For example, you could create a target geofence around the mall where a pizzeria is located, identify mobile users when they enter the mall, and deliver them a coupon for the pizzeria through mobile display ads.
What’s a Geofencing Conversion Zone?
A geofencing conversion zone is a virtual boundary around your physical place of business. When someone who has been tagged by one of your target geofence zones enters your business, it is tracked as a conversion.
A geofencing conversion zone is a way to track the effectiveness of a geofencing campaign. It shows how many people have entered your business after seeing one of your targeted geofenced ads.
(It’s worth noting that you can also track digital conversions through geofencing. You can include a link in your geofencing ad to track the number or clicks. You can also add a conversion tracking pixel to your purchase page if you would like to see how many purchases are made from your ad.)
Related: How Effective Is Geofencing? 3 Examples of Real Campaign ROI
How Do You Use Geofencing Conversion Zones?
To understand how geofencing conversion zones work, consider this case study for one of our MyArea Network partners. We worked with a local bar and grill to use geofencing for restaurants to increase brand awareness and drive in customers.
1. We used competitor targeting and created target geofence zones around 52 competitors located near our partner bar and grill. When customers entered those locations, they were tagged and presented with an ad promoting the bar and grill.
2. We then created a geofence conversion zone around the bar and grill so we could track the number of people who saw the ad and then visited the business.
3. The conversion zone tracked 133 people who entered the bar and grill after being tagged by the target geofences around the bar and grill's competitors. By assigning an average check amount of $20 to each of the 133 conversions, we were able to estimate a $2,660 return on the campaign.
The conversion zone gave us the information we needed to track and measure the effectiveness of the campaign.
Related: Addressable Geofencing: How to Use Location Targeting to Reach Customers
How Do You Set Up Geofencing Conversion Zones?
If you want to create geofence targets and conversion zones, you need geofencing software to create your campaigns. MyArea Network works with Simpli-fi technology to build geofencing campaigns with our partners.
With the right software and partner, you can then create a strategy for your campaigns in just a few steps.
1. Define your audience. Consider who you are trying to reach. Segment your audience and ask questions like:
- Who is your ideal customer?
- Where do they spend time?
- Where do they work and live?
- What type of businesses do they visit?
- What incentives would resonate with them?
2. Outline your goals. Determine your primary objective for the campaign. While geofencing can achieve multiple objectives at once, it’s good to select one primary goal.
- Build brand awareness
- Drive in new customers
- Increase sales
3. Define your target zones. Decide where you would like to build your target geofences. Consider targeting zones:
- Where travelers or locals spend time
- Around competitor businesses
- Around a live event space
- Through addressable geotargeting
4. Create your ad content. Consider your audience and goals, and create content that will resonate and incentify your audience. We recommend adding an offer to your geofence display ads as it can drive in immediate business.
5. Define your geofencing conversion zone. Build a conversion zone around your physical business so you can track the number of customers who come in after seeing one of your geofencing ads. (If you are doing a digital campaign, set up conversion points through your web platforms.)
6. See your success. Using the data you get from your geofencing conversion zones, determine the success of your campaign. Identify elements that worked and elements that did not work, iterate, and run additional campaigns based on what you learned. Do you need to:
- Change target zones?
- Change messaging?
- Increase or decrease ad delivery frequency?
- Change the delivery times of your messages?
Related: 6 Regional Marketing Tips for Brands Trying to Tap Into a Local Market
Get Started with Geofencing
Geofencing conversion zones are an essential part of geofence advertising.
They allow you to both measure the effectiveness of your campaigns and identify ways to improve and create better campaigns in the future. With them, you can monitor the success of your campaigns and see real results.
If you’d like to stop guessing if your marketing efforts are working, give geofencing with conversion zone tracking a try.
MyArea Network has a history of launching successful geofencing campaigns for local businesses. Schedule a time to talk to our team to learn about our past campaigns and see how we can create similar, measurable results for your business.
