Google Customer Match, launching globally in the next few weeks, allows advertisers to upload email lists and target Search, Gmail and YouTube ads to people in their marketing databases. Email addresses are matched to Google account logins.
First disclosed by The Wall Street Journal and a First Thing Monday story back in April, Customer Match is Google’s answer to Facebook’s Custom Audiences and Twitter’s Tailored Audiences.
Advertisers will be able to run different campaigns targeting their prospects and customers based on CRM audience segmentations, with custom bids and messaging in Google search, YouTube Trueview and Gmail ads.
Google will also enable its display and remarketing “similar audiences” targeting for Customer Match, allowing advertisers to use ads on YouTube and Gmail to reach people whose browsing behaviour is similar to current customers and prospects.
Why should you care?
Advertisers already using display remarketing and search retargeting will welcome the option to create custom campaigns for people already in their database, whether existing customers or new leads. Significantly, Customer Match will be more effective in cross-device targeting than cookie-based retargeting methods.
Google, as expected, has policies in place for Customer Match designed to protect user privacy and security. Notably, customer email lists can have a duration of no more than 180 days.
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Jeremy is a Partner and Senior Consultant at SureFire. Jeremy has been working in search since 1996, when he joined the Australian search engine, LookSmart. After relocating to San Francisco, he was instrumental in the development of the company’s paid search ad platform. At analytics company Coremetrics (now owned by IBM) he established an in-house search agency managing campaigns for Coremetrics clients such as Macy’s, Bass Pro and Lands End. At Acxiom he managed members of the pioneering SEO firm Marketleap and worked with clients such as Capital One, American General Finance and Kaiser Health. Joining SureFire in 2009, he is the head of Paid Search Advertising and oversees the delivery of AdWords and other PPC campaigns. He also helps clients make sense of their website data.
