Remarketing Ads Not Showing in Gmail

[areyougellin]

After reviewing the performance of my remarketing text ads, I noticed that I haven't received a single impression from one of the biggest Display Network sites: Gmail. My bids should be high enough.

In my usual GDN campaign, mail.google.com is a heavy hitter. For those that are running remarketing campaigns, do you see impressions generated on Gmail?

I've now setup a placement campaign targeting my remarketing audience and mail.google.com specifically to see if that helps. Just curious if anybody had any insight.

Thank you.

[RhinoFish]

how large is your remarketing list tag?

what other targeting have you combined, if any?

is there any market segment reason why gmail users may not be frequently added to your remarketing list?

[areyougellin]

Remarketing list is about 20,000 users. No custom combinations or exclusions. The ads show on every other Display Network site except mail.google.com. I'm beginning to think that Gmail doesn't serve Remarketing ads.

Can anybody confirm whether or not this is the case in their own accounts?

[areyougellin]

Plus, we get visits and conversions all the time from Gmail users through our Display Network campaigns.

It just seems to be Remarketing where we don't even get a single impression.

[RhinoFish]

you said no custom combos or exclusions, i assume you mean remarketing combos and/or remarketing exclusions... is that correct?

besides remarketing, are there other targeting methods being used in this campaign, meaning are you combining remarketing with any other targeting mechanisms (like keywords or placements)?

above, where you say no exclusions, i don't know whether you mean no exclusions or negatives applied via remarketing lists, or if you mean you have no placements, topics, or interests added as exclusions...

[areyougellin]

I'm only targeting via the Remarketing list. No keywords, no placements, no topics or interest. No excluded placements, interests or topics, and no negative keywords.

Are you able to check your own Remarketing campaigns to see whether or not mail.google.com serves your Remarketing ads. I've spoken to one other person who was surprised to confirm that their Remarketing campaign also wasn't appearing on Gmail.

I'm beginning to suspect that Remarketing ads are intentionally excluded from being served on Gmail.

[RhinoFish]

i so rarely use naked remarketing (remarketing by itself), that i can't answer your question.

and depending on the item / service for sale, many times (on a case by case basis) gmail is something i don't target, or that i block.

perhaps just using remarketing, without keywords (or others targeting mechanisms), means that other advertisers (or your other campaigns) have a much higher relevance, so this campaign isn't winning the auction.

or maybe G, to make remarketing less creepy, raises the relevancy bar for gmail targeting, meaning it's not just that you're not winning the auction, but trying to whack gmailers with remarketing alone, unlike a site visit, is treated differently, for the benefit of gmail users.

but, all i've said is conjecture, so, "i don't know" fits. :-)

try adding additional, broad keyword targeting - i'm guessing gmail wouldn't just let remarketers have the gmail ad spots based on remarketing alone - seems it'd be annoying as a gmail user. again, not saying it's prevented / blocked, but i do think naked remarketing would be algo judged to have low relevance, absent any other targeting criteria. like if i had a display campaign with one keyword, 'color', and tried to run display ads based on the keyword.

i have seen 1-word keyword display campaigns run at idle.

[RhinoFish]

forgot to ask you "where" you are looking for your imps...

[adwords.google.com...]

[areyougellin]

First, I looked at the Networks tab on my Remarketing Ad Group that has been running for nearly a year. Sorted the group and looked for mail.google.com, which was nowhere to be found. Thus, it hadn't produced a single impression.

To further test, I setup a separate Ad Group targeting mail.google.com and my Remarketing Audience specifically. This has been running since I started this thread and has yet to generate a single impression.

I've also tested other approaches, such as adding keywords to further target the Placement/Audience settings. This also hasn't produced anything.

I've only been able to get one other person to confirm that their Remarketing campaigns also aren't getting impressions on Gmail. Haven't been able to get anybody to confirm that they are getting Gmail impressions.

I think I'm going to conclude that everybody assumes their Remarketing ads will be shown on Gmail since it is part of the Display Network, when in fact they're deliberately excluded from being served. My only guess is that Google wants Gmail ads to be as relevant as possible to the content in the email being read and therefore prevents Remarketing ads.

[RhinoFish]

i definitely smell what you're stepping in, and though your testing and analysis seems thorough and correct to me, i'm still not ready myself to make a conclusion. remarketing does imply relevance in a way, but i do concur with you generally on keywords raising the relevance.

if your conclusion is correct, i wish G were more forthcoming with this sort of info.

ps - one last question set for you... what's the count on the remarketing list you're using? is the tag that made the list a sitewide visit tag, or something more specific (and therefore more relevant), like a receipt page tag or specific category or product page tag?

[Planet13]

I mentioned this in the other thread, but...

When i check my gmail, I don't seem to get any remarketing ads.

When I go to lots of websites with adsense on there, I DO get lots of re-marketing ads.

Hope this helps.

[areyougellin]

> ps - one last question set for you... what's the count on the
> remarketing list you're using? is the tag that made the list a
> sitewide visit tag, or something more specific (and therefore more
> relevant), like a receipt page tag or specific category or product
> page tag?

It's a side-wide tag with a user list of over 10,000.

[RhinoFish]

10k is way more than sufficiently large.
your conclusion is sounding very solid to me.