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How to Start a Digital Marketing Agency

Samuel Edwards
|
April 22, 2023

So, you want to start a digital marketing agency.

Awesome.

You probably already realized this is a challenging endeavor – or else, you wouldn’t be looking for guides like this.

But don’t fret. With the right strategy, the right resources, and enough diligence and follow through, you’ll be in a position to make your digital marketing agency successful.

Why Start a Digital Marketing Agency?

Advertising Agencies in the US

There are currently more than 90,000 marketing agencies in the United States. That’s a lot of competition. But it’s also an illustration of just how appealing the idea of owning your own successful digital marketing agency is.

These are just some of the reasons that attract people to the realm of digital marketing company ownership:

  • It’s easy. Okay, it’s not really that easy. But it’s easy compared to starting other types of businesses. You don’t need to create an advanced new tech product, you don’t need to spend millions of dollars on factories, and you may not even need to hire people. As far as businesses go, navigating the digital marketing landscape is relatively straightforward. With the right digital marketing tools, you can efficiently manage campaigns, track analytics, and optimize results without massive upfront costs.
  • It’s indefinitely valuable. A successful digital marketing agency is also an excellent money-making opportunity. Whether you do the work yourself or outsource it, you can charge a premium for the services you offer. As long as your client portfolio is robust and diversified, your agency can be a revenue-generating machine for years, if not decades. And in some cases, you can sell your mature agency for a massive profit later on. Expanding services like social media management and paid advertising campaigns can further increase your revenue potential.
  • It allows you to be independent. Most people don’t like the idea of working for someone else; it’s just something we feel like we have to do. But as an agency owner, you can be independent, setting your own hours and working the way you want. Building your own business in digital marketing means having the flexibility to choose your niche, define your services, and scale at your own pace.
  • It puts you in control. If you’re already involved in the world of marketing, you might be especially attracted to starting a digital marketing company so that you can be in the driver’s seat. As the leader of this agency, you will be the one choosing clients, making creative decisions, and ultimately guiding the business. You’ll also have the freedom to build a digital marketing team that aligns with your vision and specializes in different areas such as social media platforms and paid advertising campaigns.
  • It uncaps your income. As a business owner, there’s no fundamental limit to how much money you can make. As long as you keep attracting new clients and providing more services, you can keep scaling up your revenue and profits. Whether it’s through SEO, content marketing, social media management, or other strategies, a successful digital marketing agency has virtually limitless growth potential.

How to Start a Digital Marketing Agency: The High-Level View

In this guide, we’re going to cover all the little elements of starting a digital marketing agency.

But first, it’s helpful to establish a high-level overview – the architecture on which we’ll build our next points.

Starting a digital marketing agency usually unfolds over four distinct phases:

  • Individual development. First, you need to make sure you’re in a position to start an agency and make it successful. That could mean fleshing out your skills as a digital marketer, gaining more experience as an entrepreneur, or even shadowing and learning from existing agency owners.
  • Strategy and planning. Next, you need to focus on strategy and planning. How is your agency going to work? How is it going to be distinguished from its main competition? And what is it going to take to make it successful?
  • Founding and establishment. With a business plan in place and all the skills you need, you’ll be ready to officially create and start running your business.
  • Growth. From there, we’ll focus on growth. Your business is already running and (hopefully) making a profit. We just want to make it run bigger and better.

Individual Development: Digital Marketing Skills and Knowledge

Digital Marketing Skills

Let’s start by focusing on the initial skills and experiences you’ll need to be successful in the digital marketing world.

As an agency owner, you may or may not be doing the ground-level work responsible for helping your clients succeed. Either way, you’ll need to have a grasp on the fundamentals of digital marketing so that you can communicate with clients effectively, appropriately pitch your services, and step in as a leader when necessary.

  • Learn the basics. Make sure you understand the basics of digital marketing. if you have a degree in marketing, or significant experience in the field, you may already have this down. You should be familiar with the “four P’s” (product, price, promotion, and place), popular digital marketing channels, and relevant industry terminology. If these concepts are unfamiliar to you, consider taking some marketing courses online or doing your own research to increase your competence.
  • Become a contractor. It’s helpful to become a digital marketing contractor in at least one field before trying to start your own agency. This way, you’ll get an immersive view of how digital marketing transactions work, how campaigns run, and the best ways to interact with clients. Not all contractors make for good agency owners, but all good agency owners have at least some ground-level experiences.
  • Network. Consider networking with other digital marketers. It’s a great way to learn about different sides of the industry, different marketing channels, and how different agencies are run. Additionally, building your professional network can help you find clients, employees, and contractors when it’s time to officially start your agency.
  • Find a mentor (and shadow them). There’s a reason why 84 percent of Fortune 500 companies have mentorship programs: they work. Consider reaching out to existing digital marketing agency owners to see if you can shadow them and get some advice before heading off on your own. Always be respectful and mindful of your mentors’ time.

Individual Development: Entrepreneurship and Management

Digital marketing skills can help you significantly, but there’s more to running a digital marketing agency than just practicing digital marketing.

You also need skills and experience related to entrepreneurship and management.

In other words, how do you run the business?

  • Do your research. Business fundamentals aren’t the type of subject that can be taught or learned in an afternoon. If you have a business degree, you’ll have an edge here. Otherwise, you’ll need to do your own research and potentially take classes to learn the basics of entrepreneurship and management. What does it take to make a business successful? What do successful business owners have in common? How do you write a business plan?
  • Develop your soft skills. It’s a good idea to develop your soft skills as well, especially if you’re going to be directly managing people. Skills like effective communication, negotiation, and conflict resolution are essential.
  • Anticipate your biggest challenges. Every business owner is going to have strengths and weaknesses based on their past experiences, their personality type, and their existing biases. What are your biggest challenges? What are your blind spots? You need to be able to analyze, acknowledge, and work on these weaknesses.

Strategy and Planning: A Business Plan for Your Digital Marketing Agency

A Business Plan for Your Digital Marketing Agency

Once you feel confident in your skills and experience, you can begin developing a formal business plan for your digital marketing agency.

While it’s not strictly necessary to have an official, written business plan, it’s typically helpful.

This is your opportunity to evaluate the idea behind your digital marketing agency, from start to finish, and project how it’s going to operate. This is also going to serve as the blueprint for founding and establishing your digital marketing agency.

Pay close attention to:

  • The business model. How is your digital marketing agency going to make money? Obviously, you’re going to charge your clients for the provision of digital marketing services. But what kinds of arrangements are you looking for and how are you going to charge? Digital marketing agencies can take different approaches, such as charging a flat fee for each project, charging a monthly retainer fee, charging a fee based on percentage of advertising spending, billing based on hours, or even making money on commissions. As you might imagine, these approaches have different strengths and weaknesses; monthly retainer fees lead to more consistent income, but it also locks you into more client obligations.
  • Products and services. What types of products and services are you willing to offer? Some digital marketing agencies specialize in a specific channel, field, or tactic; for example, you might choose to exclusively focus on link building for SEO or PPC ads through Google. Other agencies pride themselves on offering a range of different services, fulfilling all the marketing needs of their clients in one place. There’s no right or wrong answer for your approach; what’s important is that you choose the best fit and plan around it.
  • Areas of expertise. What are your areas of expertise going to be? This is one factor in your competitive differentiation; in other words, this should distinguish you from your top competitors. Are you going to focus on serving a specific industry? A certain size of business? Businesses hoping to achieve a specific type of goal?
  • Your target audience. Who is your audience going to be? Who do you envision as your main clients and how are you going to reach them? What’s going to convince them that your digital marketing agency is worth using? Why is this audience valuable? The more market research you do, the better you’ll be able to answer these questions.
  • Competitive differentiation. Don’t forget that the world is overrun with marketing agencies – and there’s an even greater number of marketing contractors in circulation. If you want your digital marketing agency to succeed, you need to competitively differentiate. What does your digital marketing agency do that’s different from everything else on the market? What are your biggest competitive advantages? Pricing, quality, specialized expertise, and geographic targeting are common options here.

Start Your Digital Marketing Agency: Founding and Establishment

With a business plan and a solid vision for how your digital marketing agency is going to develop, you can find the business and begin establishing it.

  • Build the brand (and the website). All great digital marketing agencies have a professional, cohesive brand. These brand standards serve as the foundation of all your forthcoming marketing and advertising strategies, and they form the first impressions of the people who interact with your brand initially. Your logo, your color scheme, your brand name, your tagline, and even your voice all plays a role in how people perceive you, so take this project seriously and be prepared to invest in your brand. Additionally, you should build a compelling, conversion-optimized, and fully functional website. Most digital marketing agencies operate with their website as the central hub of communications and operations, so don’t skimp on the details.
  • Start hiring (or building partnerships). Next, you can start hiring or building partnerships. Depending on your service model, you might provide digital marketing services from an in-house team, a network of contractors, or a third-party agency that offers white label services – or all of these simultaneously. As you might expect, there are pros and cons to each approach. And no matter what, you’ll need to do your due diligence before bringing someone on board. In the earliest days of your digital marketing agency development, it’s unwise to hire too many people; labor is expensive, so you’re better off practicing minimalism until you have a steady stream of revenue.
  • Attract your first clients. Your digital marketing agency won’t last long unless you have paying clients keeping it alive. That’s why your next priority is attracting your first clients. If you spend time developing your professional network, you might already have contacts who could serve as potential clients. Otherwise, you’ll need to carefully analyze your target market and find ways to reach out to new prospects; fortunately, as a digital marketing expert, you already know how to do this. Just keep in mind that people may be reluctant to work with you if you don’t have much experience or a robust portfolio of work; if you meet much resistance, consider sweetening the deal by offering a discount or other incentives.

Growth: Scaling Your Digital Marketing Agency

Growth: Scaling Your Digital Marketing Agency

At this point, your digital marketing agency has all the fundamentals in place to make money and continue operations.

But if you want to make even more money and keep growing, you’ll need to invest in scaling your operations. There are many marketing and advertising strategies that can help you here, such as:

  • Pay per click (PPC) advertising. It shouldn’t surprise you to learn that we strongly recommend pay per click (PPC) ads for scaling a new digital marketing agency. You’ll get guaranteed traffic, you can target people with pinpoint accuracy, and over time, you’ll learn more about your campaign so you can optimize it for better results.
  • Search engine optimization (SEO). As far as long-term strategies go, there are a few approaches better than search engine optimization (SEO). With excellent content, a steady supply of backlinks, and technical optimization, you should be able to climb the rankings of search engine results pages (SERPs) and attract more organic traffic. However, the digital marketing industry is highly competitive in this area, driving up costs.
  • Content marketing. In a similar field, you could focus on content marketing. Providing people more information they genuinely need builds their trust and will eventually attract them to your brand.
  • Social media marketing. Social media accounts for your business are free and easy to set up, and you can post and interact with your audiences for free as well. Social media is an excellent distribution platform for your content, and it could be a lucrative source of new traffic and leads.
  • Email marketing. Marketers love email marketing because of how inexpensive and easy to automate it is. If you’re able to get a list of relevant prospects and leads, you can generate a drip email campaign that steadily helps you secure new clients.
  • Referral marketing. Referral marketing is especially powerful in the early days of your business – so give your existing clients a good reason to recommend you!

It’s also important to recognize that people are going to pay close attention to how you market yourself. You’ll be describing yourself as a marketing expert on your website and throughout your marketing and advertising materials, so if the quality of your work doesn’t hold up to scrutiny, you won’t be able to scale successfully. Think of yourself as your first major client.

Are you ready to start your own digital marketing agency?

Are you looking for a partner who can support you with white label PPC services?

Or do you need help scaling up your own PPC ad campaign?

We can help you with all of it. Just drop us a line and we’ll send you a free proposal for any of your PPC advertising needs!

Author
Recent Posts

Samuel Edwards

Chief Marketing Officer

Throughout his extensive 10+ year journey as a digital marketer, Sam has left an indelible mark on both small businesses and Fortune 500 enterprises alike. His portfolio boasts collaborations with esteemed entities such as NASDAQ OMX, eBay, Duncan Hines, Drew Barrymore, Price Benowitz LLP, a prominent law firm based in Washington, DC, and the esteemed human rights organization Amnesty International. In his role as a technical SEO and digital marketing strategist, Sam takes the helm of all paid and organic operations teams, steering client SEO services, link building initiatives, and white label digital marketing partnerships to unparalleled success. An esteemed thought leader in the industry, Sam is a recurring speaker at the esteemed Search Marketing Expo conference series and has graced the TEDx stage with his insights. Today, he channels his expertise into direct collaboration with high-end clients spanning diverse verticals, where he meticulously crafts strategies to optimize on and off-site SEO ROI through the seamless integration of content marketing and link building.

Latest posts by

Samuel Edwards

 (see more)
PPC Ad Trends by Sector & The Impact of AI
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August 22, 2025
Web Hosting Providers: How to Generate Quality Leads with PPC Ads
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July 22, 2025
How to Get Coaching Leads Through Cost-Effective PPC Campaigns
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June 11, 2025
PPC Case Study: Tampa, Florida Apartment Complex
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May 30, 2025

Author

Samuel Edwards

Chief Marketing Officer

Throughout his extensive 10+ year journey as a digital marketer, Sam has left an indelible mark on both small businesses and Fortune 500 enterprises alike. His portfolio boasts collaborations with esteemed entities such as NASDAQ OMX, eBay, Duncan Hines, Drew Barrymore, Price Benowitz LLP, a prominent law firm based in Washington, DC, and the esteemed human rights organization Amnesty International. In his role as a technical SEO and digital marketing strategist, Sam takes the helm of all paid and organic operations teams, steering client SEO services, link building initiatives, and white label digital marketing partnerships to unparalleled success. An esteemed thought leader in the industry, Sam is a recurring speaker at the esteemed Search Marketing Expo conference series and has graced the TEDx stage with his insights. Today, he channels his expertise into direct collaboration with high-end clients spanning diverse verticals, where he meticulously crafts strategies to optimize on and off-site SEO ROI through the seamless integration of content marketing and link building.

Related posts

Samuel Edwards
|
August 22, 2025
PPC Ad Trends by Sector & The Impact of AI

Pay-per-click (PPC) remains one of the fastest paths to pipeline, but the economics vary widely by industry and are shifting as AI reshapes the SERP. CPCs are up versus prior years, conversion rates have improved in many categories, and lead quality is increasingly a function of how well advertisers feed first-party data into bidding models.

The table below summarizes 2025 search-PPC benchmarks by sector—CPC, conversion rate (CVR), and cost per lead (CPL)—so you can compare what “good” looks like in your niche and calibrate ROI assumptions.

Use these numbers as directional guardrails, then layer in your own close rates and LTV to get to the only metric that matters: profitable growth.

PPC ROI Benchmarks by Industry (U.S. Search PPC, 2025)
SectorCPC (2025)CVR (2025)CPL (2025)Notes
Attorneys & Legal$8.585.09%$131.63Intake speed drives ROI.
Home Services$7.857.33%$90.92Strong local intent.
Healthcare (Physicians & Surgeons)$5.0011.62%$56.83Appointment UX boosts CVR.
Real Estate$2.533.28%~$100.48Lean on LSAs/retargeting.
B2B / Business Services$5.585.14%$103.54Optimize to qualified pipeline.
Restaurants & Food$2.057.09%$30.27Fast payback with ordering.
Automotive – Repair/Service$3.9014.67%$28.50Top-tier CVR locally.

ROAS reference points (revenue-based, not lead-based)

  • Median Google Ads ROAS (all, Apr ’25): 3.31x. Varos
  • By industry (PPC / SEM ROAS): Construction 2.25x, eCommerce 2.05x, B2B SaaS 1.70x, Cybersecurity 1.40x, Financial Services 1.05x (SEO ROAS is much higher in many of these, underscoring channel mix). First Page Sage
  • B2B attribution wrinkle: One study claims very high influenced ROAS from branded search; treat as upper-funnel contribution vs. strict last-click ROI. Dreamdata
20-year trend of PPC ROI by industry (2005–2025). Each line represents an industry’s estimated return on ad spend (ROAS multiple), highlighting how ROI has generally declined over time due to rising CPCs, competition, and AI-driven SERP changes—with some verticals (like home services and healthcare) holding steadier than others (like legal and real estate).

What AI changes next (and how it affects ROI)

  1. SERP real estate is shifting
    AI Overviews reduce available clicks and push some journeys into AI modules → lower CTRs and potentially higher CPCs on remaining commercial queries. Expect more ads embedded inside AI answers; you won’t yet target AIO directly, but existing campaigns will surface there. Track impression share & auction insights for queries that trigger AIO. EMARKETER Digiday Business Insider
  2. Automation will keep compressing performance gaps
    Broad match + Smart Bidding + PMax/Asset Gen keep improving. With CPL up modestly but CVR improving in 2025, automation is finding higher-intent pockets—if creative and offline conversion signals are strong. Feed Enhanced Conversions, Offline Conversion Import (OCI), and CRM quality signals to guide the models toward profitable leads. LocaliQ
  3. Privacy & measurement
    Third-party cookies’ slow-roll and Sandbox testing keep the emphasis on consented first-party data and modeled conversions. Make sure Consent Mode, EC, and server-side tagging are dialed in to preserve measurement (and therefore Smart Bidding’s accuracy). Google HelpPrivacy Sandbox

In short, AI is changing the way PPC campaign management is occurring, and it's happening FAST.

Sector-specific expectations (next 6–12 months)

  • Legal: Expect continued high CPLs; ROI hinges on intake speed and close rates. Lean into LSAs (pay-per-lead), call tracking, and qualification automation to protect ROAS. LocaliQ
  • Healthcare: Mixed CPLs by specialty; physicians/surgeons CVR remains strong. Invest in appointment UX, pre-qual triage, and HIPAA-safe OCI to let bidding value true patients. LocaliQ+1
  • Home Services: Favorable CVR/CTR; protect ROI by geofencing, lead-quality filters, and rapid scheduling flows (SMS). LocaliQ
  • Real Estate: Low CVR keeps CPL high; pair search with retargeting and LSAs where eligible. Tighten geo/keyword intent and push more first-party audience lists. LocaliQ
  • B2B SaaS/Pro Services: Lower PPC ROAS norms; success depends on lifecycle value and pipeline attribution. Broaden to PMax + LinkedIn audience imports and optimize to qualified opportunity value, not raw leads. First Page Sage
  • E-commerce: Aggregate ROAS around 3x is common but volatile by category. Creative iteration speed (UGC, feeds, promos) + PMax structure make the difference. Varos

Quick math template (plug your numbers)

ROI ≈ (Close-Rate × Avg Customer LTV ÷ CPL) − 1

Example (legal): if close-rate 12% and LTV $6,000 on CPL $132 → ROI ≈ (0.12×6000 / 132) −1 ≈ 4.45x (345% net). Improve any one input (faster intake bumps close-rate; better routing lowers CPL) and ROI jumps. Benchmarks for CPL/CVR above provide solid starting points. LocaliQ

What to test now (90-day plan)

  1. Measurement & signals: Ensure Consent Mode v2, Enhanced Conversions, and Offline Conversion Import are live; bid to qualified lead values, not just raw form fills. Google Help
  2. SERP/AIO resilience: Track segments where AIO appears; shift budget into high-intent themes and LSAs (legal/home services) and watch paid share of voice. LocaliQ
  3. Model-friendly structure: Use broad match + value-based bidding, and PMax with clean asset groups (feed + creative variants). Expect CVR tailwinds even if CPC creeps up. LocaliQ
  4. Creative velocity with AI: Generate multiple copy/visual angles; keep winners and rotate weekly. (Meta/Google automation rewards fresh, relevant assets.) Business Insider

Conclusion

PPC will keep paying when two things are true:

(1) you can convert and qualify leads quickly, and

(2) your bidding models are trained on the outcomes that actually make you money.

As AI compresses differences in targeting, the edge shifts to first-party data, creative velocity, and value-based bidding.

Treat the benchmarks above as starting points, then rebuild your ROI math from the ground up: ROI ≈ (Close Rate × LTV ÷ CPL).

‍

Contact us today for your customized PPC audit to see how we can improve your search engine marketing ad spend.

Timothy Carter
|
July 30, 2025
Car Dealerships: Why Retargeting Should Be a Key Part of Your PPC Strategy

When you’re running pay-per-click (PPC) ads, it’s easy to assume clicks mean genuine interest, but most car shoppers are just kicking tires online. Seeing your inventory once doesn’t mean they’re ready to buy anytime soon or even at all. If you want to reach the portion of clicks that come from serious buyers, you need to use retargeting. 

The reality is that even prospects who intend to buy a car will bounce before contacting you or visiting your lot in person. And if you don’t have a way to keep them aware of your business, when they’re ready to buy, they’ll buy from a competitor. Running retargeted ads will keep your dealership in their awareness even after they bounce.

According to a 2022 Cox Automotive Car Buyer Journey Study, the average person spends more than 14 hours searching for a new car, which includes visiting around 5 websites before making a purchase decision. The sites they visit include automakers, dealers, third-party sites, and pre-owned car lots with online inventory. Your prospects aren’t going to buy right away, so to get the sale you need to reel them back in. If you’re not using retargeting – also called remarketing – in your PPC campaign, you’re missing out on hot leads.

How retargeting works for car dealerships

Buying a car isn’t a small decision. People compare makes, models, and deals and look for dealerships with great reputations. Getting a single click from a potential car buyer isn’t enough to make the sale. And when they bounce, there’s no guarantee they’ll remember you exist. You’re paying for all those initial clicks, and if potential leads never come back you’ve wasted your ad spend. When you use retargeting, you’ll have another chance to turn their curiosity into a conversation, and that’s why remarketing is an essential component in every PPC ad campaign.

PPC ad retargeting for car dealerships shows your ads to people who have already clicked on an ad or visited your website. When implemented strategically, it keeps your dealership visible across multiple platforms and follows those people across the web. For example, when you run retargeted ads on the Google Display Network, your display ads will show up on the blogs, news sites, and apps your prospects frequent.

You can also run retargeting campaigns on social media sites like Facebook and Instagram. As long as your prospects scroll through their daily feed, your ads will show up for them if they’ve already interacted with you. YouTube also offers retargeting options with video ads that play right before the content. In fact, don’t underestimate the power of YouTube video advertising. According to data from Wyzowl, video ads convince 84% of people to buy a product or service. 

Remarketing allows for tailored messaging

Not everyone searching for a new car will respond to the same bland, boilerplate message. For example, someone browsing luxury SUVs isn’t going to click on an ad that says, “Low APR on all models!” That’s where remarketing shines. It lets you tailor your message to what each user actually wants, which increases response rates.

With retargeting, you can segment your audience based on their interests and behavior. For example, someone comparing financing terms won’t be swayed by flashy sports car imagery. With retargeting, you can show truck shoppers truck ads and sports car shoppers sports car ads. It sounds simple, but it’s one of the most powerful marketing methods of all time. People are far more responsive to messages that feel personal. You may have caught their attention with a general ad at first, but once they start browsing those SUVs on your website, you can retarget them with SUV ads.

When you use retargeting, you can provide different calls to action (CTAs) to users based on how they’ve engaged with your web pages. A visitor who spent a lot of time on your truck inventory pages can be served ads for your latest truck deals. Someone who checked out your lease specials can be hit with ads that talk about financing offers. It’s deceptively simple and brutally effective. Relevance is everything. When your ads reflect what the prospect was already thinking about, it feels personal and resonates.

A next-level tactic is using engagement depth to determine how strong your call to action should be. For instance:

·      Multi-page viewers and long dwell times. These are warm leads and can be retargeted with stronger CTAs like “Book a test drive” and “Get a quote today.” They’re close to converting and just need a little push.

·      Single-page bouncers. These are people who just peeked at your site. They can be re-engaged with lighter touchpoints like a general promotion or model comparison guide to reel them back in.

·      Abandoned lead forms. If someone started filling out a form but didn’t finish, retarget them with a reminder and a stronger offer to sweeten the deal (e.g., “Complete your form for $500 off!”).

This level of nuance turns retargeting into a conversion machine and allows you to show the customer exactly what they want to see.

Retargeting builds trust over time

People don’t buy cars from whatever dealer they find first. That’s too risky. They buy from dealerships they trust and that feel familiar. You can build that sense of familiarity and trust through retargeting. For example:

·      Consistent branding across ads. Using consistent branding, design, and messaging throughout your ads reinforces your dealership’s identity.

·      Frequency builds familiarity. People need to see a brand between 5-7 times before they’ll remember it. Retargeting puts your dealership in front of people over and over again. Even if they don’t click right away, it’s helping to establish your credibility.

·      Social proof works. When you use social proof like customer testimonials or awards in your ads it builds trust with your prospects.

Trust is earned over time, and retargeting will help you get it.

Retargeting helps you stay competitive

If you’re not using retargeting, your competitors definitely are. Car dealerships operate in one of the most brutally competitive markets out there, with national chains and franchise giants dominating search results and flooding ad channels with endless budgets. If you’re not showing up again and again, your competitors will, and they’ll scoop up all your leads. 

The good news is you don’t need a massive marketing budget to get results. Retargeting allows smaller, local dealerships to play smart rather than trying to play big. When you focus on local PPC with hyper-targeted remarketing, you can reach a smaller, more qualified audience – people who are actually in your area, browsing your inventory, and likely to buy soon. 

And unlike those cookie-cutter campaigns from national dealers, you can make your messaging feel personal and specific to your local community. That’s an edge big budgets don’t have. 

Every visitor who leaves your website without converting is a potential sale but not necessarily lost. With smart retargeting, you can bring them back into your funnel and stay top-of-mind while your competitors waste money shouting into the void. Persistence wins the sale and retargeting is how you stay on the map.

Remarketing is cost-effective

To be blunt, search ads can get expensive fast, especially when clicks can cost a couple dollars per click. Pouring money into cold traffic is gambling on people who may not be ready to engage. Retargeting changes everything.

Display retargeting clicks typically cost a fraction of what you’d pay for search ads using competitive keywords. You’re no longer paying top dollar to get someone’s attention from scratch – you’re nudging people who already know who you are, and those people are more likely to respond. This makes retargeting one of the most cost-effective ways to use your advertising budget.

·      Lower CPC, higher intent. Retargeting costs less per click, but you’re targeting people who already visited your site and showed interest.

·      Better conversion rates. Familiarity breeds trust. Retargeted visitors are statistically more likely to convert than new users who just clicked an ad out of curiosity.

·      Higher ROI. Since retargeting reaches warm leads, the cost of acquiring a lead is usually lower, which means your overall cost per lead is lower and you get better ROI.

If you’re skipping remarketing because you think it’s just something “extra” that doesn’t make a difference, you’re not saving money – you’re losing easy wins. Instead of perpetually chasing new, cold traffic, invest in converting the traffic you’re already getting. That’s exactly what remarketing does.

Promote real-time inventory with dynamic retargeting

Generic ads are fine for first impressions, but once someone has browsed your inventory it’s time to get specific with dynamic retargeting. Here’s how it works:

When a prospect views a specific vehicle on your site, you can use retargeting ads to show them the exact vehicles they viewed and others like it down to the year, color, trim, and mileage. For example, if they looked at a black 2005 BMW 535i, that’s exactly what they’ll see in the ad – the same photos, same specs, all across sites like YouTube, Facebook, news platforms, and more. This reminds your prospects of exactly what they want.

Dynamic retargeting works by integrating your live inventory feed with your ad platform, like Google Ads or Meta. This means the vehicles displayed in your ads will always be up to date and won’t feature cars you sold last week. 

Beyond personalization, dynamic ads are an incredible tool for creating a sense of urgency:

·      Leverage scarcity. With these ads, you can leverage the power of scarcity by stating that your inventory won’t last. Using messages like “Only 1 left” or “Recently reduced” signals that the opportunity won’t last.

·      Show what’s popular. If a particular model is getting a lot of views, let your prosects know. People don’t want to miss out on a good deal.

·      Trigger action with FOMO. Fear of missing out is real, and when people see the car they want again – with a reminder that it might sell soon – they’re more likely to come in for a test drive.

By using retargeted ads, you can increase conversion rates by up to 200% compared to standard display ads. These ads feel more like a helpful reminder than an outright advertisement.

Retargeting can be done strategically

If you’ve never run paid ads before, it’s easy to assume your only options are basic keyword targeting and generic follow-up ads. But today’s ad platforms give you a buffet of hyper-specific targeting capabilities to fine-tune exactly who sees your ads, where, when, and how. 

One of the most effective PPC retargeting tactics for car dealerships is location-based targeting. With radius targeting, you can serve ads to people within a specified distance from your dealership, like within 10-15 miles. These will be prospects who are not only likely to visit your site but could realistically walk into your showroom today. Don’t waste ad spend on clicks from people three states away.

Then there are device-specific campaigns. If your analytics show that 75% or your traffic comes from mobile (this is common), you can launch a mobile-only retargeting campaign with click-to-call buttons, mobile-optimized landing pages, and a map and directions built right into your ads. This will improve the user experience and increase conversion rates.

Timing also matters. When you schedule your ads you can control when they appear. Run them during lunch breaks, in the evenings, or on weekends when people have more time to browse car listings and are more likely to make big purchase decisions.

Other strategic targeting elements include:

·      Demographic targeting. You can tailor your messages based on age, income level, and household status. A 25-year-old college grad and a 45-year-old parent are not shopping for the same reasons even though they might buy the same car.

·      Behavioral triggers. You can create audiences for your retargeted ads based on repeat visits, clicks, video views, or interaction with a specific feature like a trade-in calculator.

·      Lookalike audiences. Build new audiences that resemble your best customers. Platforms like Meta and Google are really good at identifying similar users based on their behavior online.

The bottom line is that retargeting doesn’t have to be broad. With the right strategy, it becomes a smart, cost-effective system for reaching the right prospects at the right time.

Remarketing supports seasonal and promotional campaigns

Have a sale, lease offer, or year-end clearance? Retargeting can amplify the urgency to act now. By offering short-term discounts and financing deals, you can tap into the urgency people feel when presented with time-sensitive offers. Emphasize the end date using a countdown timer or final deadline to create FOMO (fear of missing out). 

With this type of retargeting, you can align your ads with your email messaging to increase conversions even more. For example, if you sent out a promotion to your email list, they’re likely to see your retargeted ads and be reminded of the deal you’re offering. 

Stop letting leads slip away – convert clicks into sales with PPC.co

Retargeting is the PPC secret weapon most car dealerships don’t take advantage of. Using this strategy can make the difference between a one-time curious visitor and a buyer ready to schedule a test drive. If you’re spending money on clicks without retargeting your visitors, you’re wasting your ad spend. 

At PPC.co, we specialize in high-performance white label PPC campaigns that include smart retargeting from day one. Whether you’re launching your first campaign or looking to tighten up your existing ad strategy, we can help you capture more leads, drive more traffic, and move cars off your lot. Let’s turn those clicks into closed deals – contact us now to get started.

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