Audience Lists

Audience Lists are collections of website visitors, app users or customers that you save in an advertising platform such as Google Ads, Meta Ads or LinkedIn Campaign Manager. You can use these lists to reach the same people again with adverts (retargeting) or to find new, similar target groups (lookalike audiences). You build these lists based on behaviour: pages someone has visited, actions they have taken, or characteristics from your CRM system.

How Audience Lists work in practice

You place a tracking pixel or tag on your website. As soon as someone visits a page, their anonymous browser ID or device ID is added to a list in the advertising platform. You can segment lists based on specific pages, duration, number of visits or conversion behaviour. For example, an online shop can create a list of visitors who viewed a product page but did not complete a purchase. A B2B service provider can build a list of people who downloaded a white paper. Once the list is large enough (usually a minimum of 100 to 1,000 users, depending on the platform), you can target adverts at it.

Why Audience Lists came about and why they are still relevant today

Audience Lists emerged when advertising platforms realised that generic targeting was too broad and too expensive. By re-engaging visitors who had already shown interest, the conversion rate increased and the cost per acquisition decreased. With the introduction of privacy legislation such as the GDPR and the phasing out of third-party cookies, collecting first-party data via proprietary pixels has become more important. Audience Lists are now one of the few ways to collect behavioural data without relying on external data brokers. Platforms such as Google and Meta are investing heavily in server-side tracking and Consent Mode to ensure that Audience Lists remain usable even in a cookie-less future.

What Audience Lists deliver for small and medium-sized companies

For an SME company, Audience Lists mean your advertising budget is used more efficiently. Instead of reaching everyone, you focus on people who have already shown an interest. This increases the likelihood of conversion and reduces the cost per click. A solar panel installation company can retarget visitors to its ‘solar panels’ page with a quote. An online shop can show a discount code to those who have abandoned their shopping baskets. You can also build lookalike audiences: the platform identifies new users who resemble your best customers. Would you like to know how to use Audience Lists as part of a well-thought-out advertising strategy? Check out Monkey Vision SEO services for an integrated approach to organic and paid traffic.

Audience Lists are highly versatile, ranging from re-engaging abandoned shopping basket users to finding new customers who resemble your best buyers. Below are four specific scenarios in which small and medium-sized companies use Audience Lists, plus when it is and isn’t the right choice.

Retargeting of product page visitors in online shops

An online shop with 500 products finds that 80 per cent of visitors leave without making a purchase. By creating an Audience List of visitors who viewed a product page but did not complete a purchase, you can re-engage them within 7 days with a targeted advert. You show them the product they viewed, possibly with a discount code or free delivery. Platforms such as Meta Ads and Google Ads support dynamic product adverts that automatically display the correct product. This approach often increases the conversion rate by 20 to 40 per cent compared with cold traffic. Prerequisite: you must have a product feed linked and sufficient traffic to populate lists of at least 1,000 users.

Lookalike audiences for lead generation in B2B

A B2B service provider with 200 existing clients uploads a client list (email addresses or telephone numbers) to LinkedIn Campaign Manager or Meta Ads. The platform matches this data with profiles and builds a lookalike audience: new users with similar characteristics such as job title, company size and interests. You can set the similarity level from 1 per cent (most similar, smaller group) to 10 per cent (broader, less similar). This approach works well if you have at least 100 high-quality clients and want to grow without cold calling. Drawback: the quality of lookalike audiences depends on the quality of your source list. Outdated or mixed data results in poor matches.

Event-based audiences for webinars and downloads

A software company organises a monthly webinar. Using an Audience List, you can collect visitors who viewed the landing page but did not register. You can show them a reminder advert 24 hours before the webinar, featuring a last-minute incentive. After the webinar, you create a second list of participants who watched but did not request a demo. You approach this group with a case study or a trial offer. This sequential approach increases conversion rates within the funnel. Prerequisite: you must tag events correctly via Google Tag Manager or the Meta Pixel, and you need consent via a cookie banner that complies with the GDPR guidelines of the Dutch Data Protection Authority.

Cross-selling and upselling to existing clients

An online course platform has customers who took Course A. By creating an Audience List from this group, you can show them adverts for Course B, which is a logical follow-up. Alternatively, you can build a list of customers who made a purchase more than six months ago and offer them an updated version or a bundle. This approach works well in e-commerce, SaaS and the service sector. You’re advertising to people who already know and trust your brand, which lowers the barrier to entry. Drawback: if you advertise too often to the same small list, ad fatigue will increase and results will decline. Limit the frequency to a maximum of three impressions per week.

When Audience Lists are the right choice and when they are not

Audience Lists are the right choice if you have at least 500 visitors per month, a clear conversion goal and consent for tracking. They work best for products or services with a consideration period of a few days to weeks, such as online shops, SaaS tools and B2B services. Audience Lists are not suitable if you have too little traffic (the lists will remain too small), if your product is a one-off purchase with no upselling potential, or if your target audience actively blocks adverts. In such cases, content marketing or organic search visibility is a better investment.