• by Laurie Sullivan , May 5, 2023

Intent-based audience targeting can generate a lower cost per click (CPC) when compared in a study with a controlled audience -- 59.6% lower, based on a 95% confidence score, according to recent data from Foundry, the media, data, and marketing technology arm of IDG.

Foundry analyzed how using intent-based targeting from multiple sources performs more effectively than traditional Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) targeting in B2B advertising.

Intent-based ad targeting in pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns yielded significantly stronger performance and greater reach, in addition to reduced CPC, amounting to 2.5 times greater overall campaign efficiency, the data shows.

In the controlled vs. exposed A/B tests, Foundry also found that the intent-based audience generated 83.5% more impressions than the control audience. 

Identical ads were served to each audience for three separate brands to evaluate ad performance, with targeting as the variable and found that the exposed, intent-based audiences outperformed the control audience across all tests.

All three tests were run on the Google Display Network with identical setups. Each test aimed to drive individuals to a piece of marketing content.

A campaign was created with two ad groups in it. Ad groups shared a campaign-wide budget and were enabled simultaneously. The only difference between each ad group was the targeting settings, according to the report.

Interestingly, Google audience optimization was turned off for both ad groups, and no other targeting settings were in place. This allowed Foundry to measure the effectiveness of each group based on intent versus control audience rather than Google’s optimizations or differences in ad creative or landing page.

The data shows that the total cost of both ad groups was similar, but the CPC in the intent-based group was lower because of the higher propensity of that audience clicking an ad. 

It also showed an average click-through rate (CTR) increase of 220% on ads shown to intent-based audiences in all tests.

Foundry suggests that based on these results, with the same budget using an intent-based audience, B2B marketers could see 2.5-times improvement to campaign efficiency than if they used standard firmographic and demographic targeting.

The test relied on a combination of first-party, proprietary second-party, and third-party data, using a smart scoring algorithm. The database comprises 52 million intent signals per week, including social activity, website activity, and proprietary second-party data from owned publishing networks. Intent signals were mapped to a database of 4 million companies and more than 40 million B2B contacts.