What Is RLSA? A Complete Guide to Remarketing on the Search Network

RLSA (remarketing lists for search ads) is a Google Ads feature that lets you use your custom audience lists of users who have visited your website before to target them in your Google search campaigns or adjust your bids for them.

Traditional search ads focus on the keyword the user searches for. RLSA adds a second, much more powerful layer to the equation: who the user is, meaning their past interaction with you.

Think of it this way:

• Standard search ad: you run a shoe store. You show the same ad to everyone who searches for "running shoes".
• Search ad boosted with RLSA: if a user searching for "running shoes" looked at a specific Nike model on your site last week, you can show them a much more relevant ad such as "15% Off the Nike Pegasus Models You Were Looking At!", or raise your bid by 50% for this valuable user to increase the chance that your ad shows in the top spot.

This is the essence of performance marketing: delivering the right message to the right person at the right time.

Making RLSA part of your strategy fundamentally changes your marketing efficiency.

• Higher return on ad spend (ROAS): because you show ads to an audience that already knows you and is interested in your brand, your conversion rates naturally rise. This means every dollar you spend brings in more revenue. (See our glossary for details on the term ROAS.)
• Efficient budget use: instead of spreading your budget across a general audience with a low chance of converting, you optimize spend by focusing on your most valuable user segments.
• A competitive edge: while competitors bid high on generic keywords, you can win better positions at lower cost by focusing only on users who have shown interest in your brand before.
• Personalized messaging: by showing different ad copy to different user lists (e.g. "cart abandoners", "blog readers"), you can tailor your communication to each segment's needs.

You need three core components to build an RLSA campaign:

Install the Remarketing Tag

Everything starts with tracking user behavior on your site.

• The Google tag: you need to add this tracking code, which you get from Google Ads or Google Analytics, to every page of your website. The tag recognizes visitors anonymously through a "cookie" and adds them to your remarketing lists. The best way to do this is with Google Tag Manager.

Create Remarketing Lists (Audiences)

In Google Ads' "Audience Manager" you can create lists based on different rules, according to how people interacted with your site. Here are some strong list examples:

• All visitors: everyone who visited your site in the last 30 days. (A good list to start with.)
• Visitors to specific pages: for example, people who visited your /performans-pazarlama service page.
• Cart abandoners: people who visited the /sepet (cart) page but not the /tesekkurler (thank-you) page. (One of the most profitable lists for e-commerce.)
• Converters: people who have bought a service from you or filled in a form before. (This audience can be used for upselling or cross-selling.)
• Blog readers: people who spend time in your site's /blog section. (This audience can be shown more informative, softer ads.)

Note: for a search network list to become active, it needs at least 1,000 active users in the last 30 days.

Add Audiences to Your Campaigns

There are two main ways to use RLSA:

• The "Observation" setting (the recommended starting point): with this setting, your ads keep showing to everyone as usual. But when a user on your chosen remarketing list searches, you can raise your bid for that user (e.g. +50%). This lets you prioritize valuable users without restricting your budget or reach.
• The "Targeting" setting: with this setting, your ads show ONLY when users on your remarketing list search. It is used for very niche, focused campaigns. For example, you can build a campaign targeting your competitors' brand names as keywords and show it only to people who have visited your site before.

• Targeting generic keywords: a keyword like "web design", which you would normally avoid as too broad and expensive, can become highly profitable if you use the "Targeting" setting to show it only to users who have visited your site before. Because now the person searching that generic term is a qualified user who already knows you.
• Dynamic ad copy: by dynamically inserting the name of the product or service page the user visited earlier into your ad copy ("The Webflow Service You Were Looking For Is Here!"), you can send your click-through rates (CTR) soaring.
• Segmenting by time and membership duration: create different bids and messages for "visited in the last 7 days" and "visited 90 days ago". Recent visitors are a "warmer" audience.
• Boosting with Customer Match: by uploading the customers on your email list to Google Ads, you can target these people on the search network. This is one of the most valuable services a Google Ads agency can offer.

RLSA lets you build your budget on real user data rather than guesses. By focusing on an audience that already knows and is interested in you, it makes every cent of your ad spend more efficient and maximizes your return on investment (ROI). It's not about getting more clicks; it's about getting the right clicks.

If you want to take the performance of your search campaigns to the next level, it's time to put an RLSA strategy at the heart of your marketing plan. Get in touch to learn more and build your strategy together with us.