How to Use Intent Data for Lookalike Segmentation

Want to double your conversions while cutting costs? Combining intent data with lookalike segmentation can help you achieve 2–3× higher conversion rates and reduce customer acquisition costs by 30–45%. This strategy works by analyzing 100 billion daily buying signals to identify potential customers who behave like your best ones.

Here’s how it works:

• Intent data reveals who’s actively searching for products or services like yours.

• Lookalike segmentation expands your reach by targeting people with similar behaviors to your top customers.

• Businesses using this method report massive drops in cost per acquisition (CPA) and higher campaign efficiency.

Key Benefits:

• Save up to 70% on ad spend by focusing on high-intent prospects.

• Boost lead quality and engagement with real-time data updates.

• Achieve faster results through AI-driven audience modeling.

This guide will show you how to combine these tools step-by-step to optimize your marketing campaigns.

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Understanding Intent Data

Intent data helps identify individuals or businesses researching products or services similar to yours. It tracks their online activity, giving you the chance to connect with prospects who are actively interested, and at the most opportune time.

Where Intent Data Comes From

Intent data is drawn from various sources to paint a clear picture of buyer behavior. Advanced systems powered by AI scan countless websites weekly, collecting strong indicators of interest through an extensive network of partners.

Here are some primary sources of intent data:

• Website activity: AI monitors and analyzes behavior across a vast number of websites.

• Professional networks: Platforms like LinkedIn provide valuable insights into professional interests and actions.

• Public records: Data from sources like the Census and other publicly available information.

• Consumer profiles: Regularly updated profiles of potential buyers to ensure accuracy and relevance.

This mix of data sources ensures precise targeting and real-time updates, helping you stay ahead in identifying potential leads.

Why Intent Data Matters

Intent data reshapes marketing by focusing your efforts on prospects who are actively searching for solutions. This not only reduces costs but also boosts the quality of your leads, connecting you with individuals who are ready to make a purchase. Ad platforms also benefit from this data, allowing for sharper targeting and stronger campaign results.

The real strength of intent data is its ability to identify interested prospects before your competitors do. In today’s fast-paced digital world, being the first to engage can make all the difference.

With these insights, you can incorporate intent data into lookalike segmentation strategies to further refine your targeting.

Understanding Lookalike Segmentation

Lookalike segmentation takes the insights gained from intent data and uses them to expand your reach by identifying prospects who share characteristics with your best customers. This approach ensures you target people who are likely to show similar behaviors, making your campaigns more efficient and effective.

Steps to Create Lookalike Audiences

Using intent data as a foundation, here’s how to build lookalike audiences:

• Start with your best customers: Identify your top-performing customer segments to use as your "seed audience."

• Analyze their traits: Look at their behaviors, demographics, and intent signals to understand what makes them valuable.

• Set clear parameters: Decide how broad or specific your lookalike audience should be, depending on your goals.

• Upload data to platforms: Use advertising platforms to create lookalike models based on your customer data.

• Track and tweak: Monitor how these audiences perform and make adjustments to improve results.

Why Use Lookalike Audiences

Lookalike audiences are a powerful way to grow your reach while maintaining accuracy. When paired with intent data, businesses often see 2-3x higher conversion rates, 30-45% lower customer acquisition costs, and better audience alignment thanks to the analysis of over 100 billion daily buying signals. For example, a financial advisor achieved a 42% drop in cost per lead, a 71% rise in leads, and a 133% jump in appointment show-up rates.

5 Steps to Combine Intent Data with Lookalike Segments

To make the most of intent data and lookalike segmentation, follow these five steps to effectively blend both and enhance your campaign results.

1. Gather and Refine Intent Data

Start by collecting intent data that highlights buying signals. For example, 24/7 Intent’s platform processes over 100 billion buying signals every day and updates more than 270 million consumer profiles. This involves:

• Using AI to scan billions of websites weekly

• Collecting data through co-registration partner networks

• Updating profiles with public sources like LinkedIn and census data

• Refreshing data every six hours to keep it current

2. Identify Your Top Customers

Pinpoint your most valuable customers by analyzing key factors like purchase history, transaction amounts, engagement across channels, intent signals that led to conversions, and customer lifetime value (CLV).

3. Build Lookalike Models

Use AI to create lookalike models that reflect the behaviors of your best customers. Intent data helps ensure these models are precise, connecting customer insights with a broader audience.

"Bobby, a Digital Marketing Specialist, shared that they saw a 50% drop in VSL opt-in costs within 24 hours of using intent data. This was in a market they had been targeting for three years, with typical costs ranging from $10-$25."

4. Integrate with Ad Platforms

Connecting with major ad platforms is essential. Tools like 24/7 Intent integrate seamlessly with platforms such as Meta, Google, YouTube, LinkedIn, TikTok, and Snapchat, helping reduce wasted ad spend (up to 70%) when testing new audiences. For instance, automotive dealer Bill Luke noted:

"We generated 1,608 leads in just three days, most of which included details like credit scores, vehicle mileage, car make, and in-market affinity."

Once integrated, consistent monitoring is key to success.

5. Monitor and Optimize Your Campaigns

Track campaign performance by focusing on metrics like conversion rates, customer acquisition costs, return on ad spend (ROAS), and lead quality scores. Use this data to fine-tune your targeting and regularly update your intent data. Businesses using intent-based lookalike targeting often achieve 2-3x higher conversion rates and reduce customer acquisition costs by 30-45%. Continuous optimization ensures these benefits are sustained over time.

Tips for Better Results

Here are some practical ways to fine-tune your lookalike targeting strategy and achieve better outcomes.

Start with Reliable Customer Data

The success of lookalike targeting starts with solid customer data. This data serves as the foundation for the models described earlier. Focus on collecting opt-in, privacy-compliant intent signals to ensure the data you use is both actionable and trustworthy. Tools like 24/7 Intent's platform provide reliable data sources. Make sure your data sources comply with regulations like GDPR and CCPA to safeguard your business and build trust with your audience.

Keep Your Intent Data Up-to-Date

Having quality data is just the first step - keeping it current is equally important. Some platforms update their data weekly or monthly, which is crucial for staying relevant. Fresh data helps you capture timely signals, avoid unnecessary ad spend, and quickly adapt to changes in the market.

"Who needs broad intent data from a month ago? Get the latest buying signals with context." - 24/7 Intent

Experiment with Audience Settings

To get the most out of your lookalike targeting, try different audience configurations. Moving beyond basic demographics, you can test intent-based segmentation using various approaches:

• Segments built around strong buying signals

• Audiences shaped by specific keywords

• Custom data models tailored to your business

This kind of experimentation works hand-in-hand with overall campaign optimization, helping you refine your strategy over time.

24/7 Intent Platform Features

This platform constantly monitors buying signals and updates consumer profiles, offering tools designed to drive results. It integrates with major ad platforms in real time, refreshing data every 6 hours. This ensures you're always working with the most up-to-date insights.

"The best results come from plugging our data into your paid ads, giving ad platforms the best market context - boosting conversions, improving lead quality, and lowering customer acquisition costs." – 24/7 Intent

These integrations create a solid foundation for a data-first advertising approach.

With over 24,000 ready-to-use audience segments and the ability to customize, the platform offers flexibility for any campaign. Its B2B2C contact matching feature combines personal and business data to create detailed buyer profiles.

Real-world success stories back up these features. For example, Rob T., a digital marketing specialist, shared his experience:

"Before we were getting $6-$9 per click, with a 20% avg conversion… with this, CPC at $1.03 and 50% conversion, 3x the number of total clicks." – Rob T., Digital Marketing Specialist

To further fine-tune campaigns, custom data modeling helps reduce wasted ad spend by targeting active buyers. Users often see 2–3× higher conversions and 30–45% lower customer acquisition costs.

The platform handles everything from data modeling to ongoing optimization, delivering measurable improvements within 72 hours. Its seamless integration with major ad platforms allows you to quickly turn intent data into actionable strategies for better ad performance.

Conclusion

Combining intent data with lookalike audience segmentation offers a highly effective strategy for digital marketing. This approach has been shown to deliver higher conversions and reduce costs, making it a smart choice for businesses aiming to improve their marketing outcomes.

By using this strategy, businesses can achieve:

• 2–3× higher conversion rates

• 30–45% lower acquisition costs

• Higher-quality leads

• More precise targeting

To make this work, it’s crucial to keep your intent data updated, ensure your customer data is accurate for lookalike modeling, and fine-tune your targeting parameters regularly. When done right, this method can significantly boost audience engagement and deliver measurable performance improvements.

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• How to Use Intent Data for Precise Segmentation

• How to Use Attribution Data for Budget Allocation

• How Intent Data Powers Retargeting Campaigns

• How Intent Data Improves Retargeting Segments