Geofencing, geotargeting, and geoconquesting get used as if they were one product. They are three jobs. Geotargeting picks a place. Geofencing draws a perimeter, usually for a phone that is inside it or was inside it recently. Geoconquesting uses that perimeter around a competitor.
The full definition of the fence itself is geofencing advertising. This page is the comparison: which job you are buying, which surface runs it, and how a local business in a city would draw the line without pretending the whole metro is a fence.
Geotargeting picks the place
Geotargeting means the ad is allowed to run in a place you name. A ZIP code, a city, a county, or a ring of miles on a map. A streaming household in that ZIP is geotargeted. So is a sidewalk screen on a block inside it. The place is the filter. The person does not have to cross a line at 12:41pm to qualify.
A plumber who will drive 20 minutes can geotarget the ZIPs inside that drive. A single storefront that buys the whole city has bought a place, and should say so. On streaming TV, homes are selected because they sit in the geography, which is how CTV ad targeting works. That living-room spot is a place buy.
Geofencing draws the perimeter
A geofence is a line around a point. The point can be your door, a building, a venue, or a block. Geofence ads are eligible when a phone is inside that line, or was inside it recently enough that the platform still counts the visit.
The line is the product. A ZIP with a geofence label is still a ZIP. A radius that covers half the city is a broad place buy drawn as a circle. If you cannot point to the streets, you do not have a fence yet.
Fences expire. A phone at a stadium on Saturday is a different audience on Wednesday. Say how long "was here" lasts. An hour after someone leaves a competitor is a different buy from a 30-day memory of everyone who passed the block.
Geoconquesting aims the fence at a competitor
Geoconquesting is not a third technology. It is a geofence whose point is someone else's location. You draw the perimeter around a competitor's door, a row of rival shops, or the lot they share, and you give those people a reason to come to you instead.
The mechanic is the same as any other fence: a boundary, a phone that qualifies, an ad. The job is the difference. You are speaking to demand that already exists on that block, so the line has to say why the trip to your door is worth it.
Keep it to a competitor a customer would actually switch between. A cafe two streets away qualifies. A cafe across the metro does not. Keep your own door on a separate report line, or you will not know which fence earned the response.
The three jobs side by side
| Geotargeting | Geofencing | Geoconquesting | |
|---|---|---|---|
| The job | Run the ad in a place you name | Reach a phone inside a perimeter, or just after | Do that around a competitor |
| The boundary | ZIP, city, county, or a wide radius | A line around a point you can serve | A line around their point |
| A local example | The ZIPs inside a 15-minute drive | The blocks around your door | The block around the rival down the street |
| A poor fit | One shop buying the whole metro | A radius so small that almost nobody qualifies | A rival your customers would never compare you with |
You can run more than one. A shop might geotarget the home ZIPs, geofence its own block, and geoconquest one competitor on Fridays. Each one needs its own budget line, or the report cannot teach you anything. What those lines cost, in CPM and in a daily cap, is how much geofencing advertising costs.
Mobile geofencing
Mobile geofencing is the strict version. The ad runs on a phone. The phone qualifies because its location is inside the fence now, or was inside it within the window you set. The inventory is mobile apps and mobile websites that the platform can place an ad in.
This is the surface people mean by geofencing mobile ads. It fits a moment: someone leaving a competitor, walking your block, or leaving a game. It is a poor fit as a list of named neighbors. The honest version is aggregated and permission-based. A phone that has not shared location is not inside the fence, however close it stands to the door.
Keep the line specific ("four blocks, open until 10"). A phone ad is easy to scroll past, so pair it with a screen on that block when one is there.
Display geofencing
Display is a format. Geofencing is a reason the format was allowed to run. A display ad is the still image or rich-media unit: a banner in an app, a rectangle on a page, sometimes a desktop unit when the platform geotargets a desktop it believes is in the area.
People search for geofencing display ads because a lot of entry-level fences are sold as display. A headline, a distance, and a short link often do not need a 15-second film. Published mobile and desktop display rates sit below video and well below connected TV. The ranges are in the cost guide linked above.
Display and geofence are separate choices. You can run display with ordinary city geotargeting and never draw a fence. You can run a fence as video. If the seller's answer is only "display in your city," you bought geotargeted display.
Screen-based geofencing
A screen does not walk into a fence. It is already somewhere. Screen-based geofencing, as buyers use the phrase, means choosing digital screens that sit inside the area, or streaming homes in that area, and running the ad there. The strict phone definition and this looser market usage are both in circulation. Know which one is on the order.
The screens are what DOOH advertising is: sidewalk panels, transit, and TVs in bars, gyms, cafes, and stores. On we-are-glo.com that layer is Glo OOH. Streaming TV in the same geography, Glo commercials, is a household place buy more than a phone fence. Screens plus optional TV is Glo ads.
The screen reaches someone who never looks down. A screen on the wrong block misses the customer. If the block has no screens, widen to streets you can still serve. The whole city is no longer a fence.
How to run a geofence around a local business in a city
This is a generic walkthrough, not a case study. No business name, no city name, and no result. The same steps apply to a fence in Detroit or in any other city. The city is the map. The fence is the part you can serve.
Picture a sit-down restaurant on a commercial street. It can serve about a fifteen-minute trip. It cannot serve the far side of the metro, the airport, or an office park it does not deliver to.
- Write the trade area before you open a map tool. Fifteen minutes, the transit stop, and the blocks between that stop and the door. Buying that as a whole ZIP is geotargeting. Drawing the line around those streets is a geofence.
- Add a second fence only for a reason you can say out loud. One competitor two streets away, on the nights you both serve dinner, is geoconquesting. A stadium on event days is a moment fence, off the next morning. A second fence with no sentence is a second invoice.
- Cross out the landmarks that flatter you. The airport, the mall across town, and a highway board that "covers the city" put the ad in front of people who will not come.
- Pick the surface on purpose. Mobile for the phone inside the line. Display when a still ad can carry the offer. Screens in the venues and on the sidewalks inside the same streets when you want the ad in the place. Streaming TV only when those households are worth a separate line this month.
- Write a line that would be nonsense outside the fence. "Open until 10, four blocks from the station" is a fence line. A slogan with no place in it can run anywhere.
- Cap the day and pause the dark days. Closed Monday means no Monday spend. How a CPM sits against that daily cap, with the math labelled as an example, is how much geofencing advertising costs.
- Look at the screens, then count one action. Search the streets in the screen finder. Spark can draft three concepts if you do not have a video. One area can run as Glo OOH, with TV at home only if you add it. A QR code or a short link shows whether the days you spent produced a scan or a call.
Stop at two fences you can tell apart. One test decides the brief: if you can point to the streets, draw the line. If the answer is the whole city, you are geotargeting, and the budget should say so.
Questions people ask
What is the difference between geofencing and geotargeting?
Geotargeting runs an ad in a place you name, such as a ZIP or a city. Geofencing draws a perimeter, and a phone inside that line, or recently inside it, can qualify. A whole metro labelled as a fence is usually geotargeting.
What is geoconquesting?
A geofence drawn around a competitor. The technology matches any other fence. The job is to reach people at that location with a reason to choose you. It helps when customers would actually compare you with that competitor.
Is mobile geofencing the same as display geofencing?
Mobile is the device, a phone inside the fence. Display is the format, a still or rich-media ad. Display can run as a fence or as ordinary city geotargeting. Ask which one is on the invoice.
Can a screen inside a boundary be a geofence?
Buyers use "screen-based geofencing" for digital screens or streaming homes chosen because they sit inside an area. A screen does not cross a line the way a phone does. The strict fence is the phone. The screen is a place you selected on the same streets.
How do I run a geofence around my business in a city?
Draw the streets you can serve, add a competitor or a venue only if you can say why, and leave out the rest of the city. Pick mobile, display, screens, or a combination. Cap the spend by day, and pause the days you are closed. The city name does not change the steps.