What are the various online advertising methods?
There are many forms of advertisements online.
The most common ones are Google Advertisements, Display Advertisements, Social Media Advertisements, Video Advertisements and Re- Targeting.
Pay- Per- Click (Google Advertisements or Paid Search)
Pay- Per- Click (PPC) as its names suggest is Paid Advertising, and it is to be paid every time a visitor click to go to your site or landing page. It is also known as Paid Placement or Paid Listing. Normally, where your ad listing is placed, depends on your quality score, such as highest bidding price, ad relevance and quality etc.
This method offers high conversion rate or targeted traffic as a consumer does a search on the web, typing the relevant keywords into the search text box of his or her preferred search engine. Marketers are aware of this “hunt mode”, meaning they are researching for information to satisfy an immediate or future need.
Your landing page will ultimately be the key tool to convince and convert the potential consumers to make the purchase which they are searching for. This is another area which we will need to work closely with our clients to ensure that the conversion rate is high and effective for them.
When it’s done right, paid ads can start showing in the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) at the top of the rankings within a short period of time unlike SEO. It involves spending time researching the industry and keywords, crafting the copy, designing your ads, doing A/B Testing and also having a smart bidding strategy, so that they are targeted well.
It is a great way to generate targeted traffic to your website. Furthermore, ad copy and landing content can be tweaked and adjusted along the way, to better target and reach new audiences. This flexibility allows strategies to be fine-tuned and improved further for better results and yield swiftly. With analytics, it is also easy to monitor return on investment (ROI).
Display or Banner Advertisements
Another method for online advertising is banner or display advertising. This provides what a Google source referred to as a “brand image experiment”. Banner advertising allows for you to choose the types of sites (content related sites) in which you want your advertisements to appear in, so that you can reach out to the same interested viewers. Banner or display advertisements works well for those whose products are aesthetically appealing, leaving a lasting impression on the web page visitors.
Some of the advantages of deploying this method are that it is measurable, targets audience effectively and also helps to build strong brand recognition and recall when exposed to the banner over a long period of time.
Social Media Advertisements
Increasingly popular is social media advertising as it cuts through the clutter on specific social media networks (such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Pinterest) through demographic information so targeted consumers see your brand in their feeds social media platforms. It can come in the from a simple banner to an auto- play video.
It works effectively when executed right by being strategic with the advertising spend, targeting frequency, content selection and selecting the right audience demographics.
One of the best part of social media advertising is in its ability to allow sharing with like- minded friends or followers, possibly to catalyse and fueling the advertiser’s campaign’s success exponentially.
The Marketing Rule of 7 states that a prospect needs to be exposed to the advertiser’s message for at least about 7 times before they eventually buy a product or service. Therefore, approximately 96% of visitors that land onto your website for the first time, are not ready to buy yet.
Retargeting helps to remind and target these visitors, who are high potential leads, by dropping a cookie on them. Retargeting works with apps, search and website banner ads and your advertisements will be served to them over a period of time. When optimized well, retargeting campaigns have proven to be effective to get a significant number of former visitors to return, reconsider and finally commit or complete the purchase. Retargeting also gives your existing customers the opportunity to avail to your new promotions. Smart marketers today use retargeting as an integral tool to connect with customers and increase sales wisely.
Not sure which online strategy is right for your business?
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Let us help you to craft out some internet advertising strategies which will fit and work best for your business.