It's difficult to imagine that early internet usage did not include commerce. Nowadays, the internet serves as the backbone of the business, making it simpler than ever to launch a business and turn your interests into a source of revenue. But starting is only half the fight. You'll need some sort of digital advertising to keep the store open and operating.
The good news is that digital ads often cost less to run than print ads because there are no printing expenses. Additionally, digital ads can send consumers directly to a web page where they can complete the transaction right away rather than enticing them to visit a physical store.
Despite these benefits, digital advertising is not a sure thing for businesses. Every brand competes for attention on the internet, not only with other advertisements but also with entertainment material. There are also a plethora of channels for delivering your ad (each with its own set of audiences) and many different formats your ad can take.
All of this can be intimidating for newbies to online advertising. That is why we have put together this beginner's guide to digital advertising, which outlines the fundamentals of success in this field. We'll go through what digital advertising is, different sorts of ads, and the four steps in the digital advertising process, with plenty of hands-on instruction.
What Exactly is Digital Advertising?
The delivery of promotional content via online platforms is known as digital advertising. In layman's terms, it's internet advertising.
Online advertising is a distinct practise that is frequently included as part of a brand's entire digital marketing plan. It typically entails acquiring advertising space for campaigns, whereas marketing frequently stresses organic development through current channels like email newsletters, blog material, social media campaigns, search engine marketing, and others—though digital ads can be woven into these as well.
Digital advertising is a vast field, with new sorts of "ads" appearing daily. They appear in a variety of formats (banner advertising, digital flyers, movies, or animations) and across a variety of platforms (from social media to specific websites to search engine results).
With so much territory to cover, this essay will provide a general review of the fundamentals of digital advertising and how it works as a whole.
Online Advertising vs. Traditional Advertising
Offline paid promotional programmes such as magazine ads, billboard ads, posters, TV spots, and direct mail are examples of traditional advertising.
Although the practise predates civilisation, advertising as an industry did not begin until the mid-nineteenth century. The standard structure evolved from the combination of phrases and visuals, and newspapers entrenched the practise by selling advertising space to save expenses. Traditional advertising has since provided the groundwork for sponsorship revenue, buyer psychology, and agency structure.
Digital advertising, by contrast, is a relative newcomer to the industry. While it shares many of the essential ideas of print advertising and may even appear similar, the online scene is fundamentally different. For starters, digital ads may be interactive, and most feature clickable CTAs (or calls to action) that drive consumers to landing sites where they can discover more about a brand or even make a purchase.
Digital advertisements can also target more specific groups of a brand's audience, particularly when they are matched to user shopping/browsing activity. Furthermore, they provide considerably more comprehensive and rapid information, like as views and bounce rate. Even though most firms utilise a blend of traditional and online advertising, a strong digital advertising strategy is crucial for success these days.
This article goes into detail about the distinctions between digital and conventional marketing.
The Goals of Digital Advertising
Your internet advertising strategy's aims will change from campaign to campaign and are most likely a component of your company's overall yearly or quarterly goals. Nonetheless, classic advertising practise emphasises three main objectives: inform, convince, and remind.
Create brand or product awareness by informing.
Persuade: Increase income by converting customers
Remind consumers to keep a brand at the forefront of their minds.
While advertisements can cost money, direct sales are not often the primary purpose of an advertisement. There are numerous ways to increase revenue, some of which are explicitly indirect. For example, an ad may urge a viewer to click a CTA button and make a purchase, or it could enlighten them about a product so they remember the brand the next time they buy. Furthermore, not all conversions are equal in value—some converted consumers may become repeat shoppers, whilst others may only buy once.
Finally, all of this means that a brand may not realise the full benefits of a digital marketing campaign until much later, making it impossible to assess how successfully an ad campaign met its objectives. Metrics such as sales conversion can help you gauge persuasion, but other metrics like views, impressions, or click-through rate can tell you whether or not your ad is resonating—that is, are people paying attention to your brand, and will they remember it?
The Various Methods of Online Advertising
Although there are several forms (and variants) of internet advertisements, they can be divided into two broad groups.
Display Ads
Display ads are the most obvious type of digital ad: they often include graphics, ad language, and a call to action (CTA) in some form. They resemble traditional advertising the most—the digital evolution of billboard billboards or fliers. The following are the most prevalent forms of display ads:
Banner ads are image-based square or rectangular adverts that appear above or to the side of site content.
Popup ads: Ads that interrupt browsing by superimposing an image on the screen and require the user to close them manually.
Interstitial ads: Advertisements that appear during a loading screen and force the viewer to wait several seconds before clicking away.
Ads with interactive components (other than CTA buttons) such as text boxes, swipe/scroll capabilities, multiple choice, or 360° rotational images are examples of rich media ads.
Standard video advertising, similar to those shown on television—only digital video platforms allows viewers to bypass some ads after a few seconds.
Display ads have become a standard part of web browsing, although their harsh form of promoting causes users to respond adversely if not deliberately shun them. However, when they are persuasive, well-executed, and placed in front of the proper individuals, they frequently result in more quick sales.
Native Ads
Native ads are adverts that are designed to be effortlessly blended into a digital feed. They are designed to appear native, hence the name. These advertisements listen to their target demographic and attempt to mirror the type of material that the viewer absorbs or seeks. As a result, the appearance of native ads differs based on the audience and platform. The most popular types of native ads are as follows:
Ads on social media: Businesses pay for their posts to rank higher in the platform's technology and appear in the feeds of non-followers with comparable shopping or browsing patterns.
Paid search ads: Companies pay to have their websites appear at the top of a general search results page for specific keywords or phrases.
Promoted listings: Companies pay to have their products appear at the top of a shopping website or app's search results page.
Recommended listings: Businesses can pay to have their commodities or material shown in related/recommended areas of shopping or content sites ("Sponsored products linked to this item" on Amazon).
Influencer partnerships: Businesses collaborate with social media stars who have a large number of followers in their target demographic to develop branded content for that influencer's feed.
Sponsored content: Businesses may sponsor podcasts, video channels, or specific pieces of material. The ad could have the content producer reciting extended ad material or simply informing the viewers that the content is "presented by" a specific brand.
Product placement: Companies are paying to have their items included in films or video games without direct advertisement.
Native ads are less disruptive to audiences than display ads (though by law they are still labeled as ads or sponsored content). However, subtlety can lead to less immediate conversion.
Digital Advertising in 4 Steps
Now that we understand what digital advertising is, how it works, and the various options accessible, let's take a look at the entire digital advertising process from beginning to end.
1. Strategy
To ensure the success of your online ads, you must start with a well-researched campaign concept. Begin by describing the problem you want to solve, and then connect it to the audience you want to reach.
Is a landing page, for example, not getting enough traffic? Google Analytics, for example, reveals demographic information on who is accessing these pages, providing you with a goal for growth. Have your previous advertisements gone unnoticed? Keyword research and search tools, like Google Trends, show you which topics people are interested in, as well as the questions they have—questions that your campaign can answer. Are you having trouble sticking out from the crowd? Analysing your competitor's current advertising campaign provides insight into what works for them, while customer reviews of their items reveal what areas of their service are lacking.
In terms of the ad's actual premise, combine your research with your imagination. Your digital ad should convey a story: while most viewers dislike commercials and avoid them whenever feasible, ads that feel more like diversion or tell actual stories perform better. Typically, this entails identifying your clients' pain issues and showcasing how your company addresses them.
After you've developed your campaign strategy, the next stage is to create a written brief that documents your approach and everything you'll need to put it into action. You must consider the following:
Title and description of the campaign
Goals and success indicators
The intended audience
Channels of distribution
Materials for content
Budget
Whether or not a brief is required by upper management before campaign approval, it is always a good idea to prepare one so that all relevant parties are on the same page.
2. Budgeting
Following that, you take all of your lofty ideas from the planning phase and decide how to make them a reality. Allocating and budgeting finances is not an exact science. It is determined by your income targets and the marketplaces for which you are competing. Pay special attention to the following three major concerns:
People. Who needs to be involved in the campaign is determined by the media. You may need to budget for a video production team if it is a video commercial. You will need to budget for a copywriter, graphic designer, and developer if it is a design-based commercial. Make a list of needed in-house personnel in addition to any contractors or freelancers.
Distribution. Where your advertisements are distributed. Take into consideration that each platform has its pricing structure. For advertising space on social media, an auction-style bidding system is used. Some ad channels, most notably sponsored search, operate on a pay-per-click (PPC) model, in which you are charged according to the number of click-throughs. The amount of time each ad is displayed raises your ad expenditure. Examine the cost for each of your distribution alternatives ahead of time to account for this.
Schedule. The extent of your campaign, both in formulation and management, is described by scheduling. Consider the timelines and wages of those engaged in the ad's creation, as well as the timeframe for how long the ad will be visible on your chosen platforms.
Keep all of your budgetary notes ready until the campaign is over, as they will be useful in analysing the campaign's performance afterward. Success is determined by how your ad expenditure matches your return on investment (ROI), or whether you received more money for your ad than you put in.
3. Production
You should have a solid structure to lead you through production with your strategy, budget, and timetable in place. You already created an overarching campaign paper, but now you require further, more particular briefs for each facet of your ad campaign, which must be provided to the appropriate parties.
A copywriter, for example, requires a brief that details word count, targeted keywords, messaging goals, and so on. Conversely, a designer needs a creative brief that specifies the canvas size, advertising colour specifications, target demographic, design references, and so on.
There are multiple choices for hiring employees, but when it relates to finding graphic designers, a creative platform like DigitalxMarketing is excellent for swiftly and easily locating expertise. The platform connects you to a global pool of skilled designers and creatives, making it easier to find the appropriate fit for your goals and budget. Not to mention the benefits of a secure project area for flexible invoicing, collaboration, and safe payments.
Once you've connected with the talent and assigned the proper tasks, collaborate with content creators to keep projects on track. Provide regular feedback to confirm that the campaign is progressing as planned. We propose testing the ads on a small number of people so you can integrate their input before it's too late. If necessary, consult with and change your schedule frequently as problems emerge.
4. Distribution
Now that you've done everything possible to prepare for and make your ad, it's time to release it into the digital world. The process for releasing the ad varies by channel, but it should be as simple as following the platform's instructions and uploading your content.
As previously said, testing your ad before distribution is recommended, but even this does not promise that viewers will respond as expected. When your ad goes live and is visible to the entire internet, other issues may occur. The beautiful thing about digital advertising is that you can review outcomes fast and make modifications in the middle of a campaign.
Most sites have their assessment techniques that include common metrics like impressions, clicks, and percentage watched (for videos). UTM codes can also show you how much of your website traffic is related to which adverts. A/B tests allow you to compare multiple versions of your ad on two distinct parts of your market to see which works best. Because digital ads are always live, you can change any of the content at any time.
Increase Your Online Advertising Budget
Although digital advertising is intended to supplement your overall organic marketing efforts, it can enhance sales, raise brand awareness, and engage with your audience much more quickly. That is if you have solid advertising material to support it.
While the various techniques of digital advertising may appear intimidating, we hope our beginner's guide has provided you with a solid foundation to build on. And, if you're ready to take your digital advertising to the next level, you'll need a professional designer to make your commercials come to life online. DigitaXMarketing offers a wide variety of resources and strategies to help you with your marketing needs.
DigitalxMarketing Ltd has its head office in Wellington NZ with its support and resource centre based in the Philippines. DigitalxMarketing implements the latest digital strategies, tactics, tools, platforms and technologies to deliver integrated digital marketing services so your digital footprint can be found online.