How to advertise effectively online?

Do you have a company and want to better take advantage of your online presence? You will achieve the greatest and most immediate effect through online advertising, but it has to be carried out through the right channels and in the right way.

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More than 4 billion people today use the internet. The number has grown by as much as 300% since 2005. A website or online shop is thus one of the foundations of successful business and today every serious company has one. But that doesn’t yet mean that it will bring you results.

Does your page have too few visitors? And it isn’t bringing in sales and orders?

No matter how visually appealing, user-experience-friendly, and technically polished your website is, without putting it in front of the right people, you won’t get much from it. This is where digital advertising or online advertising comes in.

Digital advertising on the rise

Investments in digital advertising are growing rapidly. Companies are becoming ever more aware of the importance of online advertising. This is also shown by the research* by iPROM and Valicon, which found that:

• Investments in digital advertising in 2021 will reach 8% growth.
• An individual advertiser in 2021 will, on average, spend a good half a million euros on online advertising.
• According to data analyses, investments in online advertising have been steadily increasing in recent years. (The mentioned research shows constant growth in investments in digital advertising from 2019 until today.)
• Investments in digital advertising will, according to the assessment of the researchers, continue to grow in the coming years.

*The research was carried out between March and June 2021 (and also in 2019 and 2020) and 225 Slovenian decision-makers in the area of advertising and marketing took part in it.

The effectiveness of online advertising

What is the main motivator for carrying out online advertising? According to the answers of participants in the research, the effectiveness of advertising. As many as 71% of those questioned cited this as the key reason for taking on digital advertising.

The success of advertising depends, of course, on several factors, among which are also the choice of suitable type and channels of advertising and the format of ads. But first let’s look at what online advertising even is.

What is online advertising?

The definition of advertising (according to the American Marketing Association) reads: “Online advertising is any paid form of non-personal presentation and promotion of ideas, products, or services for an identified sponsor.” It is one of the most measurable and effective digital marketing activities, the purpose and goal of which is to increase the visibility and traffic of a website and improve business results.

The advantages of advertising

What is key, then, is that online advertising brings many advantages, especially compared with traditional advertising. Let’s look at what these advantages are:

• Precise audience targeting

While an ad on a billboard by the motorway addresses everyone driving past, ads online allow for very targeted audience targeting. So we can choose the audience based on location, age, interests, and online behaviour. This allows us much greater ad effectiveness and a greater ROI (return on investment) than traditional ads.

• Measurability of ads

One of the greatest advantages of online advertising is certainly also measurability. We can measure what our users respond to, how long they are on the page, what they click on, and where they move on the page. In this way, we also find out where we are losing customers and what those users who have made a particular action on the page (e.g. a purchase) have in common.

• Adjusting ads

All this enables us to, in time, get to know our ideal customers better. What kinds of ads do they respond to, what keywords attract them, which advertising channel is close to them, when and where are they active online. As a result, we can appropriately adjust and change ads in the long run, to achieve even better results.

• Generating data

Above all, even if advertising doesn’t create direct sales in the short term, it is still successful. It allows us to acquire valuable information. We can use this to adjust advertising campaigns and also for effective strategic business decisions in running the company. We can also use all the acquired information for ‘remarketing’, and thus show ads only to those who were already interested but haven’t yet decided to take action (e.g. a purchase).

Digital advertising is one of the most measurable and effective digital marketing activities.

Types of advertising

For advertising to be successful, it is key that we approach it in the right way and choose the right types of advertising. So, before starting advertising, we already have to have a clear picture of who we are addressing and what our goals are.

If we know our ideal customer and their concerns, wishes, and habits online, we will know which channels are suitable for them and how to address them. It is key that with the content we address the emotions of our customers and use a combination of different channels, since usually one single channel won’t bring satisfactory results. Here we highlight a few of the most important.

Google Ads (AdWords) advertising

Advertising on Google is one of the types of advertising that people know best. It offers several different types of ads, among which are also search, display, and video ads.

• Search ads

Without a doubt the most popular type of advertising is paid advertising in the search network. Here you pay Google (or another search engine) for advertising your content for selected keywords through which users search for products or services. These ads are shown to users in text form at the very top, or below, among the search results, when they enter the ‘right’ keyword in the search engine. With this, you only pay for the ‘click on the ad’, which is measured by cost per click (CPC), cost per impression (CPI), or cost per action (CPA). It is the most reliable and easily measurable form of online advertising.

• Display ads

While search engine ads are shown in the search results, display ads are shown at the top or on the sides of various websites. They are video or image ads (also known as banners), which are animated or static, and they work by showing the ad on websites that are in some way connected to the content of the ad. You set up a display ad based on keywords and goals and their reach will be enormous. But at the same time, these ads have lost their effect over the years, since they have become very widespread and we have, as users, (subconsciously) learned to ignore them on websites.

• Video ads

People are visual beings and our attention is certainly captured to the greatest extent by video ads. Creating visual stories is an excellent choice especially for branding, especially with products that are emphatically visual. With video ads you will gain people’s attention. You can create shorter videos, educational or entertaining content, or content that, for example, explains the use of the product (know-how videos). You can use video advertising on various channels, among which are Google, YouTube (where ads have been particularly successful recently), Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

Google Ads advertising has, however, developed exceptionally in recent years and so it allows for other possibilities too. Among them are dynamic remarketing, Gmail sponsored posts, local advertising (GMB), advertising within mobile apps, and other ways of advertising.

Advertising on social media

In addition to advertising on Google, advertisers today most often use advertising on popular social media. Among them are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and TikTok.

• Facebook advertising

Advertising on Facebook brings you considerably more than you would think at first glance. It is most effective for advertising B2C (business to clients) companies that want to increase sales, or B2B (business to business) companies looking for new leads. With an exceptionally favourable price and breadth of display and precise selection of the target audience, it also enables high brand recognition. It is, for example, an excellent choice for owners of retail shops, where with the targeting options you can show ads to people in the immediate area of your shop. Facebook also allows for advanced advertising options, such as remarketing, dynamic remarketing, ‘custom audience’, or ‘lookalike audience’.

When choosing the social networks on which you will advertise, what is above all important is that you choose the platforms on which your ideal customers are. The most common choice for advertising on social media today, in addition to Facebook, are Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, Reddit, and Pinterest.

Tip: On Instagram, ads called Reels ads are also available. Placed vertically, in a similar way to videos on TikTok, Reels ads are shown for up to 30 seconds and repeat in a loop. Currently, they are exceptionally favourable in terms of price and represent a new opportunity for additional exposure on Instagram.

It is key to ask yourself on which platform your ideal customers are. On Facebook, for example, you will be able to target users of various products and services, while LinkedIn is reserved for a completely different audience interested in business, business relationships, and career.

Ads that attract attention are those that are, in a flood of identical ads, different and standout.

Effective digital advertising tactics

For ads to work as effectively as possible, it makes sense to use some advertising tactics.

• Among them is remarketing, which allows you to advertise again to those people who have already established contact with you (for example through your website). It allows you to show the ad only to those visitors of your website who have viewed only a particular product on your page or have left your basket without a purchase. For remarketing you will need to have the Facebook pixel, or GTM metrics for Google remarketing, installed on your website. With remarketing, you will achieve greater recognition, engagement, and a higher conversion rate.

• Especially on the Facebook platform, don’t forget to take advantage of custom audiences. A simple ‘boost’ of a post may sometimes bring a particular result, but this will be much greater if you reach people relevant to you. Use the ‘custom audience’ or ‘lookalike audience’ options and narrow the target audiences to those who will respond to your ad. In addition to choosing people who have already made contact with you, you can also add lists of customers, newsletter subscribers, attendees of your events to the platform, and advertise directly and only to them.

• Let your content be clear and simple. Remember, simple sells. And very simple sells excellently. Short headlines, clear information about the product or service, and a simple, action-oriented call to action (CTA).

Forms of ads

While creating ads, let’s be as original and creative as possible. Ads that attract attention are those that are, in a flood of identical ads, different and standout. So, depending on what your target audience is and what the purpose and goal of the ad is, also choose the format of the ad. Available to you is everything from static images to animated graphic content, video content, floating banners, pop-up ads, and even ads that take up the entire background of the website.

Hint: Reach your target audience, in addition to targeting, with the help of visual communication. Facebook today has problems targeting users, since it has updated its devices and disabled user tracking on them. So users are much harder to target today. Many experts therefore agree that design has become ‘the new targeting’. So you address your audience already through the way you prepare visual content in the ad.

Example: you will attract children with different content than older people.

Advanced online advertising

Online advertising brings many opportunities, but at the same time also challenges, since it is a complex process. If you have sufficient knowledge, time, and experience of advertising, you can take it on yourself, otherwise companies, for the greatest effects and integrated execution of advertising, hire external providers.

Attract customers and increase sales

A digital agency prepares for you, based on the specifics of your activity and the channels on which your customers are, an adapted advertising strategy. The choice of advertising channels and content formats is important, followed by effective execution of the advertising campaign. With polished content and creative, and adjustment of the advertising campaign (for the greatest effect), you ensure the best possible results.

To sum up

Online advertising today is one of the key marketing activities. It has many advantages, among other things it allows for excellent measurability and adjustment of campaigns and ensures precise audience targeting and as a result excellent results. We have looked at what types of advertising we know and what ad formats and advertising tactics are best to use to increase visibility and improve business results.

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