Digital Media News

The online world has opened up a wealth of opportunities for advertisers to reach broader audiences, but until recently, Pay-Per-Click (PPC) and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) have taken the lion’s share of online advertising budgets.

But advertisers are starting to see the benefits of display advertising; and with the rise of innovative technology like programmatic buying, display advertising is enjoying aresurgence, as it’s able to achieve granular targeting of consumers at scale.

Search Retargeting is a popular and powerful online advertising technique that improves targeting further, by combining the efficiency of search with the reach and branding power of display, to increase leads and sales. For a more thorough definition of what search retargeting is please read our search retargeting brochure.

Click fraud has been around since the beginning of internet advertising and fraudster’s methods have become more advanced over the years, leading to sophisticated BattlestarGalactica-like internet bots that mimic human behavior with false clicks.

Whether you know it or not, your brand is shelling out money for clicks that did not come from humans, and the problem is endemic. In 2014, click fraud cost advertisers $11 billion and unfortunately, it is easier to get away with than cross checking in hockey, or late hits in football.

What is Click Fraud?

Click fraud is a method used by competitors who are frustrated with seeing a certain company’s ads appear above their own. By employing people (or bots) to commit click fraud on their behalf, their aim is to spend your daily budget before the day has even begun.

When it comes to advertising campaigns, marketing content and experiential marketing strategies, success lies in the planning. It’s not enough to simply be creative, and losing sight of what you’re trying to achieve will hinder your chances of attaining any goal.

Ideally, you need experience. That’s experience of what works and what doesn't. And most of the top marketing experts gather that experience by analyzing campaigns from the customer’s perspective, not from their own. Whether they know it or not, what they’re actually doing is analyzing human behavior.

Yes – to consistently deliver marketing that works, you need to be something of a psychologist. Here are 4 top tips to help you connect with your audience like never before.

1. Pick your words carefully.

Sounds obvious, so let’s be specific. People put a lot of emphasis on what they read first, so make sure any headlines or initial copy is working as hard as it possibly can be. Remember that visually, less is often more. Take Apple’s approach - when they’re in full ‘product launch’ state, their messaging is less about marketing and more about the product.

In the not-so-distant marketing history, brands could only reach consumers through a few marketing channels, such as product catalogs, customer service linesand in-store interactions; but with the advent of digital media ad online advertising, the number of channels for reaching consumers has increased exponentially.

Today, customer journeys are far from linear - they tend to happen across multiple platforms, devices and sessions, and make purchase decisions based on a variety of “touch points,” such as social media, mobile apps, dynamic banner ads and retargeting ads.

Pressure is building on brands to shift their advertising spend to digital, and rely more heavily on data to measure the success of their campaigns. And at the heart of this transition is attribution.

Marketing attribution is a method used by marketers to assign value to each channel that plays a role in influencing a consumer to make a purchase. For example, if a user visits your website through an organic search; returns later via a social network and then makes a purchase after clicking on a banner ad, which channel should get the credit?

Amazon is one of the biggest success stories in the online retail space. The brand has single-handedly revolutionized the way people shop for products, asprior to Amazon, many consumers were hesitant to purchase online. Amazon changed all that by creating an easy and reliable shopping experience for customers. Amazon’s phenomenal successisdue in part,to its expertise in the field of contextual advertising.

What is “Contextual Advertising”?

Contextual advertising refers to an online advertising approach in which users are served with targeted ads based on their browsing history andpurchase behavior. The adsare based on algorithms that examine keywords found on the pages that usersare browsing.

If you thought Instagram was just a photo sharing app, think again. The Facebook-owned social media network, which now boasts more than 75,000,000 daily users,has evolved into a powerful marketing tool and advertising platform. 

Instagram has rolled out the tools to its current advertising partners, including BananaRepublic, Adidas and Michael Kors, whose striking visual adsperfectly fit the aesthetic that Instagramare striving for. The response from advertisers has been positive; Michael Kors gained 33,000 new followers in the wake of theirInstagram ad campaign (16 times more than usual),but feedback has shown that companieswant more insight into how their ads are performing and how people are engaging with theircontent.

In response to feedback, Instagram haslaunched three new marketing analytics tools, which will enable marketers to monitor how their posts are performing in real time, using detailed measurements. The "Account Insights" tooltracks impressions, reach and engagement for a brand's unpaid posts.It also aggregates stats about an account's follower base, with demographic information such as the age and gender of users. It will also advise on the best times of day or week to post, based on user’s activity.