Written by Andrew Fawcett-Wolf Managing Director, Thrive DigitalThere are three primary methods of targeting consumers with display advertising:
1. Content
2. Context
3. Behaviour
Advertising is not dead yet but in rather rude health – it’s just developing with the shift to digital marketing channels. Which, after all, is where your current and future customers can already (mostly) be found.
Online is the most accountable advertising medium yet. This is simply because of the volume and type of data it produces in real time. Thus it enables advertisers and their agents to target and re-target individuals continually with greater effectiveness than ever before.
The ability to target along with the creative execution is fundamental but you need to start out with clear objectives and plan accordingly.
A good planning and buying agency therefore is vital and one who has the ability to understand, analyse and interpret campaign data sources will be more successful in the ability to successfully target and re-target users for the desired outcome.
The flip side to the planning and buying of targeted inventory is that the publishers that own the inventory are under increased pressure to be able to deliver premium/targeted inventory.
There is only so much of this inventory to go round and competition for premium inventory is already hot, resulting in the inevitable cost of this inventory rising. With the likes of eMarketer predicting (see chart below) that online advertising spend in the UK will double by 2010, this is partially where the additional money will be spent.
Types of targetting
There are different methods of targeting with the most popular
based on content, context, and behaviour.
1. Content targetingYou can reach particular types of people by placing your ads
on pages with content that will attract that group. Two types of
content you are likely to use are:
- Professional content: you can advertise on pages written by an editorial team who have subject matter expertise and are trusted by users. Ads can be targeted by brands servicing the particular sector i.e. a car manufacturer advertising on a car site. You can take this principle further and target specificcontent or zones within a particular site such as the feature section on a car site.
- User generated content (UGC): you can advertise on pages where people are posting or reading user generated content. Bear in mind that they might not want to purchase a specific product at that moment in time, but effective creative and targeted advertising can influence the user to take a desired action.
Ad technology exists that knows the meaning of a page’s content so that pages can be excluded if desired. Many sales networks sell inventory as single site sales, channel sales (a collection of sites serving the same or similar subject matter) or blind inventory /run of service/network (no real form of targeting applied and therefore one of the cheapest forms used to obtain the greatest reach).
2. Context targetingContext targeting is when you place ads on a website based on the context of a person viewing the website, whether it’s the subject they’ve searched for, their location or personal details. Key ways of selecting and refining audiences you advertise to include:
- Demographic targeting: user data/demographic.
- Geographic targeting: by the user’s Internet protocol (IP) address which at the highest level gives the country they are browsing from or down to region, city or even postcode level.
- Keyword targeting: the ability to target display ad formats via keywords is a very powerful method and how many of the leading search engines (that still exist) started out.
- Time (day parting): showing ads only at certain times of the day such as lunch time for discount meal vouchers.
- Frequency capping: the ability for ad technology to limit the number of exposures or impressions an individual browser (person) is exposed to.
- Creative: ad format – using the IAB advertising standards – size, type (standard or rich media: video/expandable etc) or location of ad format.
3. Behavioural targeting (BT)A small file called a cookie can be stored in a person’s browser, keeping a record of the sites and content a person has been viewing within a set time period (usually 3 months). This can then be aggregated to a multi-site or network level to understand what groups of people (segments) have been doing and, more importantly, what they might do in the future. When used for online advertising this technology is known as behavioural targeting (BT), allowing for more relevant advertising for consumers and better ROI.
A new form of BT is emerging that’s not based on people’s cookies but information gathered by their internet service provider (ISP). This is a hot topic currently with several of the leading UK ISP’s planning to deploy such technology. Once launched, data may be used by the ISP for ad targeting purposes.
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