TOPIC 7 INTERNET ADVERTISING
LEARNING OUTCOMES...
By the end of this topic, you should be able to:
1. Explain the factors behind the popularity of Internet advertising;
2. Trace the development of online advertising;
3. Analyse the advantages and disadvantages of online advertising;
4. Identify the forms of Internet advertising; and
5. Discuss the effectiveness of online advertising.?
INTRODUCTION Nine out of ten businesses fail; so I came up with a foolproof plan create ten businesses". Robert Kiyosaki Internet advertising, also known as online advertising, is the delivery of advertising messages and marketing communications through the Web. It is a marketing strategy that involves the use of the Internet as a medium to deliver marketing messages to the right customers in order to obtain website traffic. Internet advertising is becoming more popular and has presented sustainable revenue growth since its inception in the mid-1990s. This is due to the growing number of online users, easier Internet connectivity, accurate statistics and the fast and easy management of advertising campaigns in real time. Due to its wide success, Internet advertising currently constitutes a significant marketing channel for a large number of firms, and it is thus gradually gaining attention in the context of marketing communications strategy planning and implementation. Research shows that advertising online works well with other forms of advertising to help give a brand name or product a significant uplift in exposure.
ACTIVITY 7.1 Find out the definition of the following concepts and compare the term with each other: (a) Online advertising; (b) Online marketing; (c) Internet advertising; (d) Digital advertising; (e) Mobile advertising; and (f) Interactive advertising.
7.1 DEVELOPMENT OF ONLINE ADVERTISING The rapid growth of the Internet, and the incredible flow of information that the Internet has made possible, have transformed the business of advertising. It is rare today to surf the Web without seeing online advertisements, often in the form of visual display advertisements on web sites and textual advertisements on search sites. Online advertising has certainly taken business away from traditional modes of advertising. There appears to be no consensus on precisely when advertising on the Internet began. Tim O'Reilly, founder of the web portal Global Network Navigator (GNN), claims that the first advertising appeared in 1993 on GNN. Others cite a banner advertisement sold to AT&T displayed on the HotWired site in 1994.
Many early attempts at online advertising met with limited success. This was due to the general problem that many advertisers still looked at advertising from the perspective of the traditional media such as newspaper and television. During this time, online ads were sold exclusively on a cost-per-impression ("CPM") pricing model used by offline media. The advertiser was charged proportionally to the number of times the ad was displayed on a web page. But reporting was very basic. According to Adjuggler (n.d.), advertisers generally had to depend on the website's visitor statistics shown on the Web to get an idea of how many people actually visit the advertisement. This way, advertising was sold almost in the way that the print advertisement was, meaning that it was based solely on the size of the advertisement. Pricing was based on the expected number of individual visitors of website who would view the advertisements. Then came the tracking technology. At first, most online advertising was very simple both in terms of the advertising and how it was sold. It was common for advertisers to pay to have a small banner advertisement placed on a website for a given period of time. Some of the earliest advertisement serving software appeared in the mid-90s. This paved the way for the more advanced serving and tracking technologies such as follows: (a) Multiple banner advertisements to be rotated in the same space on a web page to keep track of how many impressions or views a particular advertisement has obtained. (b) The start and end dates of the campaign to be specified and the limits on the number of impressions to be shown. (c) Track clickthroughs, so advertisers could find out how many people saw their advertisements and how many had clicked on it to get to their site. These innovations made it possible for advertisers to sell online advertising in new ways. For example, an advertiser could specify that they only wanted to buy 500,000 impressions over the course of three months. These innovations made it possible for advertisers to sell online advertising in new ways. With this new development, publishers are now able to sell advertising space to multiple advertisers and not giving up all of their space to just one advertiser at a time. The latest development in the Internet technology involves the social web and mobile technology. These two innovations have changed the way people use the Internet. In the social web, people have found a new way to communicate (Adjuggler, n.d.).
Since its creation in 2004, Facebook has grown into a worldwide network of over one billion subscribers with around 665 million active users each day on average. Mobile technology, on the other hand, has made possible a much greater reach of the Internet, increasing the number of Internet users everywhere.
ACTIVITY 7.2 ReportLinker (at www.reportlinker.com) reported that the annual revenue in the global online advertising industry is forecasted to reach an estimated USD$139.8 billion in 2018 with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.3 per cent during 20132018. The global online advertising industry witnessed a CAGR of 12.4 per cent during 2007 2012 as revenue reached USD$91.6 billion in 2012. The top three and top five players of the industry accounted for 64 per cent and 69 per cent of global revenue, respectively, in 2012. There is a medium degree of competition in the industry due to its moderate to high threat of substitutes and moderate buyers power. Based on the earlier statement, find out from the Internet authoritative sources about the following: (a) Profile of top players in the online advertising industry. (b) The general trends in online advertising in Asia, Europe and the US. (c) How is the trend in online advertising compared to conventional media advertising?
7.2 INTERNET AS ADVERTISING MEDIUM The Internet and its most broadly known application, the World Wide Web is gaining tremendous importance in our society. The Web represents a new medium for doing business that transcends national borders and attracts a significant share of social and economic transactions. A large part of these transactions involves advertising.
7.2.1 Popularity of Internet Advertising Internet advertising is becoming more popular and has presented sustainable revenue growth since its inception in the mid-1990s. The obvious advantages of online advertising media low costs, multiple tracking options, better segmentation as well as the growing number of online users, easier Internet connectivity, accurate statistics and the fast and easy management of advertising campaigns in real time ? are forcing marketing managers to re-allocate big portions of their advertisement budgets from traditional offline marketing media to online ad campaigns. (a) Easier Connectivity The current Internet technology no longer relies solely on cables to receive and send data. It has become easier to install any software with generally affordable cost, and better range of coverage. (b) Growing Number of Users The Internet is now serving millions of users and a multitude of purposes in all parts of the world. It has now consolidated itself as a very powerful platform that has changed the way we do business, and the way we communicate. It has given a globalised dimension to the world and has become the universal source of information for millions of people, at home, at school and at work. (c) Accurate Statistics This new technology is capable of giving accurate statistical reports and the possibility to measure the precise return on investment. Reports like this include number of visits, number of impressions and the most effective keywords. (d) Real Time Advertising This technology allows advertisers to change an advertising campaign in real time. In this way, advertisers can change the daily budget at any time, limit the advertisement in specific days, choose specific sites to show the advertisement or just add new keywords. All these changes take effect in real time where the time gaps between the events occurring, our ability to see that event and the feedback that comes from our reaction to that event has been eliminated.
7.3 The real-time marketing concept may refer to different notions in digital advertising environment. Explain the following statements and discuss the similarities and differences of each: (a) Real-time marketing can be tied to automation marketing concept by which micro or individual campaigns are automatically triggered by events and customersÊ actions. In this case, we speak of real-time marketing because the marketing message is sometimes created and sent in real time. In this situation, a message can be sent in real time but the campaign and templates have been implemented beforehand. (b) The real-time marketing term is used for describing marketing actions and executions that are realised in real time. Thus, ads are often targeted, custom taylored and bought in milliseconds in digital advertising ecosystem. Reporting is also done and accessible in real time for most digital campaigns. (c) The real-time marketing concept has been used for a different meaning. It refers to marketing actions that are thought of and deployed almost in real time by brands to react to different events and to capitalise on social media buzzing. In this case, real-time marketing campaigns are often thought of and implemented within a brand newsroom. 7.2.2 Internet Advertising versus Traditional Media Advertising Some of the most notable benefits of online advertising over traditional advertising are: (a) Cost Implications The use of Internet advertising is suitable for those who cannot bear the high cost of conventional outlets such as outdoor banner advertising, trade shows or magazine advertisements. This medium is much better in terms of cost. Online media covers a huge audience resulting in a much better return on investment.
(b) Easier Targeting Means It is possible for the Internet to taper down the target audience so that only the segment that views the advertisements consists of potentially strong buyers. The web browsing history of users can be made a reference to focus on the preferences and to avoid useless repetitions. Also, there is a lot of geographical targeting through the Internet to make the advertisements relevant to users. (c) Measurablility Measurability is one of the most important factors in deciding the impact of online advertising. The Internet is capable of collecting accurate data on hits, pages visited, number of times the advertisement was viewed by the same user, how the user reached the advertisement or the website and whether the activity resulted in a sale. (d) Versatility Online advertising can be highly interactive. This is unlike offline media which is less versatile. Online advertising may be able to incorporate videos and games to audio messages. (e) Speed Once an advertising copy is ready, the messages can be published and distributed rapidly from the advertiser and publisher to the consumers. Deployment is immediate as modifications and replacements in the advertisements are faster on the Internet. 7.2.3 Social Media Advertising Social media such as Facebook news feeds and Twitter timelines is now being used as a form of online advertising. Most people are simply using these social networks to be engaged in personal conversation or to share their personal materials such as pictures of babies and pets, family holidays and vacation as well as occasional work-related gripe or political posts. However, social media advertising has now become a staple of the media mix as marketers look to leverage their campaigns to drive valuable word of mouth and influence. Facebook does have its benefits and advantages because it uses an advertising system that is very simple to implement. It also offers a wide range of coverage in the Facebook website. However, only Facebook users that are within the specific demographic will be able to see the advertising. This helps to narrow down who sees advertising so advertisers are not wasting their money on people who are not going to be interested in what their website has to offer.
Apart from Facebook and Twitter, new social media networks keeps emerging. Many died out before they secured mass-appeal and adoption. A few maintain relevance and start to grow. Examples of those that have found staying power are Pinterest, SnapChat, Instagram, Reddit, Foursquare and Tumblr which already contained advertising campaigns. On the other hand, major companies are already expressing doubts about the efficacy of social media marketing campaigns. Experts are also questioning the issues on return on investment. Agencies and media planners, therefore, need to be careful when using social media networks by evaluating the results.
ACTIVITY 7.4 Discuss the points given next on the differences and similarities of the Internet and certain traditional media in relation to advertising.
(a) Nielsen summarises the differences by introducing the lean- forward and lean-back mode. On the Web, the consumers use their lean forward mode, since they are active, engaged and goal- directed. When watching television on the other hand, they are in the lean back mode since they are more passive, relaxed and want to be served with information or entertainment.
(b) When using television, the advertisers get the possibility to interrupt the
consumer in his or her activity. Online advertising has to compete with other elements on the website for the user'sumers are task-oriented and where the ads usually are irrelevant for the consumersÊ information search or processing goal.
(c) Television consumers can, and will probably, avoid looking directly at the advertising, but peripheral attention might still be captured. Online ads are typically located in the periphery in relation to the editorial content. Since online ads seldom are targets of information search on the Internet, consumers may use active navigation behaviour to try to avoid them.
(d) Unlike television ads that are only broadcast for a limited amount of time, online advertising can exist within the consumersÊ visual field for an unlimited amount of time.
(e) Online ads can be targeted in a completely new way. Television ads are shown in connection to programmes that target the same audience as the product or brand in the ad. When advertising online, the ads can be closely connected to every individual consumer based on their- and/or other consumers previous surfing behaviour. This gives online advertising large possibilities to target the very specific audience that is most likely to be influenced by it.
ACTIVITY 7.5 Explain the following social media networks and discuss how online
advertising may be relevant on these platforms:
Facebook News Feed
Twitter Timeline
Pinterest
SnapChat
Instagram
Reddit
Foursquare
Tumblr
7.3 ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF INTERNET ADVERTISING
There are a variety of ways to advertise on the Internet, each with advantages and disadvantages. Media planners and advertising agencies have to consider several factors when deciding whether advertising on Internet is right for the advertisers. A good online advertising agency and a good media planner understand both the advantages and disadvantages of the medium in order to create campaigns that set new heights in performance.
7.3.1 Advantages These are some of the many advantages that online marketing offers over traditional media outlets: (a) Cost-efficiency Advertising on the Internet is much more cost-efficient than using traditional mass market and niche media. Internet advertisements can be viewed by millions of people while being displayed all day and night. It has a worldwide audience. An online advertisement posted anywhere in the world can be viewed from anywhere in the world. Cooperative advertising arrangements can be completely free, allowing advertisers to reach large audiences with no expense. (b) Affordability A main advantage of online advertising is that it has a much affordable price when compared with the traditional advertising costs. On the Internet, companies can advertise at a much more inexpensive cost for a much wider audience compared to newspapers, radio, television or other mass media. (c) Effective Target Market Market segmentation and target marketing are more effective on the Internet than any other advertising medium. Strategically placed web advertisements can achieve 100 per cent relevant views. Consider, for example, an advertisement for a new video game placed on a video game- oriented website. Virtually every visitor to the website will be a video game enthusiast, maximising the impact of the advertising exposure. (d) Interactivity The Internet facilitates true two-way communication in advertising messages. By placing interactive ads on the Internet, marketers can use surveys, comments and usage statistics to fine-tune their campaigns midstream and maximise their effectiveness. Linking online advertisements to social networking, outlets can enhance the communication between your company and your customers even further, allowing you to receive genuine feedback on a consistent basis. (e) Captive Audience In many traditional media advertising, it is easy for viewers to skip advertisements. This common practice reduces the impact of this media. Internet advertisements, on the other hand, cannot be ignored as easily as television or radio advertisements. A banner advertisement on the side of an informative website, for example, remains in the visitor's peripheral vision as long as he is reading the website's information. Advertisements placed before streaming web videos cannot be skipped, allowing marketers to take advantage of a captive audience. (f) No Rigorous Payment In traditional advertising, advertisers have to pay the full amount of money to the advertising agency, no matter the results. In online advertising, advertisers pay only for the qualified clicks, leads or impressions. (g) Easy Result Measurement It is easy to measure the Internet advertising results and this makes online advertising more appealing than the traditional advertising methods. There are many effective analytics tools to measure online advertising results and these help companies and agencies to make effective planning for the subsequent campaigns. The effectiveness of Internet advertising has been traditionally measured by means of the number of clicks and commonly operationalised by means of the well-known Click-Through Rate (CTR), which is defined as the ratio of the number of clicks over the number of impressions.
(h) Build Brand Awareness
Many advertising experts argue that the mere exposure of online users to the advertising message can be beneficial in terms of building brand awareness. A regularly updated website with well-written content that maintains people's interest is essential to showing people exactly how a business is distinctive and how a company offers the best value to its clients.
7.3.2 Disadvantages
Having an online presence is a necessity for many companies and organisations. However, marketing and advertising online has certain disadvantages and downfalls that may persuade the business to use its advertising budget on other marketing methods. (a) Advertisements Seen as Spam Many online advertising vehicles, especially pop-up and pop-under ads, are seen as spam. This causes several problems for the products and business. With the advertisements being considered as spam, many users refuse to connect with them and, instead, just think of them as irritating. To protect against advertisements and spams, there are blockers programmes, often built into the Internet browser, that block these ads, so the business may be paying for advertisements that customers never even see. These disadvantages of online advertising may spill over into the business's physical presence because, if the ads are irritating enough, customers may associate that irritation with the business. (b) Advertising Fatigue Many websites have advertisements, so customers experience advertising fatigue or blindness and may not see the advertisements. Web users are so inundated with banner ads and spam e-mail that they have begun to ignore Internet advertising just as much as advertisements on traditional media. It has been used so much that users have developed a blind eye to most online advertisements. (c) Intrusion The nature of a lot of display advertising is intrusive such as pop-up advertisements. Therefore, pop-up blockers are often installed to prevent advertisements from being served as they were intended by the advertisers. Most browsers now block pop-ups. There are also extensions available for the Firefox browser, such as Adblock Plus, that will block advertising on web pages. Technologically savvy consumers are increasingly using these methods to limit the advertising that they see. (d) Technical Issues In many places, there is still less connectivity and accessibility. There is also a problem in website downtime, lags in website or video loading and browser complications which may reduce the number of times consumers see online advertisements and how well they see them. Viewing problems can occur because of problems with a website or if a consumer is using a smart phone or other mobile device to view a website, has a slow connection speed or does not have the correct applications and programmes installed on his or her computers for proper viewing. When technical issues occur, companies lose the opportunity to broadcast advertisements for their products and services and may lose potential sales.
7.4 FORMS OF INTERNET ADVERTISING Internet advertising takes a multitude of forms. More and more innovative types of advertising are coming into existence as the Web matures. The list given is not meant to be an exhaustive list. However, it covers all the main types of advertising in use today. Some of the main ones are as shown in Figure 7.1:
Figure 7.1: Some forms of internet advertising
Now, let us discuss the forms one by one. (a) Textual Advertisement According to Ratliff and Rubenfeld (2011), the simplest online advertisements are textual in nature. It is fully described by a string of words, the colour, size of the characters and the dimensions of the advertisement's bounding text box. These ads allow only the most basic interactivity; the viewer can click on the advertisement and be transported to the advertiserÊs web site or, more specifically, the ad's "landing page". (b) Banner Advertisement This is the most basic, traditional and prominent method of web advertising. Banners are placed at the top or bottom of a web page providing a link to a company's site providing product, sales and other marketing activities. Banner advertisements can be used on general sites. With this method, the advertiser essentially buys a run of advertising, usually for a specific period of time. A banner advertisement is a graphic image used on websites which comes into view on all sorts of web pages. When clicked, it takes the user to the main website of the product advertised by the banner. Banner advertisements are common, and placement matters to advertisers and potential customers. Plain banner advertisements are one of the less obtrusive online advertising formats. Users who choose to click the banners will end up on a website and hopefully will make a purchase. (c) Display Advertisement A standard display advertisement has more graphical elements. A display advertisement is typically one of a standard set of dimensions, with a photograph or other graphics, for example, a logo and a text message. Like textual advertisements, such display ads also typically allow interactivity through clicking. The graphical element of a display advertisement is often animated, typically using Adobe's Flash technology (Ratliff & Rubinfeld, 2011). (d) Website as Advertiser The most basic form of advertising on the Web is when a website sells an advertising link. This advertisement looks like content itself. They are designed to match the layout of the website so viewers will interact with the advertisement. The advertisement is displayed on one or more of its pages for which advertisers pay a fee based on the page impressions or the clicks on the advertisement.
A website can be an advertiser and a publisher of advertising at the same time. In this way, websites buy and sell the traffic of potential consumers who visit them. These advertisements are popular because their tactics can lead to a larger mailing list or purchase for the advertiser. (e) Pop-ups This form usually appears in a separate small window that "pops up" over the main browser window when a visitor enters a site. The pop-up windows can contain anything such as text, graphics, a form, e-mail addresses or a little game. A website might have one or more pop-ups, each advertising a different product or service. This kind of online advertising can be minimised with a pop-up blocker, but not all pop-ups are blockable. Some studies show that website viewers consider pop-up advertisements as one of the most annoying type of online advertising formats. (f) Opt-in Mailing This form of online advertisement consists of sending an e-mail message to an audience that has expressed an interest in receiving information on a given topic. Some sites sell their lists of recipients to advertisers, but most prefer to keep the e-mail addresses secret and distribute the advertisement on the advertiser's behalf. Opt-in mailing is not the same as spam which is another word for bulk mailing which involves sending a message to people who have never shown any interest in receiving it. Spam will destroy your business. Some companies claim to be opt-in whereas they are actually selling spam services. (g) HTML Advertisement HTML ads combine graphics and text with other HTML elements such as pull-down list, check boxes or forms. These can be very effective in getting traffic, but are much harder to serve and track, and generally require sophisticated software to run properly.
h) Video Advertisement
His advertisement has taken the place of some banner advertisements. Instead of still graphics, it takes the form of a video. These advertisements are difficult to ignore because the movement is quick to catch the eye and the video usually has audio. Some advertisers make the video hard to pause or exit, making website visitors view or hear the advertisement until it ends.
(i) Interstitials
Interstitials are advertisements that are shown in the transition between two pages of a site. So you click on a link on Page X, but instead of going to Page Y you arrive at an intermediate page containing the sales pitch. Interstitials are gaining popularity with advertisers since they offer an almost unlimited amount of space to pitch a product. These advertisements take over the entire page, and the viewer is usually asked to click "next" to continue doing what he or she wanted to do. Sometimes this kind of advertisement includes videos and does not give the viewer an option to skip it. Like most advertisements, intersitital advertisements can be an unwelcome sight if not cleverly integrated. Besides, many visitors may find interstitials irritating and intrusive.
(j) Hybrid Advertisement
Hybrid advertisement combines aspects of other advertising types, such as text and banners, to make a more effective pitch to visitors.
(k) Sponsorship
Sponsorship involves integrating the advertising more fully into the body of a site. Many sponsorships take the form: "Site brought to you by Sponsor" or "Sponsor 's guide by Site".
(l) Rich Media Advertisements
Rich media advertisements incorporate the use of multimedia elements such as sound, animation and interactive elements. This is certainly very beneficial for advertisers. However, for web masters it is quite problematic because of the extra load time although the premium for rich-media advertisements is low. In rich media advertisements, users can interact in a web page that is not solely animated or by a click-through function. These can be used either on their own or in a combination of technologies such as Flash, sound, video, DHTML, Java and JavaScript.
Online Ads: A Guide to Online Ad Types and Formats Online ads have become a daily part of Internet life. For new marketers, it can be confusing getting a grasp on the scope and variety of online ads available. Next are some of the types of online advertising based on the Internet platform, as shown in Figure 7.2 ("wordStream: Online advertising made easy", n.d.).
Figure 7.2: Some types of online advertising on the Internet platform
Let us now discuss the types of online advertising based on the Internet.
(a) Google Search Ad
Google search ads are online ads that appear alongside the search engine result page when users search a keyword query on Google. These ads are PPC, or pay-per-click ads, in which advertisers pay for each ad click. Google's PPC search ads are managed by Google's AdWords advertising platform, which allows advertisers to bid on keywords, craft ad text, set budgets and more.
(b) Facebook Ad
Facebook ads exist in many different forms, each offering unique pros and cons for advertisers looking to market on Facebook. Marketplace ads appear in the side columns of the Facebook website with a headline, copy and an image.
(c) Banner Ad
Banner ads are image-based advertisements that often appear on the side, top, and bottom sections of websites. They can range widely in terms of size, design and function. You will typically find them in all sorts of news- based websites, blogs and specialised web communities. Many websites brokerage their ad space with ad exchanges such as Google's Display Network, or you can buy the ad space in the same manner you would buy an ad in a newspaper.
(d) Google Display Ad
Google display ads are a form of contextual banner ads used in the Google Display Network, Google's collection of network sites that agree to host display ads. The Google Display Network also includes Google properties such as YouTube, Gmail, Blogger, etc. Google Display ads can be text, images and even video-based. To serve online ads on the Google Display Network, you need to start by using Google AdWords.
(e) Flash Ad
Flash ads are banner ads that use flash design, often featuring interactive elements to entice users. While flash is still used subtly in certain display ads, the playful, interactive and somewhat hokey flash ads that were common in the millennial years are no longer considered a popular form of banner ads.
(f) Reddit Ad
Reddit ads are advertisements featuring a headline title, destination URL, and an optional photo. Reddit ads work on a bid-based system, in which advertisers can set campaign budgets and choose how long they want their campaign to run for. Reddit ads allow for some unique targeting options and are often fairly cheap, with low cost-per-impressions.
(g) Mobile Ad
Mobile ads are ads that appear on smartphones, tablets and any other mobile device. Many social media platforms, websites and apps offer their own unique mobile ad options. If you advertise on Google AdWords, you can advertise to mobile devices by taking advantage of Enhanced Campaigns.
(h) In-game Ad
In-game ads are advertisements that exist within computer or video games.
One of the most common examples of in-game advertising is billboards appearing in sport games. In-game ads also might appear as brand name products like guns, cars, or clothing that exist as gaming status symbols.
(i) AdMob Ad
AdMob ads are advertisements that appear within mobile apps. AdMob itself is Google's mobile advertising platform, enabling app creators to make revenue off of free games by offering ad space, and allowing advertisers to get ad spots in the most popular mobile games and apps. AdMob ads can appear as mobile-optimised text ads, image-based banner ads or even interstitials ads, which use rich HTML5.
(j) E-mail Ad
E-mail ads are advertisements sent to users via web mail. E-mail ads can be used to notify subscribers of certain promotions, discounts, or new features, among other uses. Most e-mail advertisements feature a large image with minimal text; users will not waste large amounts of time reading e-mail ads, so it is important to make your message as clear and concise as possible. E- mail ads also rely on a compelling subject line to ensure that a user will open the e-mail.
(k) Gmail Ad
Gmail ads in Google's online e-mail service are contextual ads that are generated by an automated process that scans a userÊs e-mails to discover interests and topics that are relevant to the user. If a user is writing and receiving many e-mails about air conditioners, that user may see ads about air conditions appear within the Gmail client. While privacy advocates are wary of such practices, Gmail advertising is fully automated and Google asserts that no humans read user e-mails, only robots.
(l) Youtube Ad
YouTube ads are ads that appear on Google's video-sharing site. Since Google obtained ownership of YouTube, advertising on YouTube has become nearly as easy and customisable as advertising on AdWords. YouTube ads provide a number of targeting options and several different ad formats. YouTube advertisements can appear as banner ads, in-video overlay ads, in-stream video ads (which are video ads that appear before or during another YouTube video), as well as several other setups.
(m) Pinterest Ad
Pinterest ads are simply pieces of content pinned by brands and advertisers. When marketing a specific product, marketers create Pinterest advertisements by adding a dollar sign before the price amount to the description. This tells Pinterest that this item is for sale at that specific price. Pinterest marketers can then link the pinned item to the official product page to drive retail traffic. (n) Instagram Ad There are at the moment no „official‰ Instagram ads just brands being creative and producing Instagram pics that can be shared right alongside user-crafted content. '
ACTIVITY 7.6
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7.5 MEASURING EFFECTIVENESS OF ONLINE
ADVERTISING
There is no precise way to measure the success of an advertising campaign. It is difficult, for example, trying to determine how many sales dollars are generated by each advertising dollar spent. But there are methods that will give advertisers a rough idea of whether advertisements are effective. Since the inception of online advertising, a series of operational measures were employed to quantify the effectiveness of advertising campaigns. To assess the effectiveness of an advertising campaign, advertisers or agencies will normally monitor the following: (a) Sales;
b) New customers;
(c) Requests for information;
(d) Phone inquiries;
(e) Retail store traffic; and
(f) Website traffic or click-through rates.
The following are some of the main measures for online advertising:
(a) Number of Impression Number of impressions or exposures is the number of times an advertisement is displayed to users. "Impressions" refers to the number of times the advertisement is viewed. Some campaigns are purchased by number of impressions. Every time an advertisement is displayed on a user's screen, or every time a page loads with an advertisement on it, an impression is counted, regardless of clicks. Depending on the network or technology used, these advertisements will either be accompanied by an invisible pixel or Javascript code that alerts the hosting server whenever it is loaded. (b) Click-Through Rate Click-through rate (CTR), considered a significant way to measure the performance of online advertisements, is a metric that measures the number of clicks advertisers receive on their advertisements per their number of impressions. It is the ratio of the number of click-throughs to the number of impressions or the percentage of visitors who arrive at a web page and who click on a call-to-action that advertisers want them to click. The call-to-action can be a banner advertisement, a link at the end of a post or any other element on the web page. Most online advertisement networks use some form of URL redirect to measure clicks. Before the user reaches the advertisement's intended landing page, he or she briefly visits the advertisement network's own URL for measurement. This usually happens so quickly that the user does not even notice. Each advertisement has its own redirect URL, so each time that URL is loaded on the server, one click is counted. However, there has been a steady decline in the reported CTR levels through the past years. This declined CTR figures have been mainly attributed to the fact that online users avoid looking at the advertisement items during browsing.
(c) Post-Impression
The number of post-impressions is the number of visits to a website, after exposure to an Internet advertisement, without clicking through the advertisement. This measurement captures both the direct performance of the advertising message and the subliminal effects that this message may have on the online user. However, post-impressions are hard to track and miss some aspects of advertising effectiveness, for example the attitudes of users towards the advertised brand.
(d) Memory-based Measure
This is a traditional measure of advertising effectiveness but it has been revived in the context of Internet advertising. Such measures reflect the attitudinal response of online users to the advertisements displayed to them. Among the methods to quantify the effect of online advertisements are unaided and aided recall, brand recognition, purchase intention and purchase consideration. Recall and recognition tests measure the extent to which web advertising affects the explicit memory of consumers. (e) Priming Priming refers to the exposure of a person to some prior event or stimulus, that is, the prime that results in increased accessibility of information related to this stimulus. Priming studies quantify the implicit memory effects of advertising. Three types of priming are:
(i) Feature priming, which tests the accessibility and readiness of the priming information, for example, by means of word completion tests.
(ii) Semantic priming, which investigates the possibility of semantic changes in implicit memory through the measurement of reaction times to stimuli following semantically-related primes.
(iii) Categorical priming, which looks into implicit associations between categories, for instance, implicit attitudes towards brands.
(f) Bounce Rate
When a page is well-designed, it will be able to keep visitors at your site and it will also encourage them to navigate to other sections or pages of the website including doing a certain action such as to fill out a form, or to show continued interest in what a web page has to offer. On the other hand, a poorly designed page will make visitors leave the site. A bounce rate is calculated when a visitor leave a website. This measurement is useful to improve websites and generate the most leads possible (Podsada, 2013). The bounce rate shows the percentage of visitors that come to a website and leave after seeing the first page. This metric tells advertisers whether the page is effective at making them take action and whether they are attracting the right visitor to the page.
ACTIVITY 7.7
Advertisements on mobile devices are measured in various ways depending on the marketing channel used and its associated measurement capabilities. The Mobile Web Advertising Measurement Guidelines have been developed by the membership of the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) and other contributors who are representative of the key parties in the mobile marketing ecosystem and include handset manufacturers, wireless operators, ad servers, content providers, agencies, brands and technology enablers. Explain the main measures in mobile web advertising by referring to the guidelines which can be found in this website: http://www.iab.net/media/file/MobileWebMeasurementGuidelines2 FINAL.pdf
SELF-CHECK
7.1 Identify if the following statement is true (T) or false (F) CTR is a key measurement showing advertisers the following:
How well your online advertising, such as Google AdWords or banner ads, are enticing your customers to keep going. How well your website, social media, or mobile advertising is converting visitors into leads and customers. The percentage of advertisers who have a web page that promote click on a call-to-action.
Number of visits to a website, after exposure to an Internet advertisement, without clicking through the advertisement. How effectively your sales team is converting leads into customers. The percentage of visitors that come to your website and leave after seeing the first page. ?
Internet advertising, also known as online advertising is the delivery of advertising messages and marketing communications through the Web. It is a marketing strategy that involves the use of the Internet as a medium to deliver marketing messages to the right customers in order to obtain website traffic. Media planners and advertising agencies have to consider several factors when deciding whether advertising on Internet is right for the advertisers. A good online advertising agency and a good media planner understand both the advantages and disadvantages of the medium in order to create campaigns that set new heights in performance. Having an online presence is a necessity for many companies and organisations. Although beneficial to advertisers, marketing and advertising online have certain disadvantages and downfalls that may persuade the business to use its advertising budget on other marketing methods.
? Internet advertising takes a multitude of forms. More and more innovative types of advertising are coming into existence as the Web matures. Some of the main ones include textual advertisements, banner advertisements, display advertisements, website as advertiser, pop-ups, opt-in mailing, HTML advertisements, video advertisements, interstitials, hybrids advertisements, sponsorship and rich media advertisements.
? There is no precise way to measure the success of an online advertising campaign. It is difficult to determine its effectiveness but there are methods and operational measures which can be employed to quantify the effectiveness of online advertising campaigns.
Advertising fatigue
Pop-ups
Banner advertisement
Real-time advertising
Click-Through Rate (CTR)
Rich media advertisements
Display advertisement
Spam
HTML advertisement
Sponsorship
Hybrid advertisement
Textual advertisement
Interstitials
Video advertisement
Measurability
Website as advertiser
Opt-in mailing
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