Are you worried about losing money by investing in advertising? You have reason to be concerned.
It’s easy to mess up your ad campaign and blow through your whole marketing budget. However, is it worth skipping the benefits when businesses make $2 for every $1 spent on paid campaigns? If you’re smart with your money, paid ads are well worth the effort.
Before you jump into the world of display advertising, it’s critical to understand how the process works. Keep reading to learn what display ads are and the best way to add them to your marketing plan.
What Are Display Ads?
Display ads are pieces of content on websites that encourage users to click through to other websites. They have specially created text or images that are inserted into website content.
Most display ads work based on bids. If you want to get real estate on a website, you need to outbid your competition. If you win your bid, you get your ad spot and pay for every click that sends people to your website.
Another less commonly used bidding option is cost per thousand (CPM). For this option, you pay a set price for every thousand impressions your ad receives.
What Types of Display Ads Are There?
Before you set up your display ad campaign, it’s essential to understand the types of ads out there. Below are the common types of ads you can pick to promote your website.
1. Banner Ad
Many people react better to visuals than they do to text. The eyes gravitate to things that are different. If you place images on a text-heavy website, your display ads banner is likely to stand out.
Banner ads come in many formats and sizes. You’ll need a version for each ad spot you want to use on websites.
2. Text Ad
Text ads are great for more contextual targets. Ad platforms place these ads by adding them to websites that have similar content. They do this by matching your ad title and description to the content on web pages.
Your goal with text ads is to create headlines that relate to common problems that your website solves. You need to show people that you have the answer and going to your website is worth the time.
3. Video Ad
You can’t describe all products easily with an image and text. For situations like this, video is the perfect option.
You’ll find most video ads on video platforms like YouTube. Users don’t like it when autoplay videos interrupt them when they’re trying to read an article. It makes more sense to show these ads when they’re expecting them.
4. Interactive Ad
It’s hard to grab someone’s attention on the internet these days. People are used to being bombarded with ads, so many people begin ignoring them. You can solve this problem by providing something for people to interact with.
Interaction can come in the form of playable demos for games to calculators for mortgage companies. People are more likely to click your ads when they are invested in your content.
How Do You Set Up Display Ads and Search Ads?
Now that you have a better idea about the types of display advertisements out there, it’s time to start your first campaign. Follow the steps below to get up and running.
1. Research Your Market
Even the best marketers won’t try to create an ad that appeals to everyone. If you try to create an ad like this, the chances are that it will waste your marketing budget.
This means that your ads need to target a specific type of person. You’ll need to research your customer base to create customer personas for your typical customers. Use this information to create a set of ads for each person.
2. Set Up Your Targeting
Once you have a set of ads for your target customers, you need to set up targeting so that they are the only people who see your marketing. Luckily, that’s easy with digital marketing.
Ad platforms have a lot of information about their audience. You can use this information to target your ads based on sex, age, location, and interests. The more specific you are with your targeting options, the more targeted you can create your ads.
3. Make the Right Bids
Display ads get more expensive every year. You can’t spend a few pennies per click and expect to get the top ad spots. You’ll need to be competitive if you want to drive traffic to your website.
Ad platforms will typically provide a recommended bid for your ads. You can start by testing under the recommended amount to see how much traffic you receive. However, you’ll need to up your bid if you want to take advantage of all the traffic an ad provider has to offer.
4. Analyze Your Results
Your ads probably aren’t going to make money right away. Even with a lot of in-depth research, there’s no guarantee that your research is perfect. You’ll need data to refine your ads and targeting.
Set up scripts on your website to determine what people coming from ads do on your website. You can use goal pages and assign them dollar values to figure out how much each ad set is making for you. This behavioral targeting will help you figure out which ads are making money and which ones need more work.
5. Optimize Your Campaign
Once you analyze your ad results, you can start the optimization process. The first step is to cut losing ads. If you see any demographics or advertisements that aren’t performing well, cut them from your ad campaign.
Once you cut ads that are losing money, you can start optimizing what you have left. Create new ads that are similar to your old ones and change up a few things. Your goal is to see which text and images perform best and increase your budget on the ones that are proven winners.
Start Your First Display Ads Campaign Today
It’s easy to get caught up in the hype that social media marketing has today. However, that doesn’t mean display ads can’t provide a great return on your investment. Start your first campaign today to see how much value display ads will bring to your marketing efforts.
Are you looking for more tips to help your marketing efforts? Read our latest posts to find our best digital marketing tips.
