3 Advertising Updates that will Change the way Marketing Works

Advertising changes the way things work online. Regardless of what industry you’re in, ads are an integral part of developing your brand’s image and driving sales; even well-known companies are likely to lose a lot by failing to use ads effectively.

You only have to look at the estimates for the future of online advertising (shown in the graph below) to recognize that now, more than ever, it is vital to stay up to date with new developments and create carefully crafted campaigns. With this in mind, here are three game-changing ad solutions that your business needs to know about.

Dynamic Ads

What are They?

Dynamic remarketing is the newer, more targeted version of traditional remarketing. It enables your business to entice customers who have already shown an interest in your brand by getting personalized ads in front of them. Unlike classic remarketing, these ads are based on products or services that the consumer has already viewed on your site, regardless of how they ended up there. Given that only a small proportion of your website visitors are ready to purchase, it’s a great technique to nurture leads and give them a gentle nudge further down the sales pipeline. It also works in the case of bringing previous buyers back into the fold – you can target them with products that are similar or complementary to their earlier purchases, or offer them special deals.

Why you should be using them

Dynamic remarketing is set to expand from solely website usage to include apps, so now is a great time to hit the ground running and explore your options. Although it is obviously ideal for retail businesses with physical products to display, the technique can also be used to great effect across all industries; recruitment companies can show ads featuring jobs in a certain sector and travel agents can produce ads showing holiday deals for destinations an individual has looked at earlier, to give just a couple of examples. There are several other benefits to using dynamic remarketing, such as:

• Time-Saving – Unlike its older counterpart, dynamic remarketing automatically creates ads for each product, negating the need to do so manually – excellent news for companies with large product or service portfolios.
• Personalised – The personalization involved in the technique is one of its biggest draws. According to research from Digital Trends, 73% of consumers prefer to do business with brands that use personal information to make their shopping experiences more relevant, and numerous studies have shown that targeted ads drive more sales.
• Easier Conversions – According to DemandGen, nurtured leads mean a 20% increase in sales opportunities, and dynamic remarketing allows these warm leads to avoid falling out of your sales pipeline altogether. Chances are if someone has already shown an interest in your brand, they will be easier to convert – they just need a bit of time and a few helpful reminders.

How to get the most out of them

In order to create the most effective dynamic remarketing ads, it’s important to carry out split testing along the way. To do this you just need to create two different ad groups, with the only changes being in design and format. You can then compare the results and as a result have a clearer idea of what works for your audience.

It’s also a good idea to be meticulous when it comes to placing your bids. Visitors to your site who have already started but abandoned a purchase should have higher bids, for example. You should also look at timeframes; someone who has visited your site more recently is likely to be easier to convert, so are worth higher bids.

Automated Rules

What is it?

Facebook’s automated rules feature allows you to put your advertising on autopilot by shutting down aspects of your campaigns according to rules you’ve set in advance. You can set rules on a great number of factors in your campaign, such as cost per add to cart, cost per click, cost per purchase and cost per app install, to name just a few. For example, you could tell Facebook to turn off an ad once the CPC reaches a certain amount.

Why you should be using it

Given that, as the graph above from the Content Marketing Institute shows, social promotion is the top paid technique for the majority of businesses, and it won’t be long before every business-related social network with advertising-related features will adopt such solutions. Implementing automated rules now will not only save your business time and resources by saving you the task of manually tweaking every campaign, it will also mean you’re ahead of the curve and will be in good standing to implement similar features on other platforms.

How to get the most out of it

Setting up your first campaign using automated rules can be a little daunting at first, so we recommend the following:

• Email Notifications – If you’re reluctant to give up complete control to Facebook’s algorithms, there’s the option to receive email notifications before anything is altered, and you can then review the campaign manually and choose whether to go ahead with the suggested course of action. This might be a good place to start in any case, since it will help give you an idea of how the process works and hopefully builds your trust in the feature.
• Don’t Lose Track – Although having an automated service will undoubtedly save you time and effort, it’s important to still check in on it from time to time and monitor progress, in order to spot trends and also to alter your rules according to any outside factors, for example, seasonal changes.

Instant Article Ads

What is it?

With the rise in mobile usage for browsing the web in recent times, it made sense that publishers would need new technologies to provide faster, more responsive ways to offer content. This came in the form of Google’s AMP and Apple’s News first, and Facebook then rolled out its own version – Instant Articles. LinkedIn also implemented it.

The problem with these formats, however, was that the fact that they are so stripped back meant that publishers weren’t able to make money from ads. This caused Facebook to come up with a way for ads to be included in the content, while keeping the articles to the bare minimum.

Why you should be using it

Due to the fast nature of Instant Articles, they are shared 30% more than ordinary mobile web articles, and readers are 70% less likely to abandon the article before reading, according to Facebook. This obviously means a wider reach for your ads, and it seems that the feature is working incredibly well so far; Facebook state that Instant Articles now pays out more than $1 million every day to publishers, and French publisher Liberation has been vocal about their claim that over 50% of their mobile ad revenue now comes from Instant Articles.

How to get the most out of it

One of the factors in making your native ads on Instant Articles successful is to ensure that they are up to the same standard as the rest of the content. By all means, experiment with different designs and copy, but ultimately your ads will be much more effective if they are in line with the reader experience.

BONUS: Messenger Ads

As you may know, Facebook announced its plans to introduce ads into the Messenger app earlier this year; perhaps unsurprisingly for a feature that now has around 1.2 billion monthly users. The ads will be in message form, and you can include images and links. Although this feature does have some drawbacks; it is inherently intrusive and you’re only able to target those who have messaged you before, but it is still worth a trial; it won’t be too long before these types of ads will be commonplace in retargeting and developing dynamic advertising concepts.

Once you’re up to date with the latest trends in advertising, you can make use of Global Database lists:

• As first contact prospects – When putting together a campaign, you need those all-important first contacts to fill your sales pipeline with. A verified audience is a good starting point for building custom audiences, whom you can then re-target according to their interaction and behavior.
• As lookalike prospects – After you’ve tested your first ad campaign on relevant contacts, you can use the subsequent analytics in order to create lookalike audiences to reach even more leads. However, you can stick with the basics and work with already enriched data from Global Database.
• As to-remarket-to prospects – Yes. You can actually re-market to your first contact prospects, after testing your pipeline and the new advertising options. Measure everything, test out and you’ll find what works in your case, no matter the huge updates advertising platforms make.

Staying up to date with the latest trends and features in online advertising is crucial in order to keep up with your competitors and target your audiences in the most efficient way. You may find that not all of these features work for your brand, but with a bit of trial and error, you could see a real boost in your lead generation and sales efforts.