Why Online Advertising?
Online advertising is gradually replacing traditional radio and television advertising completely. Compared with traditional advertising, the budget to carry out an online ad campaign is relatively low, and also has the propensity to reach a more specific and larger audience. For this, marketers have made it a favorite and better alternative, with big corporations spending billions annually on different types of online campaigns.
However, it is important to realize that there are different online advertising types. In this article, we have listed some of these different types and their uses, and hope it helps you understand the online advertising market in depth.
Types of Online Advertising
1. Banner online advertising.
Mainly through the use of image files in various formats, in this type of online advertising the content is presented on the pages of the website. In addition, languages such as Java can be used to improve interactivity, and other methods can also be used to enhance the performance.
2. Text link online advertising.
Text link advertising is interspersed in the text in a web page content(mainly articles). When visitors to the website click on the linked word or phrase, they are directed to a specific page on another website. This method is popular because it does not cause much impact on the website visitor and their user experience of the initial site they visited. Publishers of these ads are paid based on the number of clicks on the text ad (customized) link.
3. Email advertising.
This type of online advertising is highly targeted because usually the audience email addresses are retrieved willfully based on indicated interests; and is relatively low in cost. This advantage is not available in other forms of advertising.
4. Interstitial advertising.
This type of advertisement can be integrated with the content of the web page; it appears between content. In traditional TV, newspapers and periodicals, such an ad would require a pause in the flow of content in the form of “a commercial break”, but it is not necessary to do so on the web page because the line between ads and content on the page is almost nonexistent.
5. Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
This kind of online advertising is used for promoting web content to appear on search engine ranking pages organically. Advertisers can use linking. Meta-descriptions, specific keywords, and by putting out valuable content that will pull in visitors.
6. Search Engine Marketing (SEM).
This is usually called the Pay Per Click model. With this type of ad, your business/service can appear at the top or bottom of results on search engine pages. The per click payment is owing to the fact that the marketer is only billed when a visitor clicks on the ad and comes to the website.
7. Social Media Marketing.
This involves marketing on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, etc. These platforms boast of billions of daily users, and so are great places to advertise online. A great thing Social media marketing has going for it, is how targeted the ads can be. Based on submitted personal data at the point of sign up, and how they interact with content on the platform, users can be segmented and better targeted with adverts that are in line with their interests.
8. Video Ads.
Think of an advert you remember, that advert you loved so very much because it appealed to you. Chances are that what came to your mind was a video, and that is how powerful video ads can be.
YouTube as a video streaming platform, is a major pioneer of this type of ad. It is audio-visual, and appeals to more senses than the other ad types, so is usually more memorable. People love to relate with people, so a living moving ad would be selected over a static photo more times than not. With video ads you can communicate with stories better, plus the younger customers/audience prefer video content. So if you want to reach them with an ad, think “video ad”.
What do these online advertising types mean for you?
The key to utilizing and getting the best results out of online advertising is first “understanding your marketing objective”. This answers the question “why” and guides your choice of ad type.
If you are not ready to invest in advertising yet, you can stick with SEO and Organic social media marketing; these will get you started. You will need a content strategy, and a lot of consistency.
However if you’re set to take your marketing to the next level, then you need to analyze and find the right ad combinations to match your objective.
Once you kick off, measurement comes into play using analytics and insights, as this will help you know which ad type/format is giving you required results, and which one you should cut back from.
To learn more about Online advertising in particular and digital marketing in general, click here to download Olotu Square Digital Marketing Curriculum. Or click here to speak with one of our marketing experts about your business for FREE.
