Understanding Digital Marketing – We Compare Online Platforms
We all know that Digital Marketing is a major factor in getting your business noticed online but knowing where to start can be tricking. In a series of weeks, we aim to break down some of the confusion and help your business ads profit.
This week we will focus on the digital platforms and ad formats, and understanding which to use.
There are so many options when it comes to Digital Marketing, it can be downright confusing. Facebook, Google, TikTok, Instagram the list goes on. The Digital world can be a confusing web. We have broken down the platforms and matched them with business and advertising goals below to help you get started.
1. Facebook.
Image Ads
These are your standout branding ad format, which sets the mood of your product or brand and evokes an emotion or feeling, giving the user a reason to click.
Here are a couple of examples of good Facebook image ads with a desirable branding image and an offer incentivising people to click.
Facebook: Video ads
Work in the same way as an image ad but when done well, allows you to show more of your product and brand. Video is said to be more effective when it comes to engagement – 60% of US digital viewers use Facebook to watch videos
Facebook: Carousel Ads
These are good for displaying several products or brand images that you can scroll through and get an understanding of your business. Below is an example of a pet food company that has used each slide to promote a different flavour of dog food.
Facebook: Collection Ads
These are similar to carousel ads but specific to eCommerce or product ads. These are used specifically to sell different products, with each slide containing and individual product which links to the website product page.
Tips For Facebook
- A good well-rounded Facebook campaign would contain a few ad formats depending on your overall goals
- By setting up Facebook Business Manager and running ads from here, you have more control over your audience, ads and display.
2. Instagram.
Instagram is owned by Facebook and tends to run similar ads formats. The main difference here is the users. The average Facebook user age is 40 years old, while most Instagram users are between 25-34 years old. Because of this we have to think about content/ brand vs audience, this will define your platform choice. Think of Linda aged 52 looking for plants at a garden centre (Facebook) vs Fin aged 26 looking for surfboard wax (Instagram).
Most companies will have a Facebook and Instagram account and it is easy to push ads for both platforms out from the same place using Facebook’s Business Manager https://business.facebook.com/.
The other difference with Instagram is you can add image shopping tags to add your product ads to the instagram shopping feed. If you would like more info on this you can read this here
3. Google Ads
Search Ads
Search Ads are one of the most powerful ad formats when set up and run correctly. This format aims to target qualified users who are directly searching for your products using keywords and terms.
Think of this example: I am going on a holiday and looking for accommodation in Rote Island so I search “accommodation rote island” the first options which appear are paid search ads which are relevant to this search term, relevant is defined by the ads as well as the website content. I am a qualified user who is looking to book there and then, so I select the second option and I book.
Search ads generally have a high conversion rates when set up correctly.
Display Ads
Google has a massive network of affiliate websites which they push ads to. Display ads are the image based ads which are displayed on these websites based on your product or service.
This format generally has a lower conversion rate than search ads but a higher number of impressions, pushing your ads out to the relevant users at a higher rate. Therefore this format is generally better for a branding or offer-based message. See the example above.
Google Tip
When running Display ads alongside Search ads you tend to see a higher volume of traffic via Search as users often will see your ad and might come back to it later by searching Google.
4. Linkedin
LinkedIn is a platform for the B2B market. It is a lot more formal than Facebook and Instagram but has a similar ad format. LinkedIn is a space to position your business as the expert in its game.
If you would like some help with your digital marketing Get in touch with us today for more information.
References
Finances Online
– https://financesonline.com/facebook-video-statistics
Facebook For Business
Instagram For Business
