« Broadband spurs ‘techno-commuters’ rise | Main | Tech companies wake up to traffic nightmare »
JupiterResearch Shows Only 2 Perecent of Surfers Click Through
By Marc Pollard | September 3, 2007
The ole saying goes in the offline advertising world- “I know half of my advertising is working, I just don’t know which half!”. In the online advertising world that saying would need to be modified to state- “I know that 98% of my advertising dollars are wasted, I am just happy the 2% of it gets me a click!”
According to Jupiter Research, $19.9 billion for online ads will be spent this year, but only 2% of those exposed to those ads will click on them. If I decided to advertise, then for every $100 I spend, $98 of those dollars are wasted. It is almost criminal, but many online advertisers don’t think they really have a choice.
Let’s break this all down to how most online advertisers approach an online ad campaign (NOTE- THIS IS WHY 98% OF ADVERTISTING DOLLARS ARE WASTED):
1. Who is our target audience and what sites do they visit and come up with a list of sites.
2. What is our product or services message and let’s design an ad, button, cleaver link, some keywords, etc. to entice those users to click on our ad.
3. Definintely, let’s budget for AdWords on Google, etc.
4. Call an online ad broker like Turn.com, contact an ad network, or have the media buyer contact the web properties to obtain CPM (cost per 1000) rates, or if you are lucky, CPC (cost per click).
5. Obtain the size of ads/links, buttons, etc. and have our web team, or web partner design and produce the ads and send them off and pray for clicks!
I don’t think it is a matter of targeting customers or coming up with clever ways of promote our products or services that is going to increase your click through. This is just the price of entry. When broadcast advertising came into existence, there were only 4 TV channels, a handful of programs, and millions of captive viewers. Not the case with online advertising with millions of websites.
Just a few suggestions on the correct approach:
1. Break down the buyer’s mental buying process into finite details and determining exactly how the potential buyer consumes online media and how, when and why they purchase online. If you can learn everything possible about your buyers media habits, surfing methods, mental state while online, (i.e. at work, home, 11pm at night before they sleep surfing the discussion boards, etc.), you probably would discover more creative ways of getting your buyers attention besides creating and running a banner ad.
2. Once you have all the information that you can obtain on your consumer, then begin to map out your media plan first, before the creative planning process begins. I start by making just one rule: NO BANNER ADS. If the average banner ad click through rate is about .25%, then why even advertise online at all! I believe most advertisers start with banner ads, because it is easy to figure out and everyone does it.
3. Look at “non-advertising” approaches to getting your message front and center of your potential buyer. Start a targeted custom discussion board, a blog, write editorials or reviews, etc. as a way to capture users with information they are looking for.
4. When developing creative, go through the potential buyers experience and determine if you are meeting their needs. For example, if they clicked on your link or key word, did you send them directly to the sign-up form? Or did you send them to a page on your website that satisfied their needs. Did you consider developing a “Splash/Landing” page to be even more relevant to the potential buyer than what you can provide on your current website?
5. Monitor and change your online ad campaign based on expected results. The most strategic advantage of offline vs. online advertising is the ability to view real-time results of your advertising campaign, and with some effort, adjust, change, correct the message or media buy in order to obtain maximum effectiveness.
To learn more about how effectively develop a SEO/SEM campaign view our web page at http://www.advantivecorp.com/blogs/solutions.
Topics: Marketing |