These 5 priorities will help ad teams optimise digital ad campaigns
Advertising Initiative Blog | 30 August 2023
The technology available today should be giving advertisers more visibility than ever before. This allows for more considered decisions to be made in real time. It’s definitely time to begin embracing the data and technology you have open to you, to start optimising your clients’ digital ad campaigns, and exploit as high an ROI as possible.
Optimisation doesn’t just happen. Considering your options before, during, and beyond a client campaign will ensure the best possible results.
So, here are my top five suggestions your media business needs to optimise your client digital ad campaigns.
1. Profit as a measure
There are many metrics we can use to measure the success of otherwise of client ad campaigns: cost per click (CPC), cost per acquisition (CPA), cost per thousand impressions (CPM), return on ad spend (ROAS), click through rate (CTR), etc. Often, these metrics are reported as one so the advertiser can get a fuller picture.
However, while these metrics give a “surface” ROI, what is the actual net profit of each transaction that gets generated? Understanding profit can allow better and more informed decisions.
2. User journey
Do we know what the total user journey looked like for people clicking on client ads? Here are some base one steps you can take to make sure your user journey is optimal:
Click throughs from mobile, tablet, or desktop? Are all the pages optimised for the relevant screen size? What does the client’s landing page say above the fold? Does it have a clear call to action? How fast does the page load? If the consumer abandons the journey, what do we have in place to tackle this? If they do become an actual consumer/purchaser, do we consider them for an ongoing, onboarding process to alleviate churn and, in doing so, stimulate sales activity?
3. Calendar of events
Right time and the right place in digital advertising is a thing.
We can spend much time buying as many eyeballs as we can, but that doesn’t drive budget efficiency. Getting the timing right can be realising what events like holidays (public, school), sports events, conferences, music concerts, and festivals, etc., are planned in the target catchment area — all of which might impact your ad client’s business.
A calendar of events might help. It helps us gaze into the future for when/where demand might happen e.g., when it’s likely big numbers of people will be in a specific area at a given time.
With foresight, we can start to leverage relevant advertising tactics to ensure any needed increase in ad spend is made at the right time, in the right place.
4. Consistency of experience
This is, in my mind, the easiest suggestion, but amazingly, I think not often utilised.
Consistency is all about ensuring your advertiser’s potential customers have a positive brand experience all the way through the journey — from, say, seeing an initial display ad in a newspaper to it appearing on a client Web site. The colours, the “tone of voice,” the logo, the various visual/creative cues should be consistent all through the journey.
Creating that familiarity is a definite way to keep them on the straight and narrow path to conversion. Make sure your advertiser is fully aware. Be the expert. It’s all part of their consultative sell.
5. Abandoning us!
No matter what we do, there will always be occasions when some users will abandon the process we have laid down. Worse is when they abandon at the point of signing up with us for, say, a subscription or buying something (from an e-commerce perspective).
To minimise the loss, we can trigger an e-mail response. The type of “abandoning e-mails” that work well follow the basic rules of leveraging a platform that sends triggered e-mails, which gives us details of opening/click rates. Then, we can send an e-mail within a short period, post abandonment.
In summary
Implementing/being conscious of the above should allow us to quickly understand which platforms or channels are delivering the most accurate results and, in turn, generate optimal levels of engagement and ultimately conversion. The insights you achieve will be welcomed by your advertisers.
If a certain platform or channel is not delivering the results your client is looking for, then you will have the chance to quickly assess, consult with your client, then change or switch off if need be. Vice versa, if you find it’s all working fine, then you can ask to beef up the ad spend accordingly.
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