Step by Step Guide for Mastering Direct Display Ads
Google Display Ads is a part of online advertising displaying visual ads placed on different websites, social media channels, and other digital mediums to promote businesses, services, or products. Display ads are placed in the following formats, including banners, images, and videos, and aim to capture user attention by driving traffic to the specific landing page helping in better brand visibility.
Mastering Google Display Ads involves understanding the complexities of its working algorithm. Display Ads were built to capture the audience through the visually appealing content placed across different parts of the websites as per the niche to capture the audience or increase brand awareness.
Types of Display Ads:
Different types of display advertising have various landscapes of digital marketing strategies. They are designed to capture audiences through eye-catching formats such as banners, videos, native ads, and interactive media. Some of the types of Display Advertising are as follows:
Banner Ads:
These ads are placed in the most visible area of the web pages. Banner ads can be static images, GIFs, or multimedia and are one of the most common types of display ads and are highly fruitful in capturing the user’s eyes.
Retargeting Ads:
Retargeting ads are designed to re-engage the users who have previously visited our website or interacted with our brand but did not complete a desired action/conversion, such as making a purchase or clicking on the desired CTAs. We recommend these ads as they follow users around the web, reminding them of our brand and encouraging them to return and convert.
Video Ads:
Videos ads are displayed at the start, during, or end of any video content on platforms like YouTube, Facebook, or any social media channel. These can also appear as standalone ads on websites and are highly effective for storytelling messages in a short period.
Native Ads:
Native ads can blend ideally with the website content or the platform on which they are placed. They exactly match the look & feel of the related content, making them less intrusive and more likely to be recognized as valuable information.
Rich Media Ads:
Rich media ads are interactive ads that help us engage our users through animations, videos, audio, and any dynamic medium. These ads increase user interaction like clicks, scrolling, or hovering making them more engaging as compared to static ads.
Audience Targeting Modes:
Display ads have three methods of targeting the specific audience as per the required niche, which can be combined to reach different groups for better reach:
- Demographics
- Audiences
- Content
Demographics:
By choosing demographic targeting, you can set the ads to appear only to certain demographics ideally your target audience which can be the following options:
- Gender
- Age
- Parental status
- Household income (Only a few countries are eligible for this option)
Other demographic aspects that can be used for segmentation include Education, homeownership, marital status, family size, race, occupation, nationality, and religion.
For example: If you run an e-commerce store selling apparel for Gen Z Girls, select the demographic targeting only a certain age bracket for them.
Audiences:
While selecting the audience targeting, display ads reach out to the users based on who they are and their scope of interest in the particular product or brand or actively researching it.
There are several considerations to account for, particularly when addressing the diverse range of audiences, including:
Affinity: Select from a list of interests, people have shown for a Service, product, or activity based on their previous searches and browsing history.
In-market: Select a list of categories and detailed products/services that people are actively researching with the intent to buy Including Financial Services, Employment, and Real Estate, with detailed alternatives like Business Loans, Internships, and Commercial Properties.
Life events: Target people who are having some huge life events, like buying a home, starting a business, changing jobs, and retiring.
Custom: This type of audience targeting was known as Custom Affinity/Custom Intent audiences. Identify keywords and interests people have and are searching for, websites or real places they’ve visited, or apps they’ve used in the past.
I.e. According to our experienced digital marketers and their years of knowledge, we suggest using competitors’ blog posts that rank highly for your target keywords works well.
We also suggest you create audiences using data about who’s interacted with your Ads by using Remarketing tactics. These lists are created based on Google Analytics data and include users who have interacted with your site, app, or any medium you are using for display ads.
Content:
Targeting by content is a kind of contextual targeting where you set the ads to appear in certain positions based on the content. Content targeting allows you a few options as follows:
Placements: You can define the desired websites, apps, and video streaming platforms where you want the ads to be displayed. It is only fruitful if targeted on high-traffic websites.
Keywords: In this type of display ads Google will place the ads on the web pages related to the desired targeted keyword(s) specially placed by you. These ads can be shown on the pages that contain the keywords but don’t focus on the subject. I.e. the target keyword “Digital Marketing” might get your ad to show on an article that only mentions “Digital Marketing Courses” but not the services.
Topics: Select a list of predefined topics from different industries and hobbies; where the ads will appear regarding your selected topic. I.e. If you choose “SEO” as a topic, your ads will be listed on those websites that focus on SEO not just a page that mentions SEO.
A/B Testing:
A/B testing/Split testing, is used to compare two versions of any ad to understand which is performing better and liked by the user as per the conversion ratio. A/B testing has the following testing variations such as different headlines, images, CTAs, and targeting options helping you identify the most effective combinations of your ad campaigns.
Conclusion:
Display Ads are very powerful for reaching out a wide audience, helping in brand visibility, and conversions. By mastering different types of display ads, using best practices, and A/B testing, businesses can run successful display ad campaigns with outstanding results.
