Article

What we've learnt about digital display advertising

by Nick Bennett

Nick shares valuable insights to help you improve your business with effective digital display advertising.

How can you significantly increase traffic and sales, without increasing your budget?

More than 12 years of planning and delivering digital display campaigns has proven to us that the key factor for success is relevance. And that with careful planning it's perfectly possible to achieve high levels of relevance and significantly increase traffic and sales, without increasing your budget.
Here's how...

Display is the most crowded territory

Digital display adverts are the billboards of the internet. Alongside PPC, they're the most consistent element to be found on digital media plans. But in this extremely crowded territory, ensuring effective performance and delivering maximum return on investment is a huge challenge.

Think from the consumer's point of view

Let's never forget that a person visiting a web page has not done so to gaze lovingly at the 468x60 pixel banner nestled neatly in the blind spot at the top of the page, or the 120x600 pixel skyscraper that stretches itself longingly down the right-hand side of the page. Nor have they navigated there in the hope of seeing your product, in all its glory, beaming at them half-way down the page from the coveted 300x250 pixel MPU (mid page unit).

That person has made the effort to find that particular webpage for a very good reason. They have a need to fulfill, whether that's for specific information, products, tools, services or entertainment. Whatever the reason, they are going to be focussed on that - not on your advert. And, of course, they are probably also in a hurry.

Keeping all of this front of mind should be your starting point if you want to achieve high levels of relevance.

Question everything

It's important to get to know the sites on the media plan and scour the content, to discover for yourself why people visit those sites. Then, put yourself in the consumer's shoes and in their day.

What do you suppose they might be doing on any given day? What is their motivation for visiting those sites? And why do they visit before work, during a lunch break, after work and at home? What is it that they might need? What information could they be hungry for?

Only with this level of analysis of the media plan and the consumer's motivation and behaviour will you begin to deliver high levels of relevancy with your digital display.

Add value and you will be remembered

If you can begin to understand their state of mind you can create a credible bridge to your products. Furthermore, if you can also be useful and provide relevant content, you begin to add value. And that's the start of a positive conversation between that person and your brand.

The right priorities

  1. Focus on your audience first, not on your product.
  2. Allocate time to research, understand and plan.
  3. Match that with the same level of intelligent technical integration.

Get the balance right and it will lead to great results.

The ingredients for success

In our summer campaign for lastminute.com we did just that. After careful audience analysis, research and planning, we devised a campaign with a simple premise behind it:
"Whatever you're doing, whatever the time, we honestly believe we can suggest something better for you to do... Go on! Unleash summer."

We built bespoke technology into our digital display adverts that not only delivered targeted and relevant messages based on the time of day and day of the week, but also reduced many costs associated with this high level of targeting.

Then we took it a stage further and incorporated live feeds that delivered dynamic messages and appropriate products depending on the weather conditions that day.

And every Thursday we used the weather forecast for the coming weekend to direct the messages and products.

"Click-through rates for this campaign are over 70% higher than other ads. The response for these ads has been excellent, better than some rich media and video streaming ads, and without expensive production, media or ad serving costs."
Thomas Loizeau, Online Campaign Manager, lastminute.com

And there's more...

Putting relevance aside for a moment, what else should you be considering when planning and delivering digital display campaigns? Our top three suggestions are as follows:

  1. Make sure your PPC is effectively coordinated with your display.
  2. Don't fall into the trap of only measuring click-thru. It doesn't give a true picture of the effect of your digital display - and won't provide you with the data you need to learn and improve your campaigns.
  3. Always apply the correct techniques to build your brand while driving acquisition and sales.

Demand more from your digital display

It takes time, effort and serious commitment to get your digital display performing effectively. And by that I mean driving maximum return for your business and for your brand. But it certainly doesn't need to cost the earth.

If you want to find out more about achieving a relevant conversation with your customers to achieve a better return on your digital display - or to discuss any of the other issues raised here, please give us a call.