Running online advertisements is a powerful and cost-effective way to promote your business and connect with your target audience, ultimately increasing the number of conversions. When utilizing a marketing tool like this, having a strategy is imperative. Too often, we see organizations set up online advertising with little to no plan or follow-through, a tactic that will not help you achieve your content marketing goals.
Here are five of the most common mistakes we see in the online advertising industry that you should avoid and some digital marketing tips to help you get results.
1. No defined target audience
We get it; reaching as many people as possible sounds appealing. Trying to target the masses can often have the opposite effect. Set smart marketing goals and think about quality over quantity. Your focus should be on refining and defining your target audience.
- By focusing on a narrow, niche segment, you can tailor your products or services to meet their specific needs. Rather than trying to appeal to a broader group, focus on serving your potential customers and loyal brand advocates. Catering your content to what this smaller audience is looking for will help you maximize engagement and achieve more success overall.
- Your marketing campaigns should always have a focused message tailored to the preferences and online behaviours of your target audience. Resonating with the right people will help your ads achieve maximum impact.
- Boost your user intent targeting by analyzing your organic search engine results, specifically, the search queries your target audience uses. This data is valuable in identifying topics to create pieces of content around.
2. Investing in the wrong platform
Every platform has its own unique features and audience. To achieve results, identify where your customers are and what they value and engage with. Focus your efforts on connecting with them there.
- Not every social platform is going to be the right fit for an organization. It’s essential to identify this early on so you aren’t wasting resources on a channel that will not result in any lead generation.
- In our recent blog post, Where You Should Prioritize Your Social Media Ads, we dive into some of the most common platforms for social media advertising and considerations to consider for your business goals. Give it a read!
3. Not optimizing budget
Optimizing the budget of your ad campaign ensures you get the most out of your advertising investment while maximizing the return on ad spend. There are a couple of ways this can go wrong:
- If you don’t prioritize your budget, gaining traction and seeing success anywhere can be challenging. Avoid putting a little budget here and a little budget there. Identify the advertising channels and data that have been your top performers and allocate a significant part of your budget there to capitalize on their proven success.
- The ad you have created is not performing as you hoped it would. Your solution? Add more money! Not necessarily. There are better strategies than continually adding to the budget, hoping that that will solve your problem. If the other elements of your ad aren’t ideal, a high budget won’t be a definitive fix.
4. Not tracking performance
Your very first step should be goal setting. What is your ad campaign’s intention, and what metrics do you want to measure? If you’re not analyzing the performance of your ads, you won’t have the data needed to optimize and make informed decisions to improve performance.
- Tracking should be done frequently and in “real-time” so you can make adjustments on the go to avoid missed opportunities.
- Consider performing A/B tests to create multiple variations of your ad. You can try different combinations of call-to-actions, images, copy, and more and allocate your resources accordingly.
- The digital advertising world is dynamic and constantly changing. Knowing to make data-driven optimizations to maximize your marketing efforts will help set your ads apart.
5. Solely relying on online advertising
- Online advertisements are just one component, albeit an essential one, of your overall digital marketing strategy. It’s important to leverage all available avenues for a well-rounded mix of advertising streams. When you diversify your efforts, you can maximize the overall impact of your marketing.
- It’s also important to remember the journey your customer takes after engaging with your ad. Investing in ads alone won’t guarantee success if your website doesn’t provide a good user experience. To maximize conversion rates, you must invest in all areas of the user experience, in this case, your website.
With online advertising, your organization can promote its products or services to your desired audience, creating conversions that will contribute to your overall business objectives. Businesses often make similar mistakes when they don’t strategically coordinate their efforts.
If you’re experiencing this, connect with our highly knowledgeable online advertising team. With our online marketing tips and services, we’ll help you grow your online presence through various channels, such as display, paid search, and social advertising.