What is digital marketing and what is a display ad?

Digital marketing – Internet marketing – comes in a few flavors. Display Ads, Paid Search, Email Marketing, Social Media. All of these are forms of marketing that center around targeting a specific group of internet users in an effort to deliver the most relevant message that increases the chances that they will do business with your company.

Let’s talk about display ads first. Display Ads are the different sized ad containers on websites that are obviously advertising. They can be along the top of web pages such as the traditional banner ad, or the larger text billboard, they can also be videos. These types of ads appear on distinct sections of the site that are specifically reserved for paid advertising and are aimed at generating a quick conversion or for general passive branding. The wider banner ads generally perform better than their tall, narrow counterparts. According to Google, the most effective display ads are 336×280 or 300×250 pixel rectangles, 300×600 pixel half-page ads, and 728×90 or 320×110 pixel banners.

What are the pros and cons of display ads?

Like everything else out there, display ads come with their own set of pros and cons. On the one side, there are countless combinations of formats, sizes, and styles, allowing you to mix it up. Giving you the the option to choose your preferred message and tailor it to a specific size or type of display ad. Display ads also travel far, given the millions of websites reached by Google’s Display Network. The search engine can match your ads up to websites and apps based on keywords or your own targeting preferences. They’re also mostly straightforward to measure. Display advertising analytics allow you to track the number of clicks, impressions and conversions the ad has generated in real-time, giving you an up-to-date picture of what is relevant with consumers.

What is the Google Display Network?

According to Google, “Reach more people in more places online”

Display ads can help you promote your business when people are browsing online, watching YouTube videos, checking Gmail, or using mobile devices and apps. The Google Display Network reaches 90% of Internet users worldwide, across millions of websites, news pages, blogs, and Google sites like Gmail and YouTube.

Which is basically a fancy way of saying that there are website owners out there on the internet that want to get paid for their traffic. So, they go to Google, set up an account and they place some specific code on their site that tells Google, “Land here, this is a place you are allowed to place your targeted ads!”. Based on what Google categorically knows about that site and the content that site houses and the products it sells, it will place targeted ads in that space. Google will then pay that website owner (fractions of pennies) for each click or impression —depending on how you set it up.

Say for example, you sell Miniature Crocheted Unicorns. Google would deliver ads to that space(s) that might relate to the people who traffic your site. Say by key categories like “Sci Fi” or “Fantasy”, maybe something more specific like “Gifts for Toddlers” and so on…

Likewise, GDP can also use that space to follow advertisers. So if a person comes to your site, then goes to another site that allows GDP ads, your display ad, “10% Off Purple Unicorns” could follow them around to any website that participates in the GDP network.

GDP can also work by demographic, location and proximity. Google may not know specifically about your personal data, but it definitely knows about your website history. Which it uses to build a pseudo profile of your internet habits. Male or Female. Interests. Location. Favorite brands. Online spending trends. Probable yearly income. etc etc. Advertisers can tap in to that wealth of information simply for the purposes of delivering a targeted message to a specific group of internet users.

That is the Google Display Network.

What is Paid Search?

Paid search marketing is known in the marketing and advertising industry by many different names (and abbreviations).

Search engine marketing (SEM, which can include SEO), pay-per-click (PPC), search engine advertising, sponsored listings… the list goes on. And that’s before you start to involve the names of specific advertising programs and ad types, such as Google Ads (formerly Google AdWords), Google Product Listing Ads, Google Shopping Ads, and Bing Ads.

Intaglio Marketing and design is here to make everything easier for you. Give us a call and we’ll give you a basic overview of what paid search consists of and what it looks like, explain the different abbreviations and ad types you’ll come across, and examine the benefits and drawbacks of investing in paid search.