If you’re a business owner – you have likely asked yourself, “Where should I be spending my advertising dollars?” That’s a very important question to ask. If you’re just getting into Advertising Online, you likely have both a limited budget and limited experience. Before you decide on an advertising strategy, here are a few things to consider:
Who are my customers?
Before even starting to craft an advertising campaign, it’s important to understand who your customers are and how they buy from you. Is your business well known in the community and your customers just need a reminder you’re there? Do your customers take a short time or a long time to decide if they want to make a purchase with you? Do they reach out to you when there is an emergency? What considerations do your customers make before they reach out to you?
Knowing when and why your customers reach out to you is important, so you can put your advertising efforts in the place that will be most effective. It’s also important to know demographically who your customers are. Generally, we see patterns in how people in different age groups, genders, and backgrounds. By identifying who the most valuable customers are to you as a business owner, we can match up our advertising with the correct demographics for your business.
Where do my customers spend their time?
Having insight into where your customers spend their time is valuable for determining where the best place to run your advertising campaign will be. For example, if your customers are between 25 and 35, Instagram could be a good place to include ads. If they are older, consider running the ads solely on Facebook. Or, use a combination of the two if your target demographic is somewhere in the middle. If your customers work in a professional setting, or are in Sales or Marketing, LinkedIn Ads might appeal to them.
How close are the people seeing my advertisements to buying my product or service?
If you know your potential customers are close to buying from you, Search Advertising would be an ideal place to reach them. Think about it – if you have already done your research and know you’re ready to purchase a product or service, do you go try to find the right place to fulfill your need on Facebook or Instagram? Or are you more interested in finding the phone number so you can give some of the businesses a call? More likely, you would fall into the latter group. And, if that’s the case, making sure to have your website and phone number at the top of the results can lead to much more business than if you are found in the organic search results.
But, what if your customers aren’t quite ready to buy? If that’s the case, you can continue to focus on your search presence through Search Engine Optimization. Knowing when a searcher is in “research mode” or “buying mode” is an important strategic difference, and a good partner will be able to help you sort through some of the keywords which will indicate their likelihood to buy. Focusing your SEO efforts on more research-based topics will allow you to get in front of the right people at the correct time in their buying journey.
If the buyer has no background or knowledge about your product or service, consider using display or social advertising to spread awareness of your product or service and potentially kick the recipients of the ads into research or buying mode.
What are my goals?
Understanding your business goals will help to guide the decisions you make on your advertising. Do you have someone who is starting to do Sales for you and you need to get them leads fast? Perhaps Search Advertising could be your best solution here. Or, are you interested in spreading the awareness of your brand to more potential buyers? If so, you could focus more on Display advertising and drive more clicks to your website.
By knowing your goal, you can alleviate some of the frustrations of having misaligned strategies and expectations.
How will I know if the advertising campaign is successful?
Refer back to #4! If you have set appropriate goals for your campaign, you will have achieved the goals you determined from the start. It’s if you haven’t began the campaign with some honest goals, you might achieve the goals, but not truly drive results for your business. Understand your business needs and look at how advertising will be able to fulfill those needs.