Online Marketing
Online Marketing
Online Marketing is essential in this day and age and something most successful businesses are taking advantage of.
Today technology controls so much of our day and really our lives. Gone are the days of phone books and newspapers. Instead we have google, online news, and craigslist. Most of our social interactions and business networking is done online, and we are having less and less human interaction.
Businesses use to advertise their products in magazines and newspapers, but that is becoming less and less effective as those mediums are becoming obsolete. While commercials are still arguably effective, there are fewer people today using cable, and more people turning to streaming services and YouTube.
So how are companies supposed to advertise? Obviously, they must go where there potential clients are, which is online.
Generally, companies do not simply want to advertise to everyone. After all, not everyone is equally likely to be a customer. So companies must find the best method to narrow down their audience.
One way of doing this is simply by geotargeting. This is simply a method of having your ad only appear to users within a specific region. This method is ideal for companies which would only be available locally such as ones providing a service such as a doctor’s office or automotive shop. Since people outside the region would not be potential clients, there would be no reason to advertise to them.
Another method is advertising on sites with overlapping interests. For example, someone selling baby products may advertise their product on a mommy forum. Since the forums visitors are presumably mothers, they would be the company’s ideal clients.
Tracking and cookies can also be used. For example, one day you may search “mothers day gift ideas” then, a day or two later, you’re scrolling through facebook and see an ad fora necklace that says “perfect for mother’s day!” These ads are a bit controversial. While some see them as more subtle and effective others consider this use of cookies as an invasion of privacy and the ads unwanted.
In addition to simple banner ads and pop up ads, another way companies can use the web for advertising is through brand endorsement. Brand endorsement is when a company pays a well-known web presence to endorse their brand. Ideally, this should be done in a way that is subtle so it is not particularly obvious that it is a brand endorsement. Usually brand endorsements are done by notable bloggers or vloggers. They will talk favorable about the product and their use of the product mentioning it by name and usually displaying it in their video or a photo. SInce their readers/viewers trust their opinion, they are often more likely to buy the product. Product endorsements work best when paired with the right person. For example, camping equipment would best be endorsed by an adventure blogger while cooking products would be most naturally endorsed by someone with a cooking channel on YouTube.