A Display Ad Success Story
We’ve all scrolled through social media and got sucked into an ad. Before long, it has been a half-hour and half of the e-commerces catalog is in our wishlist or shopping cart. For myself, this happened over the summer with ETcustomDesigns. I scrolled through my Instagram feed and their algorithm and the site’s ad keywords targeted me perfectly, leading me into a deep dive of custom album cover photo frames. Before long, I had sent half of the website to my friends and family telling them that “this would be a great birthday/holiday gift”. Being stingy with money, I did not and have not made a purchase from the site. What made this display ad successful? How do companies determine display ad success? See the answers below!
Components to Success
The goal of display ad campaigns is conversion from users who were not aware of a brand or did not convert originally. This is done by targeting a display ad campaign for these specific groups. Targeting is using specific keywords to create new customers or with remarketing for those who did not occur on their past visit(s). Remarketing adds remarketing tags to the pages within a webpage. Tags add cookies to the user’s browser that show abandoned items during future browsing. EtcustomDesigns used the first method since I had never visited their site before. They used specific keywords that attracted my demographic and algorithm to display the ad. Remarketing succeeds in reminding users of interest in a product or giving a further discount in the ad.
Determining Success
Companies determine the success of a display ad campaign by looking at the rate of conversion or cost-per-click compared to total impressions. In my situation, the company did not directly convert because I did not leave the site with a purchase. However, conversion might occur later if one of the links I sent to a friend or family is used to purchase the item as a gift. This is not to say that their campaign was a failure though because this is only one user. Google Ads breaks each campaign into different pages and into different ad groups. This makes it much easier to judge the success of ad campaigns and see how to alter their ads for greater conversion.
Display Ads Are NOT Bad
It is important to remember that display ads are not a bad thing. Many users find new brand loyalty by a simple ad that appears on social media or a search engine. What gives ads the bad persona are those that are poorly designed and/or do not take users where they promise. Remember in creating display ads, it is conversion that is desired, which is something that differs from customer to customer. Make enough ad types that will attract all the different demographics that your product or service caters to. Doing this will allow conversion rates to reach levels they have never been before.