Digital Advertising

As other forms of advertising are losing their effectiveness, digital advertising is going from strength to strength. The reason for this is simple - online advertising is infinitely more measurable, interactive and customisable.

It’s far easier to track digital advertising than other forms of advertising – you can find out exactly how many people saw your advert, how many clicked on it and where the user is located.

Digital advertising allows you to target a very specific audience. For example if you’re a Welsh business you could target users only in Wales, female, 25-35 on a Tuesday at 4.00-5.00pm via particular platforms such as Microsoft MSN or Myspace who can now offer regional targeting.

Ultimately Sequence know how your organisation can reach the online audience you want – we want your results (CTR or click through rate) to be as high as possible.

Digital & online advertising explained
The first stage of an online campaign is to establish what you want to get out of it – is it brand awareness, increase in hits or an increase in sales/ enquiries.

Based upon this goal Sequence will then establish an online advertising strategy that will likely consist of a portfolio of different channels, tools and platforms that will derive the type of result you’re looking to achieve.

It is important to be creative with how you approach your digital advertising campaign. Web users are inundated with advertising, and it’s those that stand out, or are directly relevant that get the click through.

You could for example look to tell a story with your advertising, or use topical interest or humour to capture traffic as unlike offline media you can change adverts hourly if required to appeal to the feeling of the moment.

It is often better to use several smaller, more focused channels – for example regional or sector specific media may offer a better return, than a blanket campaign on the ‘big’ platforms. If looking to promote a business or service in Wales, adverts could be bilingual, with animation transitioning between Welsh and English versions. Based upon the language version of the advert clicked, the user can be directed to the site in their language of choice.

This landing page (the page to which an online advert directs you) is very important. It needs to provide clear incentives or calls to action that will encourage the visitor to the next stage. A fantastically successful online campaign, with impressive CTRs can be let down by an ineffective landing page.

Online advertising tools
There are many different devices that can be used as part of a digital advertising campaign, including banners, tiles, skyscrapers, virals, video ads, Flash games, MVUs, email advertising, expandables, lay overs, page peels, pop unders , pop overs.

Each of them has a place, some cost more than others, and the effectiveness will vary greatly depending on message, audience and chosen platforms. They vary in size, location on the page, content, medium and level of interaction – often keeping it simple is best, and whilst it is tempting to establish a state of the art video campaign or innovative viral campaign, plain, intuitive and simple advertising can offer the best return on your investment.

The Sequence online advertising process
Sequence adopt a bespoke approach to each online advertising commission, however we do base our campaign on a clear set of core processes, that join to become an overall online advertising campaign plan.

Campaign strategy
The process of crystallizing your thoughts and commercial objectives into a tangible document that will be used as the ‘strategic’ basis of the campaign. This is an iterative process that is geared to establishing clear aims and objectives for the campaign – it will involve the profile of the target customer, details of your product/ services, analysis of the market and a review of your competitors’ activity.

Advert and concept design
The process of establishing suitable creative approaches for the campaign – a careful balance between your brand and an effective ‘call to action’ needs to be established. The artwork needs to attract the attention and ‘convert’ your desired target audience. This is an iterative process, and may need to be conducted in harmony with your creative agency and offline advertising partners.

Media planning and buying
Planning the placement of the media is a critical process. It involves the administrative elements of making sure the format is correct, the concepts are suitable for the platform, the response channels are ready to go and that the timings are appropriate.

Buying the space involves us negotiating the advertising rates on your behalf and will allow you to benefit from our superior pricing leverage and offers you a single billing point.

Advertising management
The overall project management of the advertising campaign is the ‘glue’ that holds any successful digital campaign together. Whilst the platforms for the campaign would have already been established at the strategy stage, the knowledge of when to run them can impact their effectiveness considerably.

Furthermore, watching trends, performance and competitor activity can enable Sequence to suggest in-campaign changes, tweaks and enhancements that could further improve overall effectiveness.

Reporting and analysis on results
Finally Sequence collate the results of your campaign and present them in a clear, concise and definitive report, on which you can clearly see measurable results of how the campaign has delivered tangible digital marketing results.

If you want to find out more about online advertising, please get in contact with one of our team or call 029 2025 2555 for more information.