Marketers who have been in their positions for 20, 10, or even 5 years have seen incredible changes in their roles. As digital outlets and social media platforms rose to become prominent advertising channels, the expectations for marketers’ skillsets pivoted drastically. Not only are they required to still have a firm foundation in the rules and best practices for traditional media, but they must understand the intricacies of web and social media buying and scheduling. All this aside, the basic principles of marketing all still apply to online advertising. The trick is to understand what needs to be prioritized and how.
Focus on the Problem Your Product Solves
First, it’s critical to your website marketing strategy that you understand how people shop online. Information is immediately available, from pricing to features. If you focus your marketing on those details, you do so at your own peril. Rather, you should steal a page from the content marketing playbook and center your messaging around how your product or service can improve the buyer’s life. This can be as simple as saving them time or money over the long run, or, depending on the product, how it will enhance their looks or health.
Present Every Price Point as a Deal
While you shouldn’t make pricing the main takeaway of your online campaign, there are many circumstances where it’s necessary to include it. If you do, you need to position it as an incredible offer without being dishonest. If your product retails for $20.99, you might compare it to the competition’s pricing with something like “$5 less than the leading brand.” If you can offer “limited time pricing,” include that in the copy. If you’re not able to offer a discount, “limited quantity available” is always a true statement. Whatever the case may be, if you need to highlight a price point, present it as a deal.
Use Video with Captions
Savvy digital marketers know that video jumps to the top of social media and SEO algorithms. What some of them fail to consider, however, is that most people are consuming video ads on mobile devices. You may have shot a beautiful, widescreen 4K commercial, but if you don’t modify it to optimize it for mobile, you’re hurting yourself. Take the time to create a square version. Also, include captions, as many of the people viewing on their phones will have audio disabled, and will miss out on your v/o or copy. Most platforms offer an automatic captioning function that you can choose to utilize, but you can also have fun by doing it yourself and add text to the video in your brand’s fonts and color scheme. Obviously, planning this on the front-end before you shoot and produce the video will make it easier to create multiple versions, so think ahead.
Eliminate Barriers to Buying
Let’s say you’ve managed to create the perfect online ad, and you’ve placed it impeccably with a great schedule ensuring maximum reach and frequency. Congratulations! Unfortunately, all that work will be for naught if potential customers run into difficulty closing the deal. While it’s tempting to direct them through a few levels of your website to drive traffic, a person who has clicked through an online ad will become less motivated to click “buy now” with each hoop they must jump through. Direct them to a simple landing page with specific details of the offer, and the ability to click through right to a purchase page where they can enter their payment information.
Take a Multiplatform Approach
We discussed mobile-optimized videos earlier. It’s important to consider that if your ad campaign is designed to run across multiple platforms, you need to have a version of it that is optimized for each. Think of it this way: a radio ad won’t work for a newspaper, right? It may be less drastic, but simply uploading your TV ad to Twitter or Instagram presents a missed opportunity. Research ideal aspect ratios and video sizes and produce platform-appropriate content for each channel you use.
This new age of digital marketing can seem overwhelming but keeping these concepts in mind will help ease the burden.