Local Online Advertising vs. Targeted Online Advertising – A Question of Relevancy
October 19, 2009
Although global Internet advertising revenue dropped 5% in the first half of 2009, in its new report “2010 Outlook: Local Interactive Advertising”, Borell Associates estimates that local interactive revenue will hit $14.2 billion in 2009 and $14.9 billion in 2010 – 12% and 5% growth, respectively.
The logic behind this trend seems, on its surface, to be straightforward and simple – companies are choosing to shift their online spend, whether for marketing, recruiting, or advertising, into local avenues to target potential business partners, employees, and customers who, one would assume, would be the most relevant since they are close by (geographically).
Although this logic is not necessarily wrong, it is most certainly flawed. The problem with this logic is that it applies limitations that exist with billboard/print/radio advertising to online advertising, which doesn’t succumb to the same limitations. While a billboard must be seen by someone who happens to be within 500 feet of it, advertising online can be seen by anyone, anytime, anywhere and, perhaps more importantly, you can dictate who will view your advertisement!
Take for instance online recruitment advertising. If I am looking for a new accountant and I limit my search (in this case, the scope of my advertising reach) to local websites, I am assuming the candidate I am looking for is in Chicago (where I happen to work and live). That is a fine assumption, but it is flawed. What I am not taking into account is that the ideal candidate could be outside of Chicago but willing or even looking to move here. In other words, I am pre-limiting my results by choosing geography as a limit to the scope of my advertising.
One of the most powerful tools available via online advertising is targeting. Using data to determine how people search the internet to help you target the best people to advertise to (potential customers, employees, or business partners) allows you to not only get the best results, but usually it will also offer you overall cost savings because you are only advertising to relevant people who you want to target and therefore you won’t have to invest additional time and resources into screening, qualifying, or waiting for the right person to come along.
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