8 Reasons You Should Get Started with Performance Advertising

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Online marketing can be done using various channels, such as search engine optimization, content marketing, social media marketing, etc. The channel I’ll discuss in this post is performance-based advertising.

Before we begin – what is performance-based advertising, exactly? It’s pretty simple, actually: unlike offline advertising (billboards, etc.) where advertisers can’t receive sufficient data, it’s a form of advertising where the advertiser can receive measurable results, like clicks on ads, ad impressions, leads, and sales on the website. As an agency providing international SEO services, we feel that our readers should be familiar with all types of online marketing. So you best keep reading 🙂

The two leading online advertising platforms are, of course, Google AdWords and Facebook Ads, which are very popular with many advertisers globally. Each platform has its own advantages: while Google is the best place to advertise your product/service in the search results, Facebook is a great place to find new audiences proactively. An interesting fact is that social advertising has increased by 61.5% in the first quarter of 2017, according to Netimperative.com.

Facebook ad

But that’s not all. With Google AdWords, you can also advertise on YouTube, promote a download of your app, use banner ads across multiple websites, promote posts from your website and much more. .

On Facebook Ads on the other hand, you can choose from a variety of ad types, including videos, carousel ads, single images and slideshows. You can also use Instagram as a placement, an option that is popular with photography enthusiasts and younger audiences.

If you’re not sure which type of platform and/or which activities would best suit your needs, you can always ask a digital marketing agency for a non-binding consultation that would simplify the matter for you, and help you build you a strategy to achieve your goals (increase sales, raise brand awareness, etc.).

Here are 8 different advantages of performance-base advertising that will help you understand its importance to your business.

1. Speed

When it comes to digital marketing, speed is crucial. In performance advertising, the element of speed is a huge benefit, because you can start seeing users visiting your website right from the beginning. This means you can tell right away if performance is weak, so you can do something about it quickly.  For example, if you’re experiencing a low CTR (click through rate), it probably indicates that your ads aren’t appealing enough or just not that relevant to the audience. Instead of spending your budget on trial and error, you can quickly change your tactic.

2. Budget control

Since you are the one in control of your media budget, the risk of wasting money without getting results is low. You can choose the days and hours your ads are live, and if you’re swamped with fresh new leads (fingers crossed!), you can pause your campaigns, and renew them once you’re ready to get back to all your clients.

3. No commitment

You can start advertising at any given time, and adjust the campaign volume to be lower or higher according to the results you’re getting. If you’re not satisfied with your results, the first thing you should do is check what went wrong. Perhaps the landing page is overloaded with design elements and unnecessary text, including distracting information; or maybe the message isn’t clear enough. All you have to do is make the necessary changes to your landing page and let it roll for a while. If you ultimately decide to stop your campaign – there are no strings attached.

4. Transparency

You know exactly which keywords are being targeted in your campaign, which audiences have seen your ads, and the number of times your ads were viewed and clicked on. If you install advanced tracking tools on your landing page you’ll be able to discover even more: how many sales were made on your website, how many calls you received and which ad or keywords performed the best.

5. High relevance

Using the search network by Google AdWords for advertising means that you’re targeting users who’ve searched for a specific term like “flowers delivery” or “hotels in New York”, so the chances of your ad being relevant to these users are high. On Facebook on the other hand, the platform knows a lot about its users, so you can target users by age, gender, relationship status, field of study, etc. This is how many advertisers find their clients on Facebook.

Google ad

6. Measurable results

With performance advertising, you can set specific goals according to your business objectives: leads, calls, sales, etc. If your business relies on phone calls, you can track those calls and what made them happen (which keyword and ad) and most importantly – how much it cost you. The main goal is to keep your advertising profitable, so you can constantly optimize your campaign to enhance performance, and eventually find out which the type of ad works best for you.

Analytics graph

7. Reach Large Audiences

The increasing use of mobile phones in recent years – for search in particular – means increased chances for your business to be found (we recommend reading our post about KLM’s mobile campaign). Ad platforms offer ad types that target mobile users. Once you start advertising using these platforms you’ll expose your business to fresh audiences and increase awareness for your brand. And once you’re inside users’ minds, chances of them approaching you in the future go up significantly. According to HubSpot, 51% of smartphone users have discovered a new product or brand when conducting a search on their phone.

8. Extensive Data

Last but not least, with performance advertising you can learn a lot about your business and clients: which ad was working best, what your audience didn’t like about your ad, and so on. You can learn from experience in a way that lets you make the necessary changes on the go. The more experience you get, you’ll be able to run more effective campaigns in the future.

Summary

There is much more to performance advertising than the advantages outlined above. But the best way to discover them is just to try it for yourself – experience is the best teacher, as we all know. So go ahead and give performance advertising a proper “test drive”: invest a sufficient amount of time and budget and learn as you go along.

Need some more convincing? We recommend watching this short video:

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