Successful Media Buying Strategies

So you want start an online ad campaign? Do you even know where to begin? Though online media buying can be even more complicated than traditional media buying, this week’s tip will try to give you some good first steps in the right direction.

(1) Define Your Target Market

Before buying any media, you ought to first know who your target market is. In addition to guessing at who might best fit your profile, you might also want to analyze your target market from demographical and psychographical (consumer behavior) perspectives:

# Demographics: Terms such as sex, age, region, household size and income, number of kids, etc. used to describe and narrow down target audiences.

# Consumer Behavior: Defines Internet user actions such as where they go online, do they feel secure purchasing products online, where they spend time off-line, etc?

(2) Do Your Research

In order to maximize your return on investment (ROI), you’ll want to identify a whole spectrum of sites, ranging from the most popular sites for your target market to some of “sleepers” that reach your target audience too, but are also great buys.

To find those sleepers, start with independent sites that are not part of an ad network (some of the more popular ad networks include DoubleClick, 24/7, and Engage). These “indie” sites will work with you to strike the best deals available. Indie sites also will go beyond simply placing a banner ad, especially if you ask for other visibility opportunities such as text boxes, button ads, and section or page sponsorships. You can also sometimes strike a bartering deal with indie sites offering traded ad exposure. Newsletters are great for this.

Of course, you can still work with ad network sales reps to find appropriate targeted placements. Just be prepared for higher costs the more targeted the placement (at least for those placements still priced per impression — that trend is changing; visit our tip archive for the 6/8/00 tip called, Online Ad Buying: Beyond CPM for more details).

(3) Plan the “Mix”

As we described above, there are a lot more ways to advertise online than banners alone. When planning your media strategy, don’t forget to consider ALL advertising opportunities to attract your target audience. These can include:

# Opt-In E-Mails - If using third party services, stick with the most credible ones and make sure that targeted recipients are informed in the “Sender” field that the email is coming from that service so that it’s not mistaken as spam. For more tips on opt-in emailing, see the archived tips, Marketing Through E-mail from 4/26 - 5/17/99.

# Keyword Buys - Ranging from banners to paid-for listings, these ads are served by search engines when the user types in specific search terms.

# Ezine and Newsletter Advertising - highly targeted, relatively inexpensive and producing much better ROI, ads in this medium can be either text or graphics, depending on whether the newsletter is delivered in text-only or HTML formats.

# Incentives, Prizes & Sweepstakes - whole companies have been spawned to service this form of online marketing, and with them, some very creative methods of getting in front of an Internet user.

(4) Understand Your Purchasing Options

Online advertising space is generally sold in two forms: cost per thousand impressions (CPM) and cost per click (CPC). CPM’s are based on the number of times the advertisement is actually shown; with CPC’s, the advertiser is charged only for each time a user clicks on their advertisement.

Although CPC’s might seem more attractive at first, they still might not be too helpful to your media strategy if the ads are placed on smaller, poorly-trafficked sites (more on this subject in the 2/24/00 Marketing Tip. Lots of archive referrals today — hope these are helpful but my apologies to those who might find it disruptive, too.).

(5) Negotiate!

Go into the buying process with the notion that a good percentage of your online advertising sales reps will quote you a price that can be bargained down (called “list price”). When starting a new campaign, definitely ask for “introductory specials,” “testing offers,” and “package deals.”

The testing strategy is an important one because you don’t want to be stuck with a big-dollar commitment and a campaign that’s falling on its face. Dangling the testing carrot can also be a great way to show the ad rep that, if all goes well, you’re willing to work with them on a long term basis in a positive relationship.

Here are some other important questions to ask ad reps:

* What is the site’s per month user traffic? If a site owner will not answer this question and supply you with hard stats, proceed with caution! You’re either buying space on a weak site or you’re paying too much for that space.

* What kind of ad click-thru tracking stats will they provide? (you want some proof-of-performance, don’t you?)

* What is their monthly minimum?

(6) Learn By Experience

None of us are perfect at something we’re trying for the first time. Allow yourself some permission to make mistakes, but learn from those mistakes. Remember, not only is this business changing at lightning speed, but it’s also extremely fragmented. Choosing the right media 100% of the time is next to impossible. Just do the best you can and keep your wits about you — it’s definitely a crazy ride!

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