Advertising is advertising, right? No. The world of advertising has changed a great deal, more so in the past twenty years with the rise of online ad systems, search and social media.
All advertising used to be simply creating an offer, writing some copy and pushing it out there. But today, new ad systems have become much more sophisticated. It’s now possible to target folks who have the intent of making a purchase, or have just begun their journey of conducting research gathering information to make a purchase decision. That’s a major progressive shift in targeting capabilities.
There are two major advertising platforms, Social Media and Search Engine ad platforms.
Social Media is social platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and these platforms enable you to target your ads to potential customers based upon the data social media captures on their user base. You can target potential customers using their interests, passions and stated preferences such as brands they like (Prada, Burberry, Levis), products they like, careers, physical locations, etc.
Search Engines enable you to target potential customers based upon keywords that a person uses to conduct a search of the internet. If a person types in the search terms or phrase: ‘drycleaner near me’, you can bid on the keyword ‘drycleaner’ used in the search and your ads will be displayed alongside of the search engine results.
There are major differences between Social and Search ads that you should understand. In reality, the deployment system that decides what ad to display on each platform, are polar opposites.
A social ad can be targeted to folks who like high fashion brands such as Prada, Gucci, etc, but it’s a bit of stretch to extrapolate that because a person LIKES Prada and Gucci, they have items of Prada and Gucci clothing in their closet that require dry cleaning. I like Lamborghini cars, but I don’t have one in my garage (yet).
Conversely, a Search Engine ad can trigger or expose their interests when they search for information. As an example, if a person is searching for ‘best new car of 2022, it’s pretty safe to assume that the person conducting the search has an interest or an intent to purchase a car in the near future. The person doing the search might just be idly passing time and was curious about what is the best new car coming out and have no intention of buying, but, the search itself does provide an indication of interest in a topic.
Indications of Interest. Being able to target folks well in advance of their actual buying decision is one of the greatest advancements in advertising in the past 100 years. In the old days, it was pretty much spray and pray advertising. You would paper the neighborhood with your ad, dominate the airwaves, then pray that some folks with need of your service saw or heard your ad, – then came in to satisfy their needs and demands. Of course, your ad went to everybody, even those who have no need or interest in what you offer – you paid for delivering ads to all those people too. But, now that we can use data and intelligence, both Social and Search ads offer the ability to refine targeting of ads to just those folks with the predilection of being affiliated with brands, careers and needs of our services and have demonstrated an indication of interest of need of our particular services. It’s a heck of a lot easier to sell a prospective customer with a need and interest in our services than it is to educate and create a need within a prospective customer’s mind.
Let me ask you this: who do you think is an easier sell? The customer who just ate a big meal, or the person who is hungry and seeking a restaurant to dine in?
So, which platform is the ONE for you?
Facebook offers incredible amounts of data that can be used to target potential customers. Location, residence, office, even current cell phone location can be used. I’ll mention again brands like Hilfiger, Ralph Lauren, Gucci, Prada and more. Careers such as doctors, lawyers and other professions with a proven high likelihood of need for dry cleaning are also good choices. There is A LOT information FB has captured and its ALL available for targeting. I’ve been doing FB ads for a decade now and I’m STILL learning new ideas and techniques.
Google offers a valuable service where you can see how many times per month a certain word or phrase is searched. Creating ads around the most common used search words is a strategy you can use to target your ads. But fair words of warning, our industry is tied to demand. Currently, there are not a lot of searches for the word “drycleaning” because people are not wearing dry cleanable clothes. You certainly do want to show up when someone searches Drycleaner Near Me, even if it’s just 5 searches per month. And that is another beautiful feature of search ads, you only pay when your ad is presented, or when your ad is clicked, even if it’s just five impressions.
Facebook enables you to use a wide array of visuals such as images and video to create incredibly beautiful, interesting and informative ads. A picture is worth a thousand words, a video is worth ten thousand words. You can create some astounding ads that feature the wonderful world of fashion, presentation, looking good, looking presentable. We can tell a huge story and at a very affordable price.
Google does not offer the same visuals of images and video on their ad platform, its primarily text based. But, even with just text, you can create some amazing ads. Text is simply salesmanship in print. But, Google offers a lot of other tools in addition to their ad platform. You can deploy Google My Business, Google Reviews, Google Maps and Youtube. Now, there are a ton more of marketing strategies you can deploy on these other Google assets.
So, which platform is the one for you?
Why just ONE? I say, use them ALL!
