The primary aim of ads is to solicit for the
business. It is in the way that they attempt to perform this function
that the various mediums differ. When Online Advertising started around
1997, it initially continued the tradition of the media that preceded
it. Up it went on the podium with a drum around its neck and a scroll
primary divided into two parts: the USP of the business and a call to
buy! Thankfully, the newer and broader opportunities of the medium were
soon seen and realized. The most prominent change was the change of
tone. With the Online Medium, Advertisements are no longer mere calls of
action but extended greetings for building conversations that may lead
to relations, associations and conversions.

Reasons for the Change

Conventional advertising had reached a saturation point in the late
twentieth century. In spite of the manifold attempts of advertisers and
publishers, the audiences had largely learnt to stop bothering about
them. They served as menus only when the consumers were hungry. The
ability to charm new consumers was lost by the media in general. Online
Advertising brought in new opportunities of reviving that charm. Soon,
the one-way communication of Advertising changed into a two-way process
with the internet users being able to reply in response to
Advertisements. The inflow of feedbacks was seen as the beginning of a
new dimension. Then, with the social media activating the buttons of
like and share, the power of Online Advertising to start a conversation
has reached trendsetting proportions.

Advantages

The most important advantage of starting a communication, rather than
persuading, is the development of a base for long term relationships.
Persuading might work for the initial few times but there are only a
certain number of times that you can persuade someone to buy the same
product or service. Non-committed, short-term consumers are the best
that can be achieved by persuasion. A conversation, on the other hand,
leads to more than just one entry of sales. It leads to a long term
customer relationship. Any management knows that retaining an existing
customer is far easier and lower on cost than chasing new leads.

It is much easier to convince a consumer with whom you have interacted
before than convincing someone with whom you are talking for the first
time. Companies that know the worth of a loyal consumer have very active
customer care departments. Online Advertising initiates that relation
with the consumer right from the first contact.

An established communication line helps solve a problem with promptness which can do wonders for enhancing brand reputation.

Constant and fluent communication provides opportunities for real time
monitoring of the impact of the ads among users. When necessary, changes
can be done (sometimes even before they become necessary) at a speed
that is the trademark of Online Advertising.

Disadvantages

An open-ended communication line may create a very tedious task for the
ones monitoring the influx of comments, opinions, queries, etc. It
requires intelligent strategies to be able to manage the additional
tasks like these that are created along with the opportunities by Online
Advertising.

In all fairness, there cannot be many
disadvantages of being in active communication with the consumers. The
only care that needs to be taken is a successful monitoring of the
reactions to the ads. This can be easily achieved by any worthy Online
Advertising Agency.

State of Online Advertising

Online advertising mimics print advertising in structure, layout,
content, and messaging. People no longer refer to only the newspapers or
magazines for finding ads offering products or services of their
choice. The internet is flooded with millions of ads for various
products. It is not possible to miss these ads even if you want to.
Websites, blogs and search engines are all full with and surrounded by
ads relevant and irrelevant to them. And why online ads won’t be
encouraged! A large percentage of revenue generation comes from them.
However, whether you place your ads through print media or online, you
must make sure they have the potential to generate purchase interest in
viewers.

Call for Action – Motive of Ads

Merely placing an ad through print media or online won’t necessarily
fetch you buyers; you need to create an ad that leads viewers to enquire
further about it through phone, email, click on a link or reply to the
ad on website. This is called leading to ‘Call for action’- the actual
goal of placing an advertisement. If the ad looks unreliable or
uninteresting, viewers will ignore or forget about it and not take
further interest in it. Concrete success lies in the fact the product or
services are enquired about and bought. Merely viewing an online ad and
then leaving the page leads to an increase in bounce rate.

Ad Placement Don’ts

An ad may not be a very big one with too much text sprawled across a
blog or placed besides a search engine. In fact, this acts as a turn-off
or interference sometimes. So, an ad should be big, bright, and
prominent enough to be noticed, but at the same time, you should not
place an online ad in weird ways like one that follows the cursor or
prevents viewing other pages until clicked. These forcible or tricky
kinds of ads are found undesirable. Instead, place ads with interesting
and useful information like schemes, discounts, or special offers that
people can take advantage of.

Hiring Professional Advertising Agency

Many times, companies fall short of time, and so their in-house staff
creates a worthless ad just for the heck of it to finish off the
marketing activities. Such ads do not find any takers and are a huge
waste of money, time and efforts. So, contract with a professional
advertising agency for creating and placing ads. My friend Joseph did a
wonderful job at that. He heads the beverage section of his firm in
Australia and wanted to create print and online ads for their launch for
exotic coffee beans. They hired professional advertising agency Sydney
experts to help them with the marketing efforts for the launch. Joseph
just dictated the plan and budget, and they delivered such excellent
results within a short span of time.

The work that professionals
can do is very different from what internal staff can produce. By
contracting with the brilliant advertising agency Sydney staff, Joseph’s
team was able to produce the best ads ever that not just looked good
and were visited but that which generated real sales. Moreover, they
adhered to the budget required by Joseph’s company. Not just that,
through these efforts, the beverage launch was a huge success, and they
were awarded for being the best in the beverage category last year.

Ads cost a lot. When you are spending money, do it in the smartest way
so that a lot of enquiries and hence sales are generated. Make sure you
reap enough returns on your investment.