Mel Gibbons
11 October, 2021
While the potential this creates for digital marketers and businesses using digital channels to reach audiences, this also means that there are more tools to learn and master and more tactics to work into your marketing strategy.
The benefit is that your strategy will become more powerful and efficient, and your targeting more precise. But it also adds to the ever-growing list of terms and tech you need to conquer.
Programmatic advertising is a recent addition to the broad spectrum of digital advertising tools and techniques — and one you should get familiar with, in particular regard to the differences between programmatic and display ads.
Is programmatic taking over for display networks? Do you need to be using both? Let’s take a look at these two digital advertising tools to help you determine how to best leverage them both to boost your return on your online advertising investment.
While the potential this creates for digital marketers and businesses using digital channels to reach audiences, this also means that there are more tools to learn and master and more tactics to work into your marketing strategy.
The benefit is that your strategy will become more powerful and efficient, and your targeting more precise. But it also adds to the ever-growing list of terms and tech you need to conquer.
Programmatic advertising is an automated way to buy ad space across the internet. Instead of manually purchasing placements, the system uses machine learning and AI to determine the best placements for ads in real time.
When a user visits a site, the ad exchange instantly determines if they match your target audience. If they do, your ad enters an auction—if you win, your ad is displayed.
Display network advertising connects advertisers with website publishers through a network, such as Google Display Network.
Google’s Display Network alone reaches over 90% of internet users, making it a powerful option for online advertising.
There are many similarities between the two ad types. Both can reach a global audience, can be targeted by demographic and use search history information.
Where they tend to differ is in overall reach and the different types of ads that can be run. They have their pros and cons, which you can take advantage of to develop the right advertising strategy for you.
While it seems as though Google owns the internet, the Google Display Network and other networks can only give you access to the websites that are within their network. While it is significant, the reach isn’t always as wide as what can be achieved through programmatic advertising.
Programmatic ads provide access to the Google Display Network, in addition to various ad exchanges. In total, the reach for programmatic ads is more than 95% of the internet. The addition of all those long-tail websites provides a substantial inventory, so there is potential to be seen by more people than on a display network.
Programmatic ads are often native, so they are designed to fit into the design of the page where they show up and not look like an ad. This makes it more likely they’ll be seen and result in better customer engagement. There is also the option to run rich-media ads, which open up super interactive options for a campaign.
These ads work with vast user-generated data rather than search history alone, so you can be far more specific with targeting than with display ads. TO further improve targeting, an advertiser can also add in owned collected data.
The downsides here are that these ads have more of a learning curve to make effective use of them, so it’s a better option for those who already have a good grasp on digital advertising.
Pricing is almost always in CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and if you underbid, you might get no impressions at all. Most ad exchanges require a minimum per month ad spend which might be more than you should invest if you’re just starting with online ads.
Display networks offer closed advertising ecosystems, which means you’re limited to placing ads on the websites that are part of the network. While you might miss out on a lot of websites, most networks claim to have a high reach in terms of internet users.
Networks can offer good targeting options, including keyword, topic, interest and demographic. Most use their own search data, which might not be as granular as the data for programmatic. Whether this is a pro or con depends on how precisely you need to target to find your audience.
There is no minimum spend expected in a display network, so you can start by bidding just a few dollars, then scale up as you learn more and refine your specific requirements.
Benefits can also be found in a varied pricing model, which allows for more flexibility. Your options include CPC (cost per click), CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and CPA (cost per action).
The actions you pay for can be getting a user to sign up for a newsletter or a free trial. Impressions are guaranteed regardless of how much you bid.
One major downside here is that display ads tend to look like ads. Not all publishers in these networks can support rich-media ads, so you miss out on the interactivity that can overcome banner blindness. Around 90% of online ads go unnoticed by users.
The right choice depends on your business goals and budget:
Also Read: How To Choose The Right Keywords: Expert’s Guide
If you need help refining your online advertising strategy and how it fits within your overall marketing strategy, contact us for an obligation free chat. We help businesses of all shapes and sizes with all aspects of digital marketing to help them reach customers across different platforms.
Contact us for an online marketing solution to build your brand and grow revenue.
Contact Us
1300 055 000
