What is Digital Advertising and A Guide to Online Ad Types and Formats

Once you know what digital advertising is, you will probably want to venture into the field, here we share some of the most common format formats.

When advertising began to reach the Internet, around 1994, it found its place in a web site by means of large banners, with a CTR of up to 44% https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/history-of -online-advertising # sm.0000jbmkousfueqpw4h1jpjlbt6ma (currently the CTR of an average banner could be only 0.06%).

For 1997 pop-ups made their appearance, which soon gained popularity, and quickly lost it too. The following years saw paid searches to appear and pay per click -PPC.

The segmentation was refined more and more and the search revolved around less intrusive ads. This is how native and social advertising appeared.

The future seems to be to look for the most creative ways of presenting relevant information, highly segmented and aimed at offering consumers content of interest, without feeling invaded or disturbed.

20 years after its first appearance, the question is still valid for many, exactly what is digital advertising?

What is digital advertising?

If you surf the Internet you find an ad, that is classified in digital advertising. It is not at all strange that you see it everywhere, you will usually find ads on every page of every website you visit.

The term is quite broad, within this fits almost all marketing efforts that are executed digitally.

This includes banners, search engine optimization (SEO), social media efforts, email marketing, interstitial ads, search engine marketing (SEM) ads, etc. There is even room for spam.

Digital advertising moves along with the expansion of the internet, which is why it has moved along with platform users on the platform. For example, as users migrate from the PC to mobile devices, digital advertising also does so.

Some common formats of guidelines in digital advertising

List all the formats in which it is possible to schedule on the Internet would be insufferable. The list, besides being extremely long, could never be completed, because new ones appear every day and others fall into disuse.

But in general terms, these are some of the most common formats of guidelines in digital advertising:

Banners or Traditional Display

It is the pioneer of formats in digital advertising and in general they are quite affordable. These are graphic elements that appear on the websites of a third party. Its most basic forms have evolved and it is now possible to find them in countless and creative varieties.

You can find it as static images, in the form of text, floating and moving on the screen, animated, in the form of a video or as a form.

Google and its multiple alternatives

The opportunities for guidelines are very varied. Here it is possible to make:

• Search ads: that appear when a person performs a search that is related to the products or services that your company offers. They can even be displayed in the form of shopping ads, which allow you to buy from Google.
• Graphic ads: Google is responsible for placing your ad in the form of banner or text on news websites, blogs, and applications and even in Gmail.
• Video ads: the great advantage that Google has for this is YouTube. These ads can be played before a video is played on YouTube or next to the search results.

Native advertising

It is sponsored content, which is relevant to the consumer’s experience, which does not interrupt, look and feel similar to the editorial content of the place where it is located.

According to Hub spot, there are 5 keys to native advertising:

1. Editorial skills are basic, a great story that generates interaction must be told.
2. You must be entertained. The new generations want entertainment.
3. You must align with the interests of consumers, appealing to what they are passionate about.
4. You must be relevant regarding the online activity that you are executing, you should not interrupt.
5. Your ad must be clearly identified as such, you should not try to deceive anyone.

Social networks are an integral and extremely powerful part of the success of native advertising.

Advertising on social networks

It is one of the fastest growing markets within digital advertising, it is also efficient and effective. They are similar to banners in that they can be from a simple image or a publication to a video of automatic reproduction.

Its great attraction and success are due to the precision with which it is possible to segment an audience. Facebook is one of the leaders in this aspect, allowing the use of specific parameters such as age, region, interests, and education among many others.

Facebook is joined by platforms such as LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr and Twitter, among which more facilities for digital advertising.

Email marketing

This is one of the leading channels for sales. It has the advantages of being quite cheap, fast and effective for sales.

It allows to build loyalty and improve sales, while it is possible to use tools that allow you to accurately know the performance and return on investment.

Everything must be built based on a correct strategy, which must be clear about the way of feeding the email list, its classification and the ways to contact and follow up.

After knowing these guidelines formats, you can ask yourself: which one should I choose? Which is the best? Should I use them all?

Like everything that refers to a marketing strategy: it depends. The answers will not be the same for all companies, they will be conditioned by the type of business, the objectives that are had in terms of results, public, type of campaign, among many others.

The key is to have a solid marketing strategy that is constantly tested and flexible enough to adapt to the rapid changes that the digital world is going through every day.