6 GUARANTEED
DISPLAY NETWORK TACTICS
FOR MORE PROFIT
Table of Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
3
What is the Display Network?
4
1) Keyword Contextual Targeting
5
6
6
7
2) Placement Targeting
3) Remarketing
4) Interest Categories
5) Topic Targeting
6) Geographic & Language Targeting
7) Demographic Targeting
6 Guaranteed Display Network
Tactics For More Profit
1) Changing Your Offer
2) Smart Demographic Targeting
3) Unwanted Category Exclusions
4) Above The Fold CPM Bidding
5) Segmented & Creative Remarketing Lists
6) Gmail Advertising
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2
Introduction
Introduction
The AdWords Display Network is a beauty of unknown magnitude, if you know
how to use it right :)
As you may already know, the people you catch on the display network are in a different buying cycle place compared to the people who are on the search network.
Usually, people on the display network are 2-3 steps behind their search network
counterparts who could be ready to buy today. So how do you extract value from
display traffic if they’re not as “hot n’ ready” as search traffic?
One of the things you’ll learn in this guide, is that it’s extremely important to differentiate your offers and lower the “sense of risk” in the minds of the visitor. What
works on search, won’t work as well on display. And vise versa.
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3
What is the Display Network?
What is the Display Network?
The Display Network is a juggernaut of media buying. It’s comprised of millions of
publisher sites (people who allow ads to run on their site) that allow us to advertise,
usually for a lot cheaper than the Search Network on Google.com.
That being said, the Display Network is great to bring traffic, but what it lacks is the
laser targeted keyword intent that the Search Network has.
As you start getting a feel for what the Display Network is, it’s important to understand the different options you have in regards to targeting your ads. But first, let’s
narrow down the different between the Search and Display Network:
- The Search Network is comprised of search engines like Google, Ask, AOL, etc.
where your text ads can appear. Your ads will only appear when a user types in the
keyword you’re bidding on, allowing for a more targeted keyword intent than the
Display Network. The Search Network is also the place that has the most expensive
clicks when compared to the Display Network.
The Search Network is also best for “emergency advertising”. Clients that are part
of the home service industries like plumbing, electricians, and flood repair will do
best on the Search Network and not so well on the Display Network.
- The Display Network is comprised of millions of websites that are opted into Google AdSense that allow for text, image, and video ads to be shown. These publisher
websites then get a share of the cost per click with Google since they are the ones
housing the ads. Some of the websites that you can target include forums, blogs, and
any other type of site that is related to the service or product you’re trying to sell.
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4
What is the Display Network?
Good thing about the Display Network is that you can generate large volumes of
traffic for much lower costs than the Search Network. However, the exact targeting
features of the Display Network can be vague compared to the Search Network and
give you many clicks with much lower conversions rate compared to the Search
Network. There are advertisers out there who only use the Google Display network
because it works best for their business model.
Let’s talk about the different Display Network targeting methods that are available:
1) Keyword Contextual Targeting
2) Placement Targeting
3) Remarketing
4) Interest Categories
5) Topic Targeting
6) Geographic & Language Targeting
7) Demographic Targeting
1) Keyword Contextual Targeting
Keyword Contextual Targeting helps you target certain display placements that are
in line with the keywords you’re bidding on. Google will automatically scan websites for the keywords you’re bidding on and send the appropriate ad to be shown
on that site.
Keyword level contextual targeting enables you to:
- Target customers that are earlier in the buying cycle than on search.
- Help you find new websites to advertise on through the automatic keyword bidding.
Through keyword contextual targeting, you’re able have your ads show on sites
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What is the Display Network?
where Google scans the content to find those keywords on the site. As you can
imagine, you can be bidding on keywords like ‘bounce house’ and Google will find
bounce and house on separate areas of the site and still show your ad.
One thing to note is that keyword match types to do not matter on the Display Network. Read more about Keyword Contextual Targeting here.
2) Placement Targeting
Placement Targeting allows you to show ads on the websites that you specifically
choose.
Know which websites your customers are on? Placement targeting allows you to
decide exactly which sites and/or pages you want your ads to show on.
Placement Targeting is amazing to use if you already know where your competitors
are advertising. This is where a tool like WhatRunsWhere.com comes in handy.
WhatRunsWhere is a tool you can use to see where your competitors are already
advertising on the display network. It will tell you the duration of days and how often it has seen your competitors’ ads on those sites. It then greatly reduces your own
learning curve as you don’t have to figure out what those sites are. You now have a
plug and play blue print ready to go!
3) Remarketing
Remarketing ads are like that yo-yo that keeps coming back to you. You’ve probably
been a victim of remarketing yourself: People who have already been on your site
are shown your ads across other websites as they surf around.
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What is the Display Network?
It helps you stay top of mind while your past visitor might be comparison shopping
you against your competition.
These ads remind customers of your products and drive them back to your site to
convert. We’ll cover more in-depth remarketing strategy later in this guide.
4) Interest Categories
Show ads based on the many interests of different users. It’s like sports ads for sports
fans.
nterest category targeting lets you target people whose online behaviors show they
share a common interest, like sports or travel. Then you can show them highly relevant ads wherever they are online. If your industry is within a certain interest, then
this type of targeting could be ver beneficial for you.
5) Topic Targeting
Topic targeting is almost the same (or at least very similar) to interest categories.
Interest categories go off search behavior, while topic targeting works with topics of
websites that are grouped together.
Without needing to target sites one by one, topic targeting allows you to target a
group of websites at the same time.
6) Geographic & Language Targeting
Want to reach Italian speakers across the world? Or just English speakers in your
town?
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What is the Display Network?
Geographic and language targeting lets you show your ads by language, region,
postal code, or address radius. You can decide to showcase your ads to all languages
within your geographic targeting or just one language within the entire world.
7) Demographic Targeting
With demographic targeting, you can show ads to users based on their gender and
age range.
Demographic targeting is awesome to use when paired with other targeting types.
Think your remarketing ads show be the same across both genders and all ages?
Your data will most likely tell you different.
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6 Guaranteed Network Display Tactics For More Profit
6 Guaranteed Network Display
Tactics For More Profit
1) Changing Your Offer
Like mentioned earlier, the offer you use for the search network (example could be
a “Free Consultation”) won’t work with the same effectiveness on the display network. This is simply because the person you’ll find on the display network hasn’t
made is his/her mind as much as a person on the search network has.
This is because the display network is a proactive advertising tool, while the search
network is reactive in the sense you’re only showing your ads to people who are
showing a direct interest in what you have to offer.
They’re just not quite ready to buy yet.
So how do you stay successful on the display network with lower cost per clicks and
lower cost per conversions?
Think of your offer. How do you change your offer so it becomes so easy for the visitor to convert that they don’t have to worry about what they’re risking? Instead of
your regular lead generation search campaigns, think of how you can give a display
visitor more value in exchange for their information.
A white paper or guide is a perfect example on how you can solve their problems
without them feeling like you’re about to call them and try to sell them your latest
and greatest.
Your text and image ads should then also convey that value and call to action of
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6 Guaranteed Network Display Tactics For More Profit
what they’ll receive. Be ready to quickly split test asking and not-asking for phone
number for example.
Over time, you’ll figure out which type of guide or white paper works best. After
that, you can even introduce it to your search network campaigns to see if you get
a lift in conversion rates.
2) Smart Demographic Targeting
Demographic targeting allows you to only show your ads to people who fall within
a certain gender and/or age range.
This helps tremendously if you already know your “customer avatar” and know that
people in the age range of 18-24 can’t afford your product for example. Or you may
know that it’s a waste of your time to get them on the phone because the outcome
is almost always the same.
Unfortunately you can’t filter an already running display campaign to see how the
different demographic ranges perform individually. To combat this, you’ll want to
make separate campaigns for each demographic variant and have them all compete
against each other.
And example of this would be to create a campaign that targets women, ages 25-34,
and then create another campaign that targets women, ages 35-44 and so on.
Over time, you’ll start to see how each of these demographics perform differently
and allow you to allocate your budget more effectively.
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6 Guaranteed Network Display Tactics For More Profit
3) Unwanted Category Exclusions
Sometimes you never know who Google decides to show your ads to, or what sites
your ads are actually displaying on.
To make sure your ads aren’t showing on weird, gross, or bizarre websites, it’s important to look into what categories you can exclude from the display network.
Below is a look at what you can include and exclude:
As you can see, there are a lot of categories to consider, and unfortunately you can’t
see how these individually perform through segmentation. You’ll have to test them
just like the demographic targeting options and create different campaigns to see
how they each perform.
The cool thing is that you can look in your “Automatic Placements” report under
the dimensions tab and see if your new settings are starting to clean up the randomness that was already there.
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6 Guaranteed Network Display Tactics For More Profit
4) Above The Fold CPM Bidding
PPC advertising is amazing for direct response marketing. Direct response meaning that we know exactly what produces results from what we’ve created on the
campaign side.
The display network offers another bidding option that’s different from the search
network. It’s called cost-per-thousand-impression bidding (CPM).
The only time you’d use CPM bidding is when your goal is to get as many eyeballs
as possible on your ads and don’t care about the action the person takes. This could
be great for your new store opening in a given geographic area for example.
If CPM bidding is something you do, you should be aware of the fact that you pay
every time your ad gets an impression. You’ll also pay for that impression, even
when your ad shows below the fold and the visitor never scrolled down to see it.
Sounds a little unfair right?
Many studies have been made regarding above and below-the-fold ad placement,
and it’s widely accepted that above-the-fold ad placement allows the best chance for
clicks.
Enter above the Fold CPM Bidding.
With all the different devices, screen sizes and resolutions, it’s never safe to bet that
your ad will always show above the fold.
So why pay for impressions when no one will see your ad?
To prevent your CPM campaign ads from showing below the fold, make sure you
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6 Guaranteed Network Display Tactics For More Profit
exclude below the fold placements in the same place you excluded all the other categories.
5) Segmented & Creative Remarketing Lists
Remarketing is remarketing right? Wrong.
There are too many companies and individuals out there who think adding one set
of remarketing ads to a remarketing campaign is the end-all, be-all. And then set
those ads to target “All Visitors”.
It’s kind of like practicing your sport once a month vs. every day. It’s not the most
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effective way of improving performance.
So how do you make sure your remarketing kicks butt and takes names?
Say hello to segmentation.
Segmentation simply means that you should focus on creating new audience buckets depending on which pages your visitors have been on and the actions they’ve
taken.
Did the visitor spend a lot of time on your “About Us” page? Then why not show
them a remarketing ad that offers a 15 minute, one on one consultation from the
CEO or another prominent employee in your organization? The visitor wanted to
get to know you better by being on that page, now you have the chance to grow that
relationship.
Do you have visitors who abandoned your shopping cart? Why not create an audience specific for them and offer them a certain discount promo code to come back
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6 Guaranteed Network Display Tactics For More Profit
and finish their purchase.
The same thing goes for people who found you from a non-branded search on Google vs. people from your email list. They’re in different stages of your relationship,
and you should only hold hands when you need to and make out with the others.
Once you’ve decided on which audiences should be segmented where, it’s time to
have fun with your creative side. Be careful if you’re not standing out.
How often do you see what’s expected? The answer is: very often. And the reason
why you can’t think of it clearly is because you’ve become immune to the average
and every day “Free Consultation!”, “Free Trial!”, and “2 For 1!”.
How about “Buy Us Lunch?”, “Join The Chit-Chat”, “Get a Massage”. Why be afraid
to test something new to see if it works? You’re not marketing to other computers,
you’re marketing to other humans who have humor, life, and spark.
6) Gmail Advertising
You’ve most likely seen ads in your Gmail inbox, but have you figured out how to
advertise there?
We’ll tell you a little secret…. It’s part of the Display Network.
The cool thing about Gmail advertising is that you can simply target certain keywords in the subject and body portions of the email. This works especially great if
you think prospective customers of your competition are considering going with
them. Why not bid on competitor keywords and show your ad right front and center to the viewer?
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6 Guaranteed Network Display Tactics For More Profit
To target Gmail, you’ll want to placement target the domain called: mail.google.
com
To target what’s called the “FunBox” (the single line above your emails), you’ll want
to placement target the domain called: mail.google.com::Inbox,Top center
It would be the smartest to create a new campaign specifically for Gmail targeting,
and like mentioned earlier in regards to the offer, it’s important to start testing free
guides or white papers that you split test over time to improve your results.
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