Banner Advertising Campaigns

[eddyshaf]

So a discussion came up today that I would like to get some more opinions about.

Our ad agency uses a portion of the anual budget to conduct banner campaigns. Evidently they are broken down into a few types - those that target geographically, those that target based on behavior and those that re-target website visitors. My experience is that the re-targeting campaigns show the best results with regard to click thrus, site actions, time on site etc...far better than behavioral or geotargeting.

But my real question is - Do we need to even be spending a portion of our budget on Banner Advertising at all?

What is your experience with banner ad campaigns, does your group use them to drive traffic, do you see any measurable lift in SALES from them? I would love to hear some of your opinions...

Thanks -

Ed Shaffer
IBDM
Park Place Dealerships

 

[Jeff Kershner]

Eddy,

Awesome you bring this up, because I too find myself deep in this conversation at least twice a week anymore.

We are not virgins to this conversation here in the dealer forums…

http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f43/behavioral-targeting-campaign-576.html

http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f43/display-advertising-retargeting-276.html

Display advertising is a whole’ other beast. IMO something a little different than what we traditional ISM’s are used to because tracking its full effectiveness not always black n white.

There was an updated study conducted by comScore that shows 8% of Internet users account for 85% of all clicks.

The “unclicking” contributes to 84%...

4% of Internet users are Heavy clickers
4% of users are Moderate clickers
8% are Light clickers

The “traditional” internet marketer inside of us quickly tells us to stay away..right? Of course it does!

Could it be true that banner advertising can lift natural searches and the click is the wrong metric to measure?

I agree that the click is not the only metric to measure. You need to track every level of your display advertising and if you are optimizing your ads for clicks only, it could mean you're ignoring a majority of the population.

This touches on another level and why I believe most dealers will never capitalize on display advertisings. Most dealers do not currently have the resources or budget to create the degree of ad it takes to engage the customer to the level it needs to, in order to be effective.

My experience is that the re-targeting campaigns show the best results with regard to click thrus, site actions, time on site etc...far better than behavioral or geotargeting.

You are 100% correct Eddy. Your site re-targeting is your prize! So really think about that..every customer you can get to visit your website can now be retargeted with your ad and brand. How many customers can you get on your site , but more importantly what other methods of advertising can you get to drive traffic to your site so you can really drive some homerun results??

 

[AndrewDiFeo]

I look at banner advertising as a way to "plant the seed" in a consumers head, much like television. If you run a television commercial once, it probably won't be that effective. But thousands of impressions over and over again will stay in a customer's head. You may not get a click/sale that day or that month, but over time when that customer is in market, your name will be on their mind.

Also, when we started doing banner advertising on comcast.net (our local broadband and cable company) we saw an increase in search from comcast's search engine.

 

[cangelo]

Edmunds Premier dealer program is really good for banner advertising, they let a particular brand lock down your territory so that only you show up when the consumer searches on Edmunds. Depending on the make for the dealership its a pretty cost effective way to sell your dealership, you have to buy it from a 3rd party source though like Dealix, AUSA etc