The Changing Digital Landscape

23/2008 Issue: Page 56

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2008 has shaped up to be a crazy year for online advertising - the writers' strike drove people online and the presidential election and the Olympics are causing advertisers to boost spending in a down market. The timing of these factors has altered media behavior - making the business of online media anything but typical for the year.

How the advertising dollars that moved online in 2008 will be spent is a matter of much debate. Reports indicate that because the digital landscape is changing, advertisers are finding that the tried and true initiatives that performed well a few years ago are now considered passé.

As more and more individuals become their own tastemakers, advertisers need to take into account how users consume information. The days of pushing content have given way to users pulling the content that they want – making it tricky for companies to get a hold of their potential consumers.

At the end of 2007, AdTech and MarketingSherpa surveyed 421 Internet marketers about the tactics they would try out this year and where they plan to spend their budget in 2008.

In terms of the initiatives that marketers plan to increase more than 5 percent of the budget on in 2008, 32 percent of marketers cited PPC, 27 percent of marketers said they'll increase their spend on behavioral targeting and 26 percent will spend it on rich media.

The survey found that viral marketing and advertising on online video sites, mobile phones and virtual worlds are among the emerging trends that marketers plan to check out this year. Marketers say they are encouraged to try out those tactics for the first time by their agencies.

Ninety-three percent say agencies suggested an increase in spending or begin spending on viral video; 87 percent were urged to spend on viral marketing using networking sites; 60 percent were asked to try wireless ads on mobile networks; and 62 percent said agencies advised advertising in games and virtual worlds.

In March, PQ Media reported that total spending on alternative media - including expenditures on online/mobile, lead generation advertising and consumer-generated media - is predicted to grow 20.2 percent to $88.24 billion in 2008.

Clearly, how companies approach their ad budgeting is going through a major metamorphosis. Of course, online marketing plans and their budgets depend on several factors – including the type of company, product, audience and goals.

The Big Trends

In terms of how advertisers budget their marketing plans, three trends have been shaking up the status quo in 2008 - paid search, social media and ad networks.

The biggest change in the last couple of years is that search ad spending continues to increase – it is expected to rise 32 percent this year to $15.5 billion in the U.S, according to J.P. Morgan Chase.

Some industry watchers call search the greatest advertising medium of all time and many marketers agree. However, Jake Fields, president and creative director of Treeline Interactive, warns that marketers need to be careful because it is easy to waste budgets buying keywords. Fields recommends Spyfu.com, a tool for finding competitors' keywords.

The rise of social media is one of the dramatic differences between 2007 and 2008. Although a recent Forrester Research report indicates that spending is still relatively small, companies are benefiting from what it offers: consumers contribute brand messaging as opposed to only passively receiving communication from marketers.

There are many ways for new publishers as well as established brands to leverage social media. They could create buzz on a social network before the site launches or do some ad buys on social networks sites, which are cheaper than buys on traditional content like CNN because traditional advertisers are weary of social networks.

The Northern California ski resort, Northstar at Tahoe, has a campaign that encourages customers and staff to post videos and photos with the tags "Northstar, Tahoe" on social media sites such as YouTube and Flickr - with the prospect of being featured on the Northstar site or even the possibility of winning complimentary services. Fields explains that this initiative enabled Northstar at Tahoe to quickly expand its presence within these social media sites from a couple hundred entries to thousands of social media posts that positively represent their brand.

Also gaining traction in 2008 are advertising exchanges, which allow advertisers to bid for impressions on a CPM basis. Cam Balzer, vice president of emerging media at DoubleClick Performics, explains that ad exchanges bring the benefits of search marketing to display advertising - namely, the ability to test a large number of placements (an ad of a particular size on a particular site or even site section) dynamically (no minimum or locked-in budget), to bid more for placements that are driving strong ROI and less for placements that aren't working.

More and more display inventory of an increasingly high quality is becoming available via advertising exchanges, and this trend should continue as publishers get comfortable with selling inventory in this way.

Balzer says that for a minimal investment, companies can test various approaches to building awareness of their brand. They can secure a large number of impressions at a low CPM to increase reach. If they are also selling advertising on their site, they could sell ad inventory via an exchange to improve the CPM yield of their site.

Regardless of whether companies attempt to leverage one or all of the big online marketing trends for 2008, the ever-evolving interactive space is moving away from cookie cutter campaigns that seem too inflexible to yield results.

To rise above the clutter, companies need to aggressively try the latest tactics like product placement in games and paid ads on networking sites. Mixed approaches are required – recent research finds that when search and display advertising are combined, clicks increase after people see the display ads.

Because there is no silver bullet, marketers need to constantly analyze and optimize their mix. Fields says that campaigns are all a matter of trial and error – it is important to try, pull back, measure, analyze, and then try again.

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