With nearly 80 percent of the U.S. population online, it is a given that advertisers need to take a stake in the digital space. While the digital marketplace offers a plethora of opportunities, it’s important to invest in the right opportunities. The key for advertisers is to ensure their online campaigns are strategically set up for true success, which translates into increased ROI.

Here are five ways to ensure advertisers get the best return on their digital investment:

Premium Brand Environments: The last thing online advertisers want is to make substantial investments that do not deliver or even worse, jeopardize their brands. Advertisers seek reputable brand environments, such as local news sites, to ensure their brands are protected and enhanced by trustworthy, reliable and relevant content. Within these types of environments, advertisers connect with consumers while they are in the right mindset, rather than catch them off guard in unexpected areas like email.

Targeting: In today’s innovative and fast-paced world, consumers need immediacy, which is incredibly advantageous for online advertisers. Using effective targeting strategies, including demographic, behavioral and/or geographic targeting, advertisers can give consumers exactly what they want and/or need. Relevant targeting creates a speedy, serendipitous connection that consumers welcome.

Appropriate Reach: Along with targeting, advertisers need to ensure they are reaching the right audiences across relevant sites and markets. It’s important to identify multiple high impact opportunities that will effectively connect advertisers with their target markets. Without appropriate reach, advertisers can miss out on profitable opportunities to convert consumers.

Proper Frequency: Increased ad exposure is an absolute must. Why? Message repetition increases message recall (Psychology 101), which results in more actions. The more consumers see a powerful brand, the more likely they will connect with it and keep it top of mind. Strong brands should strive to become an unforgettable, integral part of consumers’ lives. Proper frequency within a short timeframe can act as a reminder throughout various stages of the consumer journey.

Outsourcing: While the online space is a digital land of media opportunities, it does come with its challenges, particularly from an ad buying and planning standpoint. Our industry is still using outdated, manual processes despite technology advancements. Thus, there is a need to streamline and automate the process, so advertisers can focus on the actual brand experience vs. media logistics. In a past study, we found that nearly all respondents (85%) would like to spend more time on highly strategic work, but instead they devote their time managing administrative or logistical activities.

What are other ways in which advertisers can improve digital ROI? Should other factors be taken into consideration?

Background: Leading up to the 2008 presidential election, President Barack Obama’s campaign team took a huge leap into the digital space spending more than $16 million in advertising. The campaign effectively leveraged display, video, search and social media to reach large audiences including progressive advocates. As a result, more politicians are taking advantage of digital media and relying on it to communicate their platforms and connect with voters.

Now that the digital space has evolved and been embraced even more since the last election, what should advertisers expect in 2012?

Increased Competition: Content and news sites will become infiltrated with traffic as the nation follows the campaign and stays informed of the issues at hand. Thus, the competition will increase for politically-driven advertisers to reach their desired audience in these high-impact digital environments.

Emphasis on Local Media: Local news sites will become even more valuable as presidential candidates campaign throughout the nation and local communities get involved with the election. It will be incredibly important for advertisers to target relevant messages at a local level, especially as voters seek local candidate information and voting specifics.

In the 2008 presidential election, local media was an essential component as stated in a ClickZ article: “Local media was clearly important to the campaign. Throughout the election, hundreds of thousands were spent on local media sites. Local media company Centro, which took in $1.3 million from the campaign, facilitated many of those local ad buys.”

Limited Online Inventory: Advertisers should expect a race for premium ad formats, such as pre-roll video, and placements on news sites. The competition will increase particularly during times when the campaign experiences high traction. While there is no shortage of inventory in the digital space, there is limited availability for premium ad formats and placements within premium sites during critical times.

Media Advancements: Advertisers will become more aggressive with digital mediums and channels, including display, video, search, mobile and social, to inform and influence the public in innovative ways. These digital channels will be leveraged alongside traditional channels such as TV. Thus, messages will be continually repeated at every voter touch point.

The Social Impact: Social media will be a huge contributor to the presidential election campaign as voters will use it to get quick updates on a candidate, participate in discussions and influence others. Additionally, politicians will use social media more (e.g., Twitter) to stay connected with the nation on a regular basis and to provide more transparency. Social media will be used as a springboard to other digital touch points, including news sites, video sites (YouTube and Hulu), official candidate sites, etc.

Politically-focused advertisers should ensure they have a consistent and loud voice that follows voters throughout the digital space, especially in high-impact environments. How do you think the 2012 presidential election will be impacted by digital media?

Last month, Centro’s very own President and Founder, Shawn Riegsecker, led the Retailers Play Small Ball panel discussion at the Digiday: Local conference in New York. The discussion focused on the importance of local and brand marketing particularly from a large retail brand perspective.

Below are two key takeaways from the discussion:

Balance your digital media buy: Local matters; however, it is important to find the right balance (i.e., slicing a market or target without jeopardizing scale). Additionally, local is effective when used with digital and traditional channels. Rather than focusing on one or the other, the two channels should be integrated together; this approach creates a stronger force and also mirrors consumer behavior as more people take in content through multiple mediums.

Shift your focus: Brands are often put on the backburner due to the overly complicated ad buying process (i.e., the dreaded spreadsheets). This creates creative and strategic shortfalls due to an increased focus on logistics. Often times what matters most to advertisers, the brand, is lost in translation through both planning and measurement. Thus, there needs to be a shift in focus.

During the discussion, Shawn Riegsecker read Tom Cunniff’s (a panelist) comment from a recent Digiday article on brands, which further conveys the above points:

“Brands don’t need more metrics; they need *relevant* metrics. Online suffers from two self-inflicted problems. 1) The illusion of perfect targeting works directly against the scale that big brands require. 2) We measure and optimize to events (CTRs, downloads, conversions, Facebook “Likes” etc). This ignores the fact that brand-building is a process in which preference is built over time. And, it forces marketers to be offer-driven to reach “success” rather than brand-driven.

We won’t see richer investment by brands online until we find the courage to question the conventional wisdom. Our spreadsheets are poisoning the well.”

For more highlights from the panel discussion, watch the full Digiday:Local video.

What are your thoughts on local? Is it important? Do brands matter?

Brands should grab your attention, invoke an emotion and drive you to want more. Good advertising should not only be creative, it should also spark creativity among its audience. A powerful brand starts with an amazing brand experience that lasts well beyond a first impression. It should move consumers through various stages and touch points. The key is to tell a story that is thought and action provoking.

Here’s an example of how one advertiser took me on a memorable and impactful journey.

Awareness: While waiting for the El in Chicago, I saw a billboard that said, “Murder is Back in Season.” The image was graphic and the message was haunting; it hit me hard. Who would write such a thing?

Higher Awareness: A few minutes later, my train arrived. While still confused, I took a seat, pulled out my iPhone and clicked on my People.com app (shameless guilty pleasure) to view the latest entertainment news. To my surprise, a similar ad was displayed on the top of the PeopleMobile page. The ad was promoting the TV show Glades (note: relevant ad placement). As the ads were building off of each other, the show was really starting to spark my curiosity.

Consideration: When I arrived at work, I searched on Murder is Back in Season. I clicked on the promo video hoping for more information. The very short video brought the unforgettable ad image to life with spooky 1920s background music. However, no other details were provided, which took my imagination to another place.

Higher Consideration: I’m dying (no pun intended) to learn more about this show even though I hate mysteries and murder shows.

Action: This weekend, I plan to ask my friends about the show (social recommendations). This will further determine if it is worth my time to watch the show on Sunday evening or record it.

Like this example, it’s important for advertisers to create exciting, fluid paths that drive consumers from one stage to the next, ultimately leading to a final action.

Have you experienced your own personal consumer journey?  Which brands have left you with a lasting impression? And more importantly, if you’re responsible for marketing a brand, are you taking consumers on a journey?

Up until now, the internet has been thought of as mostly a direct-response medium, in the eyes of marketers and brands. If all goes well, however, we should start to see a big shift in that view of online efforts.

In a recent Digiday blog post, the author points out that the current “programmatic buying landscape” is dedicated primarily to “non-guaranteed inventory” and this inventory is largely thought of as direct-response media. It is this type of thinking that prevents the web’s use as a medium for branding, thereby undercutting it’s potential.

But this is all changing. The drumbeat is getting louder and we’re starting to see movement towards new ad formats to attract brands and more importantly, towards a new perspective on the impact of web advertising.

I’m not talking about more discrete metrics; I’m referring to relevancy of metrics. Instead of focusing on CTRs and Facebook “likes,” we should see a greater awareness of brand marketing’s place in the entire customer journey. While that customer journey may end in a sale, it starts somewhere, and we’re here to say it can start online.

With a better, more macro-economic, attribution model, we’ll be able to see how online brand efforts contribute to a sale and customer loyalty; this in turn will lend value and emphasis to non-direct-response marketing.

Let’s give brands more than just another “tool” for their marketing arsenal. Let’s give them a platform for brand creativity and growth, one that proves value beyond the click.

Premium Content vs Scalable Audience Buying

Ladies and gentlemen, in one corner we have Premium Content weighing in at high CPMs, guaranteed inventory and brand safety.  In the other corner we have Scalable Audience Buying weighing in at low CPMs, performance-based inventory and questionable content.  Which side are you on?

While HBO will not be featuring this slugfest on Saturday night, this video below might interest you if you live and breathe digital advertising every day.

The Shift is On – Buying Audiences Instead of Content :: Digiday Target Panel

Future of Display Advertising

During the DigiDay: Target keynote panel, The Shift is On – Buying Audiences Instead of Content, members of the digital advertising community spoke candidly about the future of display advertising.  To be fair, with a background in search marketing, I am biased towards the platforms that provide scale, efficiencies and are based on performance. However, I can understand the importance of premium content.

In short, as presented by the panel, the pendulum is swinging to the advantage of the media planner/buyer.  While the digital landscape is becoming more fragmented, traditional online media is becoming easier to plan and execute.

The opportunity that ad exchanges, private exchanges and demand side platforms are bringing to the market is another venue for advertisers to reach a larger audience online.  This venue challenges the dollars that may have been routinely spent on large name brand websites.  I think as an advertiser, before moving your money into this new space or keeping it in your comfort zone, you should answer some of these questions:

• What does premium content mean to you? This phrase is thrown around often.  Does it mean local content? Does it mean web only publishing or perhaps content developed by respected authors?
• What is the objective of your online dollars? Are you trying to drive online actions?  Do you want to be associated with certain publishers?  Are you supporting offline buys?
• What does brand safety mean to you? Are these trusted, unquestioned providers of content?  Does having transparency of site level satisfy your needs or do you need guaranteed placements?

It is important to consider your objectives, client needs and business needs before venturing into these platforms.  Beyond these questions, what else would you ask of your client? Where do you see the online dollars shifting?

Learn more about Display Advertising with Centro.

Consumers spend more time with digital vs. traditional media. Digital is magnetic. In the last five years, internet usage has risen by 121%, while offline channels (TV) either declined or remained constant. Key contributors to this growth include increased usage of mobile and social media as well as a shift to more online shopping experiences (nearly two-thirds of consumers shopped online in 2010).

Consumers rely on multiple digital media channels. PCs, tablets, smartphones and more! Today, consumers are taking in content through multiple digital channels, often simultaneously:- Time spent with mobile devices is rising faster than all other media. In 2010, consumers spent 28.2% more time with mobile devices. Social networks account for nearly two-thirds (64%) of the online population. eMarketer forecasts that 21% of US mobile phone users will be regular social network users in 2011. Online video experiences have shown a surge in usage. U.S. users spent almost 45% more time viewing online video in January 2011 vs. January 2010. Additionally, the mobile video audience increased by 40% in Q4 2010.

Ad dollars’ shift online to follow consumer behavior. The economy will not keep advertisers down. Online ad spending in 2010 rose by 13.9%, reaching a record $25.8 billion. It will continue to reach new peaks in the coming years, passing $30 billion in 2012 and $40 billion in 2014. This growth is attributed to online reliability, especially during the economic downturn, along with an increased investment in video and display. In fact, display spending is expected to surpass the growth rate of paid search through 2014. This growth is driven by the rise in video, banner ads and brand dollars vs. direct response alone.

Ad dollars are underutilized in the digital space. Opportunity knocks! While more dollars are shifting online, they have yet to catch up with consumer behavior. This represents an underutilization of ad dollars and an opportunity to get in front of more consumers. According to eMarketer, the internet took up 25.2% of adults’ daily media time in 2010, but received just 18.7% of US ad spending, which represents a gap of 6.5 percentage points. What does this all mean? The digital space offers endless opportunities for engaged consumers and creative advertisers to interact with each other. What are your thoughts on the evolving digital space?