Digital advertising is sold on the basis of targeting. Whilst everyone watching the super bowl or the X factor gets shown the same TV ad regardless of their age, gender or interests, digital ads can be hyper-targeted to just be seen by the exact demographic you know is most interested in your product. Or rather that's how it works in theory. In practice, the results are often very different. Recent research by Nielson found for certain groups, such as males in the 18-24 age range, only 17% of targeted ads were actually reaching the intended demographic. The rest were being seen by people the advertiser did not intend to target.
This reveals a big flaw in targeted advertising, as across the board about half of views are coming from people the advertiser wasn't paying to target. Whilst there is a wider debate about the metrics of hyper-targeting versus mass media, the point is advertisers should be aware of the difference between what they think they're paying for and what they are actually getting.
By Robert Allen
Rob Allen is Marketing Manager for Numiko, a digital agency that design and build websites for purpose driven organisations, such as the Science Museum Group, Cancer Research UK, University of London and the Electoral Commission. Rob was blog editor at Smart Insights from 2015-2017. You can follow Rob on LinkedIn.
Turbocharge your results with this toolkit containing 7 resources
The Marketing Campaign Planning toolkit contains:
Start your Digital Marketing Plan today with our Free membership.
Recommended Blog Posts
Evaluating technology options for innovation in marketing – do you know your Hype Cycles? If you’re involved in marketing strategy development, you will be constantly making judgments and reviewing with colleagues which digital technology innovations are most relevant to your …..
From B2B to E-commerce to Brands, we’ve got examples of digital marketing plans for early startups through to multinational enterprises Whether you’re starting from scratch, or improving your existing plans, examples of digital marketing plans help marketers see the how, …..
Dr Dave Chaffey’s practical review of the marketing trends that will matter for B2C and B2B marketers in 2025 I’ve been writing reviews of the latest digital marketing innovations for well over 10 years now; spurred on since they seem …..
