In the digital world we now live in, advertising evolves on a daily basis. New apps, devices and methods of advertising are constantly being created. However, here at Superfly we feel that Social Media has resulted in a revolution in advertising. Previously we’ve had to advertise to users based on what you think will hit your target market. Does a certain radio show appeal to a certain audience? Is a certain newspaper read by a specific demographic? The problem with these methods is that there can often be a large amount of wastage, which for smaller businesses is a scary proposition. That said there’s still a definite place for these forms of advertising, we’ve seen some brands and businesses use them with fantastic results. We don’t think that social media advertising replaces these formats by any means, it can even enhance them.
With the wide range of social media platforms out there, users are openly providing us businesses with information which we can tap into. On Facebook for example we’re able to advertise to users on both desktop and mobile devices, and target people based on things such as their age, location, gender, interests, relationship status, education level, workplaces and more. Obviously all of this information is private; we’re unable to see specific people, only a rough estimation of potential reach.
LinkedIn on the other hand allows us to target people, similarly to Facebook, based on information such as their age, location, job title, skills, company industry, company size and more. Looking to target Managing Directors of companies with over 200 employees? No problem! We’ve seen clients have great success with LinkedIn advertising, especially when their target market is more business focused.
Twitter has even recently launched TV ad targeting. This new form of advertising targeting allows you to engage directly with people on Twitter who have seen your ads on TV. Twitter can not only determine where and when your TV advertisement ran, but also identify the users on Twitter which are tweeting about the program which the ad aired in between. This allows brands to offer engaging and interactive messaging. This combination of social media and traditional media is a real evolution in the way we can advertise.
As businesses we’ve never been able to be so specific with the people we’re advertising to until now. We live in an era where we can deliver advertisements to specific targeted demographics and only those demographics. Not only does this prevent ad budgets from going to waste, therefore improving advertising efficiency, but it also benefits us as individuals being advertised to. There’s nothing worse than using a service and seeing irrelevant ads all over your screen. As businesses are able to get increasingly more targeted with their advertising, the quality of adverts that we see in our every day lives will improve.
Join the social media advertising revolution today, give us a call on 01482 242007!
