Digital adds are eating away traditional media’s market share

Where do you spend your advertising money? Is it really where your customers are?
An increasing number of businesses are moving their advertising dollars from traditional media to online marketing strategies. Spending on television, newspapers, radio and magazine all lost a significant percentage of the advertising pie, some by as much as 6%.

On the other hand US advertising spend on the internet is growing by 3.5% every single year. Estimates are it will reach $503B by the end of the year. USA is still the largest market for advertising spend, with Australia sitting not far behind at number 7.

Why?

It’s quite simple really; more and more people are using personalised electronic devices to consume media instead of traditional paper or broadcast devices. Sales of tablets such as the iPad are predicted to overtake sales of the PC this year and smartphones are becoming the primary way users get online. Even television has been superseded by the on-demand features of the internet, meaning that for the first time in history more people are using their laptops than watching television.

All of these trends mean it is an important time for businesses to ensure the right decisions are being made about their advertising budget.

Pay Per Click Advertising Still The Winner

As more business owners realise the significance of online advertising, competition for eyeballs is heating up. Pay Per Click or ‘Paid Search’ advertising is still the most popular form of digital advertising. PPC advertising can be done across any platform where people browse for information such as advertising on Google. It may be that Pay Per Click is the most popular form of advertising because of the customizability and warmth of leads it offers clients. Tools such as Google Adwords management allow advertisers to narrow down their choice of who to target quite specifically, depending on keywords the user types in. Provided pay per click management is done correctly, many visitors to a website are already warm leads, looking for the product or service being sold.

Not far behind PPC is display advertising, allowing business owners to place ads in front of customers on websites of strategic importance. Some websites, such as Facebook, allow a highly customised targeting of the consumer. Others simply display an ad on a website a particular type of customer uses. The gap between PPC and display advertising is closing, due to technology advancements that allow display advertising more accuracy and warmer leads.

Mobile Advertising Hugely Important

Digital advertisements are the only category predicted to grow over the next few years and mobile websites are a significant portion of that. Traditional media, such as TV, Newspaper, Magazines and radio are all predicted to be a shrinking market share. (NB: This does not include the online revenues generated by online content from newspapers. Many newspapers have successfully transitioned their revenues from paper to digital.)

This confirms the trend for customers to continue using their mobile phones as a valid way of obtaining information about services and buying products. All businesses need to work on their mobile phone website offering and ensure their mobile website design appeals to customers using smartphones and tablets. For customers to remain engaged with services and products, many businesses will need to create a mobile website through a mobile website designer.

The changes within the advertising industry could mean big changes for how your own business generates revenues and profits. If you don’t keep up, you may be left behind. Now is the time to discuss the changing technological landscape with some internet marketing professionals. Why don’t you create a mobile website for your business?