Whether it's PPC advertising or social network ads, providing the right message to the right people is one of the most important elements of success. Do it right, and you will attract an audience that requires exactly what are trying to offer them.
But if you run campaigns without an accurate targeting, you are risking throwing money away. So how do you display your posts in front of specific segments of your audience? The answer is to use contextual targeting.
Contextual targeting
Contextual Targeting is the practice of displaying ads based on the website content. This type of targeting is achieved by analyzing topics, demographics, and keyword parameters attached to each ad. The data is then compared to the central theme of the content on a web page for matching. Additional relevant factors assessed may include language, location orientation and viewing history.
There is a category targeting content, where ads are targeted to pages that fall into pre-assigned categories, and contextual targeting to keywords, where ads are targeted to pages that match specific keywords. Semantic targeting is the most advanced form of contextual targeting , and it involves the use of machine learning to understand the meaning of each page of content, and not just the definition of suitable keywords on a page.
Placing the right ad in front of the right person at the right time is one of the key goals of contextual targeting. Specialists who work with the data say that with proper ads placement you can get almost twice as many clicks as compared to the target on the basis of the cookie used in behavioral campaigns.
This type of targeting is often cheaper to implement because it traditionally does not depend on the user's location, GPS data, or the size of the advertiser’s company. This is an approach that has been particularly successful in getting clicks and conversions for small stores.
Contextual targeting allows for hyper-personalized advertising. By choosing specific topics and matching them with the content on your site, your ads may appear in relevant posts, blogs and websites.
Here is how it works:
Select keywords and topics. Start by simply adding targeting keywords and themes to your ad groups in the Google Display Network. Google Ads analyzes potential placements. This allows you to determine which websites best match your targeting settings. To do this, Google analyzes the text, language, page structure and internal links on each website.
Your ad is being placed! The system selects placements based on the type of targeting you choose. Content Keywords: an ad is placed when the targeting keywords correspond to the main topic of the website/post. For example, suppose you launch an ad for a new brand of coffee with keyword targeting, advertising will be targeted to relevant individual pages.
Topic. Your ad is placed on a website if it matches the main topic you’ve chosen. Using the example of coffee brand above, Google will advertise on websites that have content related to the subject of coffee.
As with any other marketing aspect, contextual targeting may require some practice. If you are struggling to find ways to integrate advertising with content, find a professional who will help you plan your next campaign.
