Advertising in the Digital Age

Big Business Ideas

Stephene Chikozho

AS we previously noted, most aspects of our lives happen in the media. This makes the media the main tool through which we perceive the world and our role in it.

With continued technological shifts, the essence of advertising is evolving, in tandem with the changing environment and human behaviour.

This week, we are going to look at advertising advice from industry experts.

There are profound practical ideas and tips from Tofara Lindsay Chokera, a seasoned Zimbabwean digital marketing expert.

In January 2021, she published a book titled “Tech-Driven Marketing: The Essential Practical Guide for Digital Marketing in Africa”.

The work tries to assure everyone that Africans can adopt technology and solve problems they go through despite technological challenges they might be facing.

The book outlines examples of digital marketing strategies that can work effectively in Africa.

Below are a few tips.

1. Localise your content: When creating content for digital marketing campaigns, it is important to take culture and language into account. Ensure that your content is localised to resonate with your target audience.
2. Leverage on mobile marketing: Mobile technology has taken off in Africa, with many people owning mobile phones. You can leverage on this by creating mobile-friendly content or running SMS and WhatsApp campaigns targeted at consumers in different locations.
3. Use visuals to communicate: Visual content is popular across various social media platforms in Africa. Therefore, it is essential to use visuals to communicate and emotionally engage with your audience.

You can use videos, graphics or images to pass on your message to your target audience.

4. Invest in social media marketing: African millennials are tech-savvy and tend to lean towards the social media. Therefore, investing in social media marketing and advertising can help you reach your target audience and generate leads for your business.
5. Avoid using large data due to internet connectivity: Africa’s internet connectivity is slow and data bundles are expensive for the average user. Therefore, keep your digital marketing material as light as possible with web pages that load quickly and do not consume a lot of data bundles.

Ultimately, Tofara contends, it is critical to keep refining and innovating your digital marketing strategies to adapt to the unique needs of your target audience.

Digital advertising metrics

Digital advertisements can be measured in almost every aspect of performance.

To measure your digital advertising campaign, Tinashe Saruchera, an experienced creative director, notes that you could use the following engagement metrics:

1. Clicks: How many times your ad is clicked
2. Impressions: How many times your ad appears

iii. Click-through rate (CTR): The percentage of impressions that result in a click

1. Reach: How many viewers are shown your ad
2. Video completion rate: How many times viewers who are shown your video ad watch the entire ad

The following metrics measure the results of your campaign:

1. Conversion rate: How many times customers performed a desired action (click, purchase, subscription) after viewing your ad
2. Ad-attributed sales: Purchases that can be traced back to your ad (attribution models vary by ad type and service)

iii. Return on ad spend (ROAS): How much revenue was generated by your ad campaign in relation to how much budget you spent

1. Return on investment (ROI): How much net profit you earned from your ad campaign in relation to how much budget you spent
2. Advertising cost of sales (ACOS): The ratio of ad spend to ad-attributed sales
3. New-to-brand sales: How many purchases were made by customers who had never bought from you before

Digital advertising best practices

The digital advertising strategy can be complex, but here are a few take-aways from what we have covered so far:

1. Reach the right audience: Take advantage of the precision of digital advertising targeting to reach relevant audiences that are more likely to find your ad relevant and engage with it.
2. Track performance: Performance metrics for digital ads can be tracked closer to real time than traditional ad formats. Stay up-to-date with how your ad campaign is performing to see what is working and what is not, and be efficient with your ad spend.

iii. Test and optimise: You can customise nearly every aspect of digital ads, from the copy to the visual assets, which audience segments you are reaching, how much your budget is, and more.

The best way to find success with your digital ad campaign is to keep testing variables to maximise performance.

Make optimisation a required part of your campaign execution.

1. Be authentic: Digital ads continue to become more sophisticated, so, too, does your audience.

Online audiences are discerning, so low-effort copy or irrelevant ad content will not set you up to succeed.

In all aspects of your digital advertising strategy, reference, your visual assets, messaging and even which audiences you choose to reach, be authentic about what you have to offer so that you can genuinely engage your audience and make an impact.

Conclusion

In many cases, entrepreneurs and business executives may find demands of effective advertising in the Digital Age very complex. In such cases, engaging experts is vital for business survival and growth.

One thing is certain, advertising and communication are going digital.

Stephene Chikozho is the managing director of Urbane Create Agency — a strategy, marketing and advertising agency. He writes in his personal capacity. You can follow him on social media (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn), WhatsApp +263772409651 or email: [email protected]