Upper Funnel Advertising: How to Use Display & Video Ads to Boost Awareness

Learn the common advertising tactics used to target customers at the top of the purchase funnel and build awareness of your brand, product, or service.

For PPC marketers judged on generating a return on advertising spend, it’s tempting to focus on bottom-of-the-funnel tactics to generate last-interaction conversions.

However, upper funnel advertising is vital to sustainable growth and avoiding stagnation. After all, you can’t get more customers if they aren’t aware of your company, product, or service.

Upper funnel advertising refers to messaging that reaches users before they are aware of your brand, product, or service. Example formats include video, display, and sponsored content.

When done right, targeted advertising to build awareness will put you in front of ideal customers before they start looking for competing services, letting you emerge as the top choice.

Upper funnel advertising should be a blend of reach and quality. The perfect placement will position your brand in front of the largest possible portion of your target audience.

Let’s explore a few common advertising tactics used to target customers at the top of the purchase funnel and build awareness of your brand, product, or service.

Display Advertising

Display advertising can be run across networks such as the GDN (Google Display Network) and numerous other advertising networks.

According to Google, its display network reaches 92 percent of all Internet users expanding across 2 million sites!

An example of display for generating awareness can be seen in the ad below.

A grocery store is creating awareness of deals in-store. This ad will likely never be credited with conversion value. Its sole purpose is to drive awareness of an offer that people may eventually consider.

To make the best use of display advertising, you’ll need to lean on the options available to target users who share demographic information and interests matching your target customer personas.I’ve previously written a post here on SEJ covering some advanced display network targeting tactics. But if your goal is to reach as many people as possible, then you might not want to add too many targeting layers to your display ad groups and reduce potential reach.

You should, however, set up multiple different targeting methods in separate ad groups so you’re able to modify bids on each combination without limiting overall reach.

Here are some basic combinations to get you started on Google Display network:

Age + Gender + Affinity Audience

Affinity targeting is like interest targeting, matching your ads with users who visit sites of the same topic. Consider an affinity a long-term interest in a particular topic.

Managed Placements

A managed placement means controlling the websites your ads are placed on. This is the most direct way to target a website you deem relevant to your target audience.

Topics + Affinity Audience + Placements

Topic targeting allows you to target sites matching a defined topic.

Topic targeting will allow you to reach a wider audience than managed placements but the sites you appear depending on Google’s topic categorization. Placements may not be as relevant as sites you’ve chosen yourself

Custom Affinity Audiences

Custom affinity is a more refined version of standard affinity targeting.

Criteria for setting up a custom affinity audience is a minimum of five different interests, URLs, places or apps that describe the audience you’re looking to target.

For best results, I would recommend sticking with a combination of interests and URLs:

Measuring Display Advertising Success

Display advertising often won’t result in a direct conversion and so should be assessed differently to bottom of the funnel advertising activity, typically judged on last interaction attribution.

Display advertising often won’t result in a direct conversion and so should be assessed differently to bottom of the funnel advertising activity, typically judged on last interaction attribution.

Brand Awareness

Any increase in search activity resulting from a display campaign should be monitored and annotations should be used in Google Analytics to denote the dates in which your display campaigns launched.

• Use metrics such as new site visitors to judge how successful your campaigns are at increasing brand recognition and overall site traffic.

• Impressions can be used as a measure of how many times your ads have been served on targeted sites.

• Reach and frequency metrics will show many people have been served your ads and how frequently the same people were shown them over a certain period of time:

Engagement

This is the amount of interaction with your display advertisements can be measured using metrics such as:

Engagements happen whenever a user taps, clicks or expands your ad if using lightbox ads.

• Clicks through to your website landing pages.

Direct Response

The number of desired conversion actions taken whenever your ads have been served – metrics such as:

• View through conversions: Track the contribution from display on conversions where a user has viewed a display ad and later converted via another channel. (More here.)

• Assisted conversion value: Track the contribution made by display on overall conversions (people who’ve clicked through to your site and later converted through another channel).

After you’ve been running any display activity, regularly check both Google Analytics and Search Console to monitor any increases in:

• Direct or organic traffic.

• Organic branded search volume.

Video Advertising

Much like display, video advertising can offer huge reach.

Video advertising has been more commonly used for B2C. But recent stats released through Think with Google report that video is having more influence in the B2B decision making process than originally thought.

Nearly half of all B2B researchers are millennials and reportedly watch video during the entire path to purchase.

• Nearly half of these researchers are viewing 30 minutes or more of B2B-related videos during their research process, and almost one in five watch over an hour of content!

When it comes to online video advertising, there’s little doubt that YouTube is the market leader.

YouTube

YouTube offer the following video advertising options:

• TrueView skippable ads: Ads which can be skipped after 5 seconds. Advertised before, during, or after a video.

  • Advertisers are billed if a viewer watches for at least 30 seconds or clicks on elements of the video.

• TrueView discovery ads: Ads that appear beneath a video, on search results pages or on the YouTube homepage to encourage users to watch an ad:

Non-skippable video ads: Non-skippable ads that appear pre-, mid-, or post-roll while viewing partner content.

• Advertisers charged on a CPM basis which can be more expensive than other ad formats.

• Bumper ads: Non-skippable video ads up to 6 seconds that play before a video can be viewed.

  • Advertisers are charged on a CPM basis which again can be more expensive than other ad formats.

Consider using YouTube if you already have (or are capable of creating) high quality videos that you can use to run as awareness ads.

YouTube Targeting Options

YouTube provides advertisers with the same targeting options as GDN activity.

Ads can be targeted based on:

Demographics.

• Interests (including custom affinity and in-market audiences).

• Topics.

• Keywords.

• Placements (YouTube channels and videos).

Social networks including Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat are prime real estate for generating awareness.

Usage research indicates that:

• 81 percent of adults age 18 to 29 are on Facebook, alongside 78 percent of adults age 30 to 49.

• 64 percent of adults are 18 to 29 are on Instagram, alongside 40 percent of adults age 30 to 49.

With a multitude of social networks available to run video ads, you need to:

• Start out by defining who your target audience is.

• Match your target audience with the right social media platform.

Spending money on a platform that lacks active users from your target audience would be a huge waste of advertising budget!

Measuring Video Advertising Success

If you’re looking purely at conversion metrics, expect to see a low conversion rate, and high CPL on YouTube ads. Measures you should be tracking to analyze the performance of your video ads include:

Awareness

Measure the impact your video advertising is having on brand awareness with metrics such as:

• Impressions and view rate: Measuring how many people saw your videos and who watched the full ad.

• YouTube advertisers serving over 1.5 million impressions can also take advantage of brand lift. This is used to assess “direct impact YouTube ads are having on perceptions and behaviors throughout the consumer journey.”

Engagement

Engagement metrics include watch time, likes, shares, and comments. This will provide a basic barometer of how your audience is responding to your videos.

Conversion

Though not the aim of upper funnel ads, you can measure traditional direct response metrics such as clicks and conversions (including view through conversions) related to your video ads in the Google Ads interface:

Other methods of assessing the impact of video ads on brand awareness include Google consumer surveys. This tool will allow you to create short surveys for approximately $3.00 per form submission (or as little as $1.50 for a single question survey).

Conclusion

Measuring the success of upper-funnel advertising is a well-known industry challenge.

It’s easy to measure direct response (conversion) metrics. However, marketers still lack a consistent means of measuring the effectiveness of upper-funnel advertising.

Last-click attribution models incentivize marketers to target users who are already aware of a brand, product, or service.

Upper funnel advertising tactics tend to receive less budget because they receive less credit for the part they play in sales.

Display isn’t allocated the value it deserves in most cases. Many advertisers are still measuring its success through last-click models, when we know that only a small fraction of users ever click on display and video ads.

As the industry continues to develop, attribution modeling should allow advertisers to shift budgets across the full marketing funnel. Advertisers must understand that each user is different and the path to purchase is less likely to be linear as time goes by.

For now, using a mix of upper funnel advertising tactics will help you nurture more leads toward purchase. And ultimately, this will lay the foundation for sustainable growth.

7 Tips for Creating Eye-Catching Instagram Ads

Instagram is popular with marketers of consumer-facing brands but requires both channel and user knowledge to succeed. Learn how to create eye-catching Instagram ads here.

Like all things in marketing, there’s no single silver bullet to find success with Instagram advertising.

Though it can be a highly successful ad channel for brands of all sizes and is among the most popular with advertisers in consumer-facing brands, it requires both channel and user knowledge.

Instagram advertising is a delicate mix of strategy, targeting, budget, and creative outputs. Eye-catching creative goes a long way towards effectively influencing conversions and managing ad spend efficiency.

Looking to create a stellar set of high-performing ads on Instagram? Start with these ideas.

1. Use Content That Feels Feed-Native; Try User Generated Content (UGC)

No one sells your product quite like the people who love it most.

In an era of personalization and representation, your customers are your single best billboard for your products on the internet, and no ad strategy is complete without UGC in the mix.

There is something innately personal about seeing that you are a part of a larger brand community and seeing “yourself” in that mix.

However, truly embracing UGC as more than just a one-off ad does require a great deal of trust in their ability to capture quality photography that feels both compelling enough to be real and produced enough to be usable.

UGC generates rapport and an instant identification with a brand and product set.

Your company’s products through your customers’ lens? It’s easy to see why it resonates. The best-in-class category for UGC is often destination marketing organizations (or DMOs).

Experiential brands excel in the social space through visual storytelling and creating a sense of place that allows users to preview their own (potential) trip through someone else’s eyes.

The best DMO ads don’t show staged shots of exhibits, attractions, or cityscapes. Although all have their place in marketing, the best show the destination through visitors’ lens using UGC and let you “feel” what it would be like to be there.

2. Utilize Attractive Ecommerce Photography With Dynamic Ads

Have a crack creative team that knows exactly how to stage, shoot and edit your products to shine on the web?

Utilize this existing set of assets in dynamic product ads that pull directly from your product catalog.

If the products really can sell themselves, let them (with creative copy and a great CTA, of course).

3. Make Sure Your Targeting Is Aligned With Your Audience & Outcome

So many great ads have gone awry because of lazy, careless targeting. The lowest hanging fruit in advertising is to make the ad appealing to the people you want to sell to.

This requires them to be the ones to actually see it.

Forgetting basics such as age, location, language, and working in customer data and interests are table stakes in ads, but often get left behind in the quest for innovative creative.

The bottom line is that the best creative assets in the market can’t sell to people who simply won’t buy what you’re selling.

They won’t buy, and even worse, they might click and blow the budget and throw MER, ROI, and ROAS out the window.

4. Put Your Products in Context

It can be hard to sell a product or service in abstract, even really great ones. Content (and in this case, I mean on-location, styled, and shot photography) helps your audience to imagine themselves using, experiencing, and loving your products.

For best-in-class content shoots, look no further than Nuuly (that in full disclosure is a client of mine).

Expertly styled, meticulously thought out, high contrast images front every ad, perfectly capturing the breadth of products and proclivities of their subscription clothing rental.

Each image feels tied to season and place, even though it’s the clothes on display.

Take this concept a step further and ease the path to conversion by making sure that the products are linked up to the product catalog and are tagged/shoppable in your organic posts, as well.

5. Use Social Identity Theory for Creative Positioning

Any long-time communications or psychology student is probably familiar with social identity theory, although it may be new to you as a marketer.

Social identity theory describes the process of creating a negative cognitive stigma against something else as “othering.”

As much as it’s not great for building mutually beneficial communication, it is a great ad tactic to build instant identification around what your brand is or is not.

Body care brand, Harry’s, does this explicitly in its Instagram bio saying. “Harry’s is not the same.”

This immediately prompts you to think, “So what are they?”

By creating ad creative or copy that clearly lays out the ways your products are different from competitors (and how yours is obviously superior), you help answer the immediate question of, “Why product x and not product y?”

This is often best done visually, as users are not apt to spend much time reading a comparison for a brand that is prospecting them when they were scrolling for fun.

This “us vs. them” approach is tried-and-true, though tricky to pull off without coming off as petty.

6. Use Your Words Carefully

There are times to use wordplay, puns, and in-the-know audience/community language, but ads for top-of-funnel acquisition are generally not it.

Ad copy must be clear, direct, and inform users about what the product is or how it works.

Creativity absolutely has its place — except when it’s attempted at the expense of clarity.

And while I don’t personally subscribe to generic platitudes like, “Shorter ad copy is always better,” I do generally agree that clarity supersedes all else.

And generally, brief begets clear.

7. Stop the Scroll With Motion

Slideshows, videos, GIFs… there are so many ways to build motion into ads. Though video isn’t the right avenue for every ad campaign, it is effective at interrupting the scroll.

Consider when flighting in a new asset what video could do for your product.

Ask a few key questions to help you find early opportunity:

• Is it easier to see in motion?

• Can we show a unique attribute through motion?

• What would be the most effective type of video/moving asset to deploy?

• How does this asset perform compared to static images?

Creative that shows products in motion can help sell the USP and help demonstrate value and clear market fit (like Billie is known for). There’s no guesswork involved for consumers that are able to easily see the product “working.”

In Conclusion

Ultimately, there is no right answer to what makes an Instagram ad “great.”

However, eye-catching and high-converting ads have a few things in common.

They speak to their core audience, showcase the product in a clean, clear, and compelling way, and are well-targeted to the end-user.

Everything You Need to Know About YouTube Audio Ads

YouTube audio ads are a refreshing new ad type designed to serve brand awareness and reach goals with audio content on the video platform. Here's how.

YouTube launched its version of audio ads, part of the platform’s strategy to engage music and podcast listeners, in November 2020.

YouTube audio ads give advertisers another avenue for capturing the attention of its users, particularly those who use the platform as an auditory versus strictly video medium — for listening to podcasts, concerts, or lectures, for example.

If your goal is brand awareness and reach, it’s worth testing this new initiative out.

Let’s take a look at how to get started with YouTube audio ads.

How Do YouTube Audio Ads Work?

While the audio ad format is primarily characterized by a voiceover, there is still an image or animation component that displays on the screen when played.

Here’s an example of a YouTube audio ad with a simple animation display:

YouTube Audio ads share similar characteristics with video ads, such as running on a CPM basis.

Google touts the relatively low cost of creative, simplified buying and campaign setup, streamlined targeting and measurements, and extended reach into new inventory at a low cost as the primary benefits of YouTube audio ads.

Where Do YouTube Audio Ads Show Up?

Audio ads only show on music or podcast content. Video ads, in contrast, can be placed on multiple categories, playlists, and channels.

Currently, there are audio and podcast lineups available to choose from, such as:

• Pop.

• Rock.

• Country.

• EDM.

• Rap & Hip Hop.

• Made for Audio Music.

• Podcasts.

Google is also rolling out dynamic music lineups to their targeting options. More on that below.

Who’s Eligible for YouTube Audio Ads?

This new audio format was limited to certain brands in a test phase since late 2019. Since the announcement in November of 2020, audio ads have remained in a global open beta.

Certain brands are ineligible to run audio ads, including those in:

• Healthcare & medicine.

• Alcohol.

• Gambling.

• Other sensitive verticals.

It is important to note that Google requires that brands run two Brand Lift surveys before being eligible for the open beta.

Audio ads are currently available in Google Ads, Display & Video 360 platforms.

How To Start Your First YouTube Audio Ads Campaign

To get started, open your Google Ads Account. From there, navigate to Video Campaigns and click the Plus button.

Select New Campaign > Brand awareness and reach (goal) > Video (campaign type) > Audio (campaign subtype).

Then click Continue. That’s it! Now you’re ready to enter your bid and budget details.

Audio Ads Specifications

Similar to YouTube Video ads format, your audio ad also has to be uploaded to YouTube.

A few other requirements and specifications for audio ads include:

• Ad length: 15 seconds maximum.

• File size: 128GB maximum.

• Resolution: anywhere from 426×240 (240p) up to 3840×2160 (2160p).

• Aspect ratio: 16:9.

• Companion banner & Call-To-Action: available by request through your Google representative.

Audience Targeting For Audio Ads

YouTube audio ads offer the same targeting options and bidding strategies as video campaigns. Consider it one less new thing you have to learn.

Google recommends not narrowing your audience too much. At the end of the day, you’re in control of the people your ads get in front of.

Some of my favorite audiences to test in YouTube ads, where our clients have seen success, are:

• Custom Intent (based on Google searches).

• A combination of layering In-Market and Detailed Demographic targeting.

Example

Say your brand is trying to reach people who own a restaurant or other hospitality business at a broad level. You want to target them with a new payment technology product.

With Google’s newer feature of Custom Combinations, you can get creative on how you can try to reach these people:

• Detailed Demographics: Works in the “Hospitality” Industry.

And Also Includes:

• In-Market:

  • Payroll Services.

  • Business Financial Services.

  • Payment Processing and Merchant Services.

Now is the time to get into the mind of your user. These may be the type of people who listen to podcasts on business ownership, finance, etc.

Try creating an audio ad that plays on podcasts only, then set up another campaign for different music genres. By segmenting out where your audio ads are being shown, you can quickly grasp the top placements that are performing.

Dynamic Music Lineups

Dynamic music lineups are driven by advanced contextual targeting. Choose from lineups that align with topics, moments, or popularity with your target audience.

If using dynamic music lineups, it is important not to overlap targeting with the following options:

• Advanced audience targeting.

• Keyword targeting.

• Different targeting types in the same campaign (meaning dynamic lineups audience should have their own campaign).

In the campaign interface, simply go to:

Placements > Click Enter Multiple Placements > Search for the specific video content ID.

YouTube Audio Ads Best Practices & Key Takeaways

Now that we’ve covered the who, what, and where of YouTube Audio ads, it’s time to cover the “how.” Follow these best practices for a more streamlined setup.

Be interesting! Since audio ads run only on music or podcast long listening sessions, it’s critical to capture a user’s attention in the 15 seconds your ad can play.

Focus on the sound component. While the ad still has an image or animation component, the main focus should be on audio. You’d be surprised how difficult it can be to master your message in 15 seconds.

Think about the tone and tempo. Do your ads come off as conversational or sales-y? A user-friendly tone is crucial to help engage and capture your audience’s attention between their music or podcast content.

Word count is important. With only 15 seconds, don’t try to cram too much information in at once. Google recommends aiming for 40 words in your audio clip. Be clear and specific for optimal brand recall.

Don’t forget the call-to-action. Try adding in an offer that is specific to audio listeners. This can help determine the success of your campaign when reviewing results.

Start testing! Google is starting to roll out Video Experiments, making it easier to test. Creative and audience testing will be the main components of these initial experiments. This feature hasn’t rolled out to everyone yet, so be sure to discuss it with your Google representative.

Stick to one audience per campaign. This is similar to how we set up YouTube video ads, but worth repeating. If you use two different audiences with different sizes in separate ad groups in the same campaign, chaos can ensue. Typically, the audience that has the higher size and CPV will win out the majority of each auction. If you want to test audiences, do so with separate campaigns.

If advertising on platforms such as Spotify or Pandora seems daunting, give YouTube Audio ads a try. Your first audio campaign can be set up in no time.

YouTube audio ads can also give you a leg up on remarketing efforts since it’s tied in with the Google Ads platform.

Testing audio ads with YouTube can be a cost-effective way of amplifying your brand message, and at the fraction of a cost compared to other platforms.

How to Make Video Ads on a Budget with YouTube Video Builder

Video advertising is an easy target for budget cuts because many advertisers think it's too costly—but YouTube Ads production doesn't have to be so pricey.

While some businesses are flourishing during this pandemic, others are seriously struggling.

Regardless of whether business is good or bad right now, all businesses need to continue to build and maintain brand awareness if they’re going to be resilient and strong over the long term.

Video ads are an excellent way to maintain brand awareness.

Even so, many advertisers reduced their advertising budgets in the wake of this pandemic, and video advertising was not spared the axe.

In fact, 43% of advertisers reported pausing, canceling, or decreasing their digital video advertising budgets in the early days of COVID-19.

Why is video advertising such an easy target for budget cuts?

I suspect it’s because many advertisers see video advertising as costly and complex.

They worry about the hassle of finding a good producer who will faithfully represent their brand as well as the associated costs.

As a result, video production is viewed as a risky venture during such an uncertain time.

So they decide to put their advertising dollars elsewhere.

Video Production Costs Don’t Have to be Sky High

But video production doesn’t have to be so pricey.

Yes, traditional TV-type ads can be expensive and take weeks or months to produce.

Further, the pandemic has made the logistics of in-person video shoots even more challenging (if not impossible in jurisdictions under lockdown).

Fortunately, these traditional shoots aren’t the only way to make a video ad.

You have a much more affordable option in the YouTube Video Ad Builder.

YouTube Video Ad Builder

YouTube’s Video Ad Builder has been around for quite a while but has largely flown under the radar.

If you check out YouTube Ads main page, for example, there’s no mention of the Video Ad Builder tool. Instead, the page recommends different creative partners to help create videos “whether starting from scratch or repurposing existing videos and images…”

Even their article How to Make a Great Video Ad Without Breaking the Bank doesn’t mention Video Ad Builder but instead covers topics relating to the story, cast, and location.

Yet Video Ad Builder is by far the easiest, fastest, and most flexible way to create a video for video advertising.

While the tool is still in beta, it’s available to any advertiser that wants to sign up (as far as I can tell).

You have to fill out their form to request access and then wait about five days for a response.

It’s a perfect tool for businesses that don’t have the resources to produce, shoot and edit videos from scratch.

All you need are the same existing assets (images, text, and logos) you would need for a display ad.

This may sound almost too easy, but we’ve found it works great in practice.

For example, we’ve been using YouTube Video Ad Builder for a client that regularly promotes special events.

Whereas creating multiple “traditional” videos each week would have been out of reach for this client, it’s perfectly doable using the YouTube Video Ad Builder tool.

And the end results look great!

How to Use YouTube Video Ad Builder

As mentioned, creating videos with this tool is surprisingly easy. Most of the hard work is in the planning and preparation.

Here are the five steps you need to follow:

Step 1: Decide on Strategy & Messaging

Start with strategy and messaging. This is something you’ve probably (hopefully!) developed if you have a PPC program in place.

Get clear on what you’re trying to achieve and what you want to convey, and think about who you’re trying to reach and the problem you’re trying to solve.

Don’t forget to include a call to action!

Step 2: Gather Assets

Pull together existing assets such as images and logos. If you’ve already created display campaigns, this should be easy.

Make sure the images are clear and in full color. Don’t overlay logos or text or buttons.

Generally, simple images work best in these ads, so don’t get fancy with filters or other creative processes.

Step 3: Choose Your Layout, Font, Colors & Music

One of the coolest things about YouTube Video Ad Builder is that you can choose from different layouts, fonts, colors, and music. Almost everything you need is built-in.

For example, here’s a mockup of a layout:

Different layouts are designed for different purposes such as introducing your brand, highlighting your product catalog, and sharing promotions.

Each layout has a set duration when played. Most are 15 to 16 seconds, although there are a couple of six-second options for bumper ads.

The builder also has a storyboard feature to help you plan the flow of your ad.

Unless you have good designer instincts, you’re better off following the recommended layout styles, sizes, and orientation.

To further customize and brand your ad, you can select from different fonts and colors.

You can also select music from the built-in library so you don’t have to worry about copyright issues.

Step 4: Upload to Your YouTube Channel

Once you’ve uploaded your assets and selected your layout, you can bring everything together into your video ad and preview/edit as needed.

Once you’re satisfied, upload the video to your YouTube channel.

Additional edits (after uploading) can be done in YouTube Studio.

Step 5: Start Using

The final step is to start using your new video in campaigns!

Still confused about the steps in this process? This YouTube video tutorial does a good job of breaking it down.

Need a bit more incentive? As of this writing, YouTube Ads is offering $100 in free credits when you spend $50 on video ads.

Video Ads Can Be Affordable

Don’t assume that video ads are out of reach due to cost or complexity.

Simple video ads are still doable with YouTube Video Ad Builder, even during a pandemic.

You’ll be surprised at how professional these videos look, and how well you can continue to build your brand on a budget.

This article and cited credit goes to:

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/upper-funnel-advertising/295649/