Back At You reviews the state of the ad market for small business. Analyzing the effectiveness of Social ads vs banner ads.
Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) January 31, 2012
Back At You, a social media marketing company focused on creating and executing online marketing strategies for small businesses, reviews the state of online advertising as it pertains to small business and, in particular, the Real Estate industry.
The Real Estate industry is playing catch up when it comes to technology and online marketing. Like most small businesses, Real Estate professionals are focused on marketing methods of the past. These methods are usually highly competitive, expensive and not very effective, especially when compared to when they were first introduced. For example, ads in the local newspaper, at the bus stop or in the grocery cart, these were all very effective when first started. However, like all marketing channels, change is required to maintain an ad’s effectiveness. Unfortunately, these same channels today are exactly the same as they were 30 years ago.
Fast forward to the Internet. Banner ads are the rage of advertising. Real Estate professionals who were the early movers experienced great success with this new way to advertise. As ad networks became smarter with better targeting, banner ads started to replace traditional advertising. Many of the Real Estate professionals who were the early adopters became the industry’s top sellers of property.
Now 15 years or so later, banner ads are being ignored. Consumers have been flooded with ads over the years and have built up immunity. Today, for an ad to be effective, it not only has to have a good call to action and look sleek, but also it takes multiple viewings of an ad before anyone will click. Meaning, you have to spend a lot of money on design and buying ads in bulk. Even then, it’s a tough sell for most.
Today, Social ads are what banner ads were 15 years ago and newspaper ads 30 years ago. Social ads are refreshing, engaging and encourage a call to action by the consumer to engage with your business. According to Wikipedia, Social advertising is the first form of advertising that leverages “offline” dynamics, or social influence. Facebook is a great example of where businesses can leverage a social platform and target people according to their stated interests and actions. Imagine targeting people to “Like” your Page that are interested in real estate, or are following similar businesses as your own, or have stated they are interested in buying a home or investing in real estate. All of this is possible through Social ads. Facebook is the dominant social network allowing for this rich base of data to be mined through targeted Social ads. Real Estate professionals have a significant opportunity to build a targeted base of customers using Social ads and over time, will likely never need to pay for advertising again.
Research conducted by Ignite Social Media looking at the effectiveness of Social ads vs traditional banner ads was quite conclusive. It demonstrated that social ads attracted 5.7x more visitors than display ads, cost per visitor was less expensive, bounce rates were half and customer conversations occurred 4.0x more. Consumers are becoming more savvy and have a shorter attention span than ever. Thus, engagement becomes important when marketing online.
Researched conducted by Pilot, who surveyed over 200 marketing professionals, asked how satisfied they were with their Social advertising. Only 1% said they were not satisfied. Meaning 99% said they were somewhat to very satisfied. These are professional marketers, so Real Estate agents and other small businesses, take note, Social advertising is going to be the greatest marketing channel to build a pipeline of customers for the long term.
