Household Income Targeting
March 11, 2010 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
As part of our new Demographic Targeting feature on Gourmet Ads, one of the new targeting options for advertisers is Household Income Targeting. This new targeting option is ideal for any advertisers who are looking to target consumers with the total household income as the main metric for the campaign.
The level of household income can be a significant driver in relation to the making a purchase decision for a product. Household Income Targeting can target populations with higher or lower buying power. As such the 5 segments advertisers can target include;
- $0-29K
- $30-39K
- $40-49K
- $50-75K
- $75K+
So what are some examples of advertisers using Household Income Targeting for campaigns?
- Food Coupon company wanting to reach low income households
- Gourmet Food company (ie truffles, caviar etc) wanting to reach high household incomes
- Cereal company wanting to reach low to medium income households
- Kitchen Appliances company wanting to reach an affluent consumer
- Winery wanting to reach high worth individuals for their premium wine club
- Automotive Company wanting to reach different income levels with different vehicles
This new targeting option provides advertisers the ability to greater reach their target audience and they are available now. So if you’d like to use our new demographic targeting options on your next campaign, Download our Media Kit or Request a Proposal from our team.
Demographic Targeting
March 9, 2010 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
Nearly every campaign which runs on the Gourmet Ads network has some sort of targeting applied to it. Some of the targeting used includes Geo targeting, time day part, frequency capping etc. In addition to the full suite of targeting options, we can now announce the newest targeting options on Gourmet Ads is the ability to target by US Demographic Targeting.
The new US demographic targeting feature enables advertisers to target line items to US ZIP codes based on underlying demographic characteristics derived from projected census data for the current year. For each demographic metric, the US population is divided into five groups each representing a segment of the US population.
With this new targeting feature you can target by the following metrics:
- Median household income
- Median age
- Children in household
- Owner-occupied household
- Employment level
This new targeting option provides advertisers the ability to greater reach their target audience and they are available now. Over the next few days we’ll be writing about each of the demographic targeting options and offering some ideas on how you can use them – Read the demographic targeting blogs here
So if you’d like to use our new demographic targeting options on your next campaign, Download our Media Kit or Request a Proposal from our team.
Easter Advertising
March 3, 2010 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
This year Easter is the first week of April (dates below) and even if you don’t sell chocolate Easter eggs there are significant opportunities over the holiday period for all types of industries. Once regarded simply for the kids, Easter has become one of the most profitable holiday seasons of the year.
With spring in the air and many consumers possessing tax return money makes it an ideal time for you to kick-start your marketing campaign. As such we thought we’d put together a few Easter advertising ideas separated by various sectors.
Retailers
Given that Easter is of course a holiday period, many retailers run Easter Sales and to drive interest in the lead up is important. So running at least 10 days prior to the sale starting is essential, then upping the visibility over the Easter weekend to drive consumers in store. Ideally you’ll be running discounts off big ticket items and winter apparel.
Grocery & Supermarkets
With many people spending time with the family over Easter it’s important to gain market share in the lead up to the Easter Weekend. Ideally your Easter Advertising will feature creative with messaging to drive consumers in store like discounts off key staples items or loss leader activity encourage them to do their Easter “big shop” while in store.
Travel Companies
With most people spending time with their families over the Easter weekend, there are two opportunities here for travel companies. Firstly, with many people head home there is a significant benefit for companies such as airlines to go heavy up 3-4 weeks prior to Easter, then slow it down closer to the weekend. The 2nd opportunity is for people not heading home, but rather going away for the weekend. So vacation specials should be advertised 10-14 days from Easter weekend. See Grocery Buyers make Travel Decisions.
Ecommerce Sites
Many of the major ecommerce retailers run Easter weekend specials, from free shipping to coupon discounts so why let them have all the business? In the lead up to Easter why not run a campaign targeted at consumers with creative indicating your Easter specials. So no matter if you sell food, clothing or kitchen gadgets, Easter is a great time to boost sales.
Movie Releases
Many over the Easter weekend will be looking for things to do to fill out the weekend. So for the movie studios, running movie trailer campaigns for new release in the days prior and over the Easter weekend will help boost a movies weekend revenues.
Automotive Companies & Dealerships
Consumers in the market for a new auto will dedicate the weekend heading to dealerships and doing test drives. So running a campaign in the 5-7 days prior to Easter, then heavy up over the Easter weekend will no doubt result in leads being generated. Learn about our audience of automotive buying Grocery Buyers.
So as we head in Q2 and with only a few weeks to go till Easter now is the time to book your Easter Advertising Campaign. For more information, Download our Media Kit or Request a Proposal from our team.
2010 Easter Dates
Good Friday is 2nd April 2010
Holy Saturday 3rd April 2010
Easter Sunday 4th April 2010
Easter Monday 5th April 2010
Advertising Free Shipping
February 26, 2010 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
The other day I was reading an old article in the New York Times about how offering Free Shipping on your ecommerce site can significantly increase sales. The article discusses and shares insight into the strategies of the some of the most popular online stores and how they price their shipping and how it can greatly impact sales. Read the article here – Nothing Says ‘Buy’ Like ‘Free Shipping’ .
The Free Shipping Article had me thinking about how a company which was going to offer free shipping for a period of time and how they would promote the offer. Naturally I think most only stores undertaking a free shipping promotion would do two things. First they would put some sort of promotional messaging on their sites advising prospective customers that they might qualify for free shipping on their first order. Secondly, an ecommerce store offering free shipping would reach out to their existing customer with an EDM of sorts advising that for their next order the shipping is free. Another idea is advertising free shipping, but I’ll get back to that in a moment.
What I think most online stores forget is that free shipping could be a great lead generation strategy to build sales. A few years ago I was involved in an online store start up as a consultant. Well before the successful bricks and mortar company started building their new start up website, they undertook a market research study to identify customer ideals, which they assumed were very different from their existing bring and mortar customers.
The number one thing that came from the market research was that customers online were more likely to make a purchase on their new site if the shipping was free, opposed to paying a premium for the delivery. So the company went into the new ecommerce site with the marketing tactic that customers would never pay for shipping. They simply built the shipping into the price point. The result; sales exploded for them and they’ve never looked back. The site has turned out to be a multimillion dollar online business and I believe that it’s because of their foundation that customers will never pay for shipping.
Ok, so you’ve decided to run a free shipping promotion. So apart from reaching out to customers on your site or your existing customer base, you should consider running an advertising campaign to market your free shipping campaign. By advertising free shipping you’re removing one of the hurdles that many online stores face and reaching out to gaining new customers. It could be the best lead generation campaign you’ve ever run.
Apart from simply running your free shipping advertising across our entire network of grocery buyers, we can help develop your advertising creative. It’s important for the creative to indicate that you’re offering free shipping. Don’t put the key message in a small font, make it stand out in bold and gain attention.
For more information about running your free shipping advertising with Gourmet Ads, Download our Media Kit or Request a Proposal from our team.
Explaining Comscore
February 24, 2010 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
Gourmet Ads is currently in the process of being included in Comscore and as a publisher in our network you’ve probably received a request from our publishing team to sign a Traffic Assignment Letter (TAL) which is located here. We thought it was important to write a short blog explaining this further and why it’s essential for increasing revenue on your site.
What is Comscore?
Comscore is a NASDAQ listed company which provides web business digital market intelligence on sites and audiences. Comscore is the preferred measurement service for many online companies and provides networks like Gourmet Ads independently audited statistics of our entire audience.
Digital Advertising Agencies
Comscore provides media buyers and media planners software to better understand audiences, quickly and easily. Nearly every advertising agency around the globe uses some sort media planning software from Comscore. So being listed with us provides visibility through to agency staff for your site or blog. Because most sites have low traffic they don’t automatically appear in Comscore, so this is a great opportunity to be listed.
Audience numbers
Having third party audited audience numbers from Comscore is a bit like having Google Analytics across every site in our network. This allows media buyers to understand the reach of the Gourmet Ads Network. This is extremely important for brand advertisers who are interested in reaching as many people as possible for their campaigns.
Understanding the audience data
One of the greatest advantages of using Comscore is that media buyers can dig deeper into audience data ie how many kids in a household, how often they go to the supermarket etc. This once again allows the media buyer to analyze our network in consideration to running a campaign for an advertiser.
So what do you have to do?
All you need to do is fill out the Comscore letter at the link below, sign the form and then you’re done.
http://www.gourmetads.com/publishers/comscore
Yearlong Campaign
January 27, 2010 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
I want to share a strategy which we developed for a client who advertised every other month on Gourmet Ads last year. This client wanted Gourmet Ads to develop ideas for a yearlong campaign in 2010 which would be booked in addition to the other booked branding campaigns throughout the year. Most important to her was that whatever we did it had to be targeted to reach possible consumers of her product.
What we developed was rather simple and just a few weeks into the campaign is already proving fruitful and driving sales and subscriptions. Although this client is in the food industry, the same strategy we developed could easily be applied to any industry.
So what was the all year campaign that we developed? Well it’s basically a retargeting campaign, which uses a variety of creative to drive people back to her site depending on pre determined trigger points. In fact we plan to change the creative every couple of weeks.
The client added JavaScript to their site late last year, which meant they starting dropping cookies in the lead up to Christmas when their site had increased traffic. Now any people that visited our client’s site and didn’t make a purchase or signup to their newsletter is targeted for the year long campaign. Effectively we’re bringing back people that have already visited their website, who in theory are more likely to convert than first time visitors.
To even refine the targeting further we’re also time day parting the campaign as purchasers are more likely to purchase on weekdays from 10am through to 10pm at night. So the ads will only be displayed during these times. Once again we’re drilling down the targeting for ROI purposes.
This is an ideal strategy for any sort of company whose goal is customer acquisition or online sales. We would of course suggest that you also run far reaching branding campaigns to drive additional traffic. These could be short run campaigns or around key dates in the year.
For more information, download our media kit or request a proposal from our team.
Q1 Media Planning
December 22, 2009 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
Q1 is literally only days away and you’ve probably already started your digital media planning for Q1 already. But for those that haven’t started media planning what should be your strategy for the first quarter of 2010?
Maybe take a moment and read our 2010 Advertising Trends.
For grocery / supermarket and CPG companies the largest event to allocate advertising budgets towards in Q1 is the Super Bowl the first week of February. Campaigns we’ve already got booked start around the 10th of January and conclude on the 10th of February focusing on driving consumer intent in the lead up to the Super Bowl – see blog on Super Bowl Advertising. Most advertisers are including a combination of regular display units (728 x90, 300 x250 and 160 x 600 ) and high visibility ad units such as interstitials and floating ads to make an impact. Don’t forget the earlier you start media planning the better CPM rates that can be negotiated.
Surprisingly we’ve already seen a number of companies who’ve held off advertising during 2009, now planning campaigns in early Q1 2010. Some have seen their market share reduce during 2009 and their strategy is gain back market share with roadblock advertising and high impact advertising units. So the strategy is to get their message in front of grocery buyers and household decision makers to drive sales growth.
So no matter what your media planning strategy you’re undertaking for 2010, the team at Gourmet Ads can develop a bespoke media plan for your consideration. Start by downloading our Media Kit or Request a Proposal from us.
Targeted Advertising
November 21, 2009 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
There is no doubt that Targeted Advertising when done correctly is the most effective way reach your target audience. Here at the Gourmet Ads network, we provide companies the ability reach the Grocery Buyer online when they are making meal decisions for their family. Just by advertising on our vertical network the advertiser is already targeted their audience. However, most advertisers choose to apply additional targeting to their campaigns.
So to illustrate some of the industry standard targeting options available on the Gourmet Ads network we thought we’d put together a quick presentation.
Super Bowl Advertising
October 27, 2009 by Benjamin Christie · 1 Comment
When you think of Super Bowl Advertising, you’ll probably immediately think of the advertising during the game, you know the ones that cost millions of dollars per 30 seconds. But the kind of super bowl advertising we’re talking about is the advertising to driver consumers to buy your food and beverage products prior the end of season game.
Each January the Super Bowl draws an enormous audience of viewers from right around the country, most at super bowl parties. So in order trigger Super Bowl party planning ideas with consumers undertaking a targeted Super Bowl Advertising campaign can provide great results. Because the Gourmet Ads network features an audience of grocery buyers and household decision makers it’s essential to ensure that we are part of your Super Bowl Advertising media mix.
So what companies can benefit from Super Bowl Advertising online? Well any companies that are associated with their products being served at Super Bowl Parties. With mostly a range finger food styled dishes being served at Super Bowl parties any ingredient or pre-made products which make dips, guacamole, chili, bbq ribs, nachos, spicy hot wings, sliders, hamburgers, hot dogs and quesadillas. Don’t forget chips, crisps, pop corn, crackers, cheese as well as beverages such as sodas, wines and beer which traditionally buy the million dollar TV advertising.
With the super bowl being played on the first Sunday in February, ideally your Super Bowl Advertising should commence in the last week of January which means you’ll have a two week campaign flight to drive consumer intent and engagement. Campaign ideas include using regular display advertising, expandable creative, interstitials, video and rich media. Campaign ideas which perform well include competitions and the ability to download Super Bowl coupons for product purchases.
It’s never too early to book your Super Bowl Advertising as this period tends to book up quickly as you can imagine. To book your two week Super Bowl Advertising campaign with Gourmet Ads, download our media kit or contact us with your campaign requirements.
Wine Sales on a Monday
October 19, 2009 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
We’re often asked by advertisers and advertising agencies to offer practical ideas on how they can use time and day targeting to maximise the effectiveness of an advertising campaign. Well today we discovered a great example using real data.
Corkscrew is a website that allows you to track wines and check the pricing of them on the web, mobile web, iPhone, email and SMS. In a recent blog from team at Corkscrew called Sober on Mondays, the team looked at the data of when their users were using the site and as indicated below and commented “Only 5% of wine consumption happens on a Monday, while the weekends account for 56%. As suspected, Saturday is the big drinking day, with 22% of drinks.”
So taking this example, how can you tailor your advertising campaign to only reach wine consumers when it matters. By planning media towards the end of the week and after lunch will definitely contribute to a more effective media buy.
