As Online Advertising Gets Smarter, Content Strategy Will Be Rewarded
On the contrary to what you may have been thinking, online advertising is actually becoming more welcomed by consumers. A poll from March of this year by Opinion Research Corp. has shown that customer responses and sentiment to different sources of online advertising had positively increased from the same study done a year ago.
In the poll, 51 % of respondents were either likely or very likely to respond to e-mail offers; a 4% increase versus 2009. The survey also showed some increased interest in customers clicking search engine links with an increase in 1% interest versus 2009.
Findings like this are why marketing is pervading the online marketplace more and more. This sounds troublesome at first, but with marketing technology becoming smarter and more targeted, this could actually be a good thing. If I’m searching online in Google and it is doing a better job at getting me in front of the websites and information I am looking for, then it seems difficult to complain. It could also seem a little bit eery that no matter where I surf on the web, certain kinds of ads keep following me. It could feel like cyber-stalking.
Therein lies the dilemna that faces Google, which has more users than any other internet company, and enormous troves of data, as they move towards the world of highly targeted advertising: every advance in the innate intelligence of the marketing solutions they offer has a direct impact on our privacy. How much are we willing to relinquish?
Google has become notably more voracious in its appetite for user data. Until fairly recently, Google wanted to keep its hands off our private messages, etc. Now that Facebook has begun living off of private user data and leveraged it as a major part of its business model, Google has felt compelled to follow suit. Google has gone from being the good guy, the most protective of user privacy, and the most self-policing, to the one being dragged into the ring by smaller more aggressive players and social media rivals like Facebook. An August 10th article in the Wall Street Journal entitled "Google Agonizes on Privacy as Ad World Vaults Ahead" provided an insightful look at what the future might look like through Google's eyes if it were to pool all of its data, and permit cross-sharing across its many currently firewalled service offerings.
Regardless, there are benefits in local search advertising that most people can agree are positive. If Google knows where you are because you are using a mobile device, it will be able to give you local search results for restaurants, pool cleaners, carpet cleaners – whatever you are looking for around town. The smarter Google gets, the more online advertising small businesses will do, and the more businesses and customers will be connected in a mutually beneficial way. According to an August Gartner Report, Mobile device sales surged 13.8%. You can definitely expect to see some massive growth in mobile online advertising, so make sure you have your website optimized for mobile use.
Here at WNW, we love to see the shift from outbound marketing to inbound marketing. The way consumers are more accepting of marketing messages these days points towards the fact that marketing is becoming more inbound. The content you generate on your website is what helps services like Google find you, as well as offering value to your customers. So keep the content coming, and don't be surprised to find people, and some intelligent ads, starting to follow you.