by Charlotte Otremba | Jan, 2019 | Native Advertising
It’s been eight months since European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) went into effect, strictly controlling what data a company can collect and what they can do with it. GDPR is now holding businesses to a higher data standard – from usage to storage – and ultimately returning personal-data-deciding-power to the consumer. Now more than ever is the time for businesses to take charge of their data and this can be done so with the best advice and solutions for all your IT related needs from an IT support company. Still, many companies are worried on how data protection will affect their ability to create and deliver content.
Understanding consumers’ wants, interests, and environment may be keys to helping deliver relevant content, but it does not have to be hindered by data protection law compliance. Advances in technology – like Contextual Targeting, contextual Forecasting, Dynamic Creative Optimization (DCO), and AI – make, arguably, stronger high-quality placements, but the increasing data standards serve as a reminder that nothing makes up for high quality content.
Contextual Targeting
If you haven’t caught on to optimizing by contextual placement, you’re behind. Not only are data protection standards changing, so are clients’ unique goals. If you have an ecommerce store on Shopify, you might want to look at an SEO checklist for new Shopify stores to gather information about how you can improve on your target placement and context of the content on the site. From the same checklist, you may be able to garner other relevant information regarding your Shopify store, such as maintaining the website which can actually help improve on-site SEO metrics. Bring in an expert technical team such as one from WebCitz, that can help you out with regular updates to the website as well as maintenance. The more up-to-date and easy-to-use your website becomes, the more potential customers will enjoy shopping on your store. That’s where your ad targeting investments can start to show results. The term contextual targeting – that is, targeting based on the information available of the site of the ad space, rather than user data – covers both. It’s possible to determine a unique ad space’s location, the time of day, day of the week, the size and location of the ad on the page, the site it’s on, the page of the site it’s on, and even specifics about what content is on that page. The look and feel of every single ad placement is unique, and can be correlated even more closely with user behavior.
Bidtellect’s Forecasting 2.0 – the most advanced in the biz – enables us to go a step further: forecast contextual preferences – revolutionary and necessary in a post-GDPR landscape. Forecasting for Context is the “new” match rate for data.
Read more about Contextual Targeting and why Forecasting is the future.
Take Advantage of AI
Advanced AI-based technologies not only make deep, contextual placement-level targeting possible, but allows real-time optimization, including to best-performing creative per individual placement. That’s right: AI-based technology means the most advanced real-time adjustment and learning => personalized customization in real time! At this point, you may be worried that loads of confidential customer info would need to be accessed to make use of such targeted, personalized advertising. Worry not! Advanced software such as Private AI can help detect and redact any Personally Identifiable Information (PII) from the data, and keep only what’s necessary to create customized ads based on consumer interests. AI creates a more seamless consumer experience and maximizes every dollar (hello maximizing budget! hello ROI!) by making decisions based on data from the decision before. And AI can help optimize media in new ways – like to best-performing creative or Dynamic Creative Optimization (DCO).
Read more about the Promise of AI.
Creative that Counts
Story-led copy. High-performing images. A data-backed approach that bridges the gap between arts and science is the winning formula. If the creative doesn’t woo a user, it doesn’t matter how good the content or landing page or the technology that placed it is – they won’t visit it. Take advantage of experts that know the difference: a data-backed, trained approach to creating high-performing headlines, descriptions, and images (like Bidtellect’s [b]+studio) makes all the difference.
Check out our Tips for Top-Performing Creative.
Quality Content
We’ve said it once, we’ll say it again. Relevant, high-quality content is what inspires users and ultimately creates customer loyalty. The stats prove it: content makes consumers 131% more likely to buy (Nudge, “The State of Content,” ), while content can help double website conversion rates from 6% to 12% (Hubspot via Shopify, “State of Inbound 2018,”). According to the same study, marketers who prioritize blogging are 13x more likely to generate a positive ROI.
Check out this infographic for more stats.
Remember, “less data” isn’t a scary thing. A combination of high-quality creative assets, cutting-edge technology, and content that delivers will put you ahead of the game even while the rules are changing.
Read about more Predictions for Native in 2019.
Want more from the Bidtellectual? We have a monthly newsletter!
by Arthur Hainline | Jul, 2018 | Native Advertising, Product and Technology
It didn’t take long for the use of Artificial Intelligence in marketing and paid media campaigns to catch on as the new shiny buzzword in the ad tech and mar tech industries. Like many of the trends that consume these industries, most were excited about the potential implications – enhanced personalization at scale, real-time adjustments, smarter media buys etc. – followed by an inevitable shadow of doubt once people began to realize that it was a bit more complicated than they first anticipated.
Skepticism around Artificial Intelligence
Before we dig into why artificial intelligence in marketing actually does deliver on its promise, we first need to take a step back. Artificial Intelligence is not the first thing to complicate digital advertising. Programmatic advertising – the automated buying and selling of digital media – introduced incredible complexities. Even though it is predicted that 82.5% of all US digital display ads will be bought via automated channels in 2018, 10 years after it emerged, many people in the industry are still trying to get a solid grasp on it. Nevermind regular consumers.
So it makes sense that when another extremely complex technology, Artificial Intelligence, emerged as the next game-changer in digital advertising, many were excited at its promise, but confused at how it will actually work and then eventually skeptical if it works at all. For the skeptics, I am not going to explain how it is already being leveraged every day (more on that here), but why it really will deliver on its promise of optimization.
Programmatic decisions are made in real-time and are based on the trillions of data points in the digital ecosystem. It is similar to how software developers make use of application intelligence to see all the connection points between the app and database. For marketers, it is really important to extract the maximum amount of value and understanding. However, when it comes to data, it is yet another code that marketers have had a tough time cracking. It is one of a brand’s greatest assets, but also presents the most challenges, ranging from aggregation, organization, and utilization:
- Siloed data across all marketing channels (email, CRM, paid media etc.)
- Analyzing this data and applying insights to make customers feel like each experience is unique and personalized to them
- Using 1st and 3rd party data to scale content while maintaining relevant, personalized experiences for consumers
High consumer expectations for tailored experiences
Content on demand has instilled a need for instant gratification in consumers. Brands want customers to feel like they understand them and what content they require in any given moment. The best way to create this feeling is to tell personalized stories and create tailored experiences for individuals, and then use the best digital marketing strategies to increase the reach of these stories and Grow Your Business as a result.
Before the concept of “real-time” became part of every marketer’s plan, personalization was achieved through batch processing. Data scientists would analyze weeks or months worth of consumer behavior data, derive relevant insights and then activate paid media and marketing campaigns some time later. However, as discussed earlier, consumers have high standards for the content they consume and for the experiences that brands provide them, so data that is weeks or months old, more often than not won’t lead to an optimized experience.
So while there is an element of “learning” that occurred here, it was nowhere near as efficient, effective or impactful as identifying even deeper insights and then using them for real-time media buying decisions.
Personalization made possible by advanced technologies
As human beings, our brains are perhaps the most obvious example of Artificial Intelligence in action. As we go through life, meet more people and experience new things, we are constantly learning and becoming smarter, retaining knowledge that will help us make more insightful decisions in the future.
Now think about this same process, but apply it to the computer that is processing billions of data points per second and automating media campaigns. Consumer actions are expressions of their wants and needs. Might seem insignificant, but every single action taken by a consumer is remembered and made actionable for future decisions.
AI promises to deliver this personalization, but in real-time and with much more relevant data. This is probably why AI has so much value in business and also health analytics. The latter has gained much from machine learning (part of AI), with respect to finding misdiagnoses and clinical decision-making. It is always learning and improving over time, becoming an all-knowing entity. Anyway, AI is driving exponential value out of data, ad tech, and mar technology, extracting insights in real-time and delivering personalized messages.
More than just tailored consumer experiences
Personalized marketing messages at scale is the glaring opportunity that harnessing Artificial Intelligence offers brands: through real time adjustment and learning, personalized customization can happen in real time. But there are a lot of other benefits. The first is greater ROI: marketers can truly make the most out of every dollar by making decisions based on data from the decision before, thus maximizing marketing budget and performance. The second is innovation. Marketers can optimize media in new ways by taking unstructured, unused data and making them relevant to paid media campaigns. The third is ad tech: AI can optimize data within and across paid media channels in real-time, driving a seamless consumer experience.
AI joins programmatic, mar tech, and ad tech efforts into a unified approach that maximizes data and assets to offer a smoother consumer experience and greater ROI. While skepticism still exists, advertisers, marketers, and brands should learn quickly the power of Artificial Intelligence and harness its capabilities, or risk lagging behind.
Bidtellect now offers the most advance Forecasting technology on the market – by harnessing the power AI. Read more: Forecasting 2.0: The Future of Contextual Targeting
Want more from the Bidtellectual? We have a monthly newsletter!
Recent Comments