With the growth of South Africa's internet population it is no surprise that online advertising spend has also seen a tremendous increase and will continue to grow in 2009/10. However, according to online marketing company apurimac media, only having a website is no longer enough. Companies need to invest in strategically placed and designed online ads in answer to the ever-changing demands of the consumer - this will not only increase their reach but also result in better measurement and return on online marketing investment.
Internet growth
According to World Wide Worx's recently released Internet Access in South Africa 2008 report, the number of internet users in SA grew by 12.5% to 4.6-million in 2008. They predict that this internet population growth rate is expected to continue in the next five years bringing the total internet population to the 9-million mark.
Marketers have shown a growing confidence in the online medium. The internet has grown from 9.7 billion web pages in March 2006 to over 12 billion web pages in March 2008. Likewise, online advertising spend has shown a 32% growth in 20081. However, even though advertising spend in 2008 was up to R319-million, many companies are still only spending 1% of their advertising budget online. “There is definitely more South African companies spending online, however most of this spend is directed towards the development of a website and a launch media schedule and not towards considerable sustained monthly online advertising activity,” says Will Green, Managing Director of apurimac media. He continues, “with the immense amount of websites on the net, companies have to spend at least double the amount spent on developing their website to direct traffic to their particular site.” Even then the company's online reach will be limited.
“Companies should invest their marketing budget in smarter ways in order to increase their online reach,” says Green. He continues, “it makes more marketing sense to analyse the investment spent on a website and in turn invest this spend in online advertising. This in turn gives you not only a higher reach, but also a more targeted and results driven approach.” Only a few online brands such as Yahoo.com are currently offering South African companies the ability to focus their online advertising directly to their target audience, based on the sites users' demographic profiles. The results of such advertising campaigns are decreased media wastage and increased return on advertising investment.
Static online advertising vs rich advertising - what will get your target audience interacting and clicking
The web has become a more interactive and communicative medium over the years and likewise, online advertising has done the same. “Answering to the changes on the web and the demands of the consumer, online advertising has evolved in rich media, which is ‘online advertising on steroids'. This kind of advertising puts the ball into the consumer's court and allows for two-way communication as it provides an interactive platform,” says Green. Rich media not only entices potential consumers, it also builds relationships as opposed to the age old static advert that is merely conveyers of information. The most attractive feature of rich media is its ability to facilitate direct interaction, creating a virtual showroom for clients where they can: choose how often and what parts of the advertisement to view; change and turn the soundtrack up or down; view the inside and outside of products; change the background; spin products around and change its colour; link to the website; request a brochure and apply for a trial or purchase; or viral the ad by emailing it to a friend. By including multiple calls to action, control of the viewing experience is essentially handed over to the user - whose choices, and moments of indecision, are measured and recorded in real-time. “We've noticed that rich ads have a much higher interaction rate than standard online advertising,” says Green.
Not only are these ads more popular with consumers, they are extremely beneficial to the marketer. Rich media gives the marketer more tools to work with and a better understanding of consumer behaviours through innovative measurement of the adverts' impact and how the consumer interacts with it.
Simply knowing that an advertisement has been seen is no longer enough. “Rich advertising and video metrics have taken us beyond tracking product visibility and allow us to measure brand interaction,” says Green. Online advertisers can now measure what happens before any clicking takes place: scrolling over an advertisement, filling in a form or even how long a consumer dwells over an advertisement. This information is vital to justify return of advertising spend. The value of these new metrics is multiplied by its speedy delivery. Access to this level of data was typically available monthly, if you were lucky weekly or at the conclusion of a campaign. New metric data is now available on demand, refreshed in seconds. For the advertiser this means that from the moment your advertisement goes live you can track its performance in real-time across multiple sites, automatically adjusting to achieve your marketing objectives.
How will this impact on my marketing budget? The cost of a complex website or a good print or television ad campaign is exponentially more than that of an effective online advertising campaign. However, with a good online advertising campaign using rich media you are able to not only directly reach your target market but also measure the impact of your advert a lot more effectively. Green is however, not advocating excluding all other media and solely following the online route. “Online should be allocated more budget from the annual marketing budget but should be combined with other selected media channels that work synergistically,” he says.
"Nevertheless, ignorance of online media's abilities and possibilities can seriously harm a company's reputation or performance - there are more than a few blue chip brands that can attest to this. We need not look further than the unlikely but extremely positive effect a 60 second online video advert featuring a drum-playing gorilla, had on Cadbury's share price in the United Kingdom, to see the impact thereof,” concludes Green.
1 Media in South Africa 2009 study conducted by World Wide Worx in collaboration with the Online Publishers Association.
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