Media Buys: It’s more than just Search Engine Marketing…it’s Online Marketing!

MoreVisibility - March 19, 2007

Each day Online Marketing is looking more and more like Global Marketing. You can place text ads on third party news source sites (Contextual Marketing) ala newspapers or magazines. Banner and Image ads can be placed on many websites as can also be done in any city with billboards. Google has recently launched its click to view video ads, which are basically 30 second TV commercials. Google has also launched its Beta test of radio ads which can be heard on Google partnered radio stations.

The great thing is that there are so many ad networks to choose from. For search engine marketing of course you have Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask.com to name a few. It is also rumored that WikiPedia is currently working on a search engine that may finally give Google the competition the online marketing world has been waiting for. You can run your Site Targeted or Contextual ad campaign on Google, Yahoo, AOL or AdBrite. MSN also has launched its Beta version of Contextual ad placements earlier this year. Banner ad campaigns can be created in Google, AOL, 24/7 and AdKnowledge. And if you want to get really creative, you can create brand recognition for your website through video advertising, which Google and Tremor Media seem to be the frontrunners in. Quigo looks to be focusing more on creating a video ad channel and bypassing image or banner ads. Finally, Google has recently launched a beta test for radio ads, which they are hoping will work better then the very expensive pay for call ads.

Sounds like a lot huh? Well, the great thing is there are so many different channels you can use now when creating an online marketing campaign for your website. Though it may be costly, creating brand awareness through each network can payoff. If you do move ahead with running campaigns on different networks, I suggest using an analytics tool to watch the different channels closely. Some networks can spend very fast and may not exactly work for your site, so you will need to optimize your campaign quickly if your ads aren’t returning any sales or conversions on each of the networks. The ad networks have created so much more then just using keywords for search engine marketing; they have created an online marketing arsenal that approach the searcher from every angle on the internet.