Intro to Online Microtargeting

As more organizations, businesses and campaigns look to the internet for there advertising needs, I thought it would be helpful to give a really brief intro to this field and offer some interesting resources as well.

First, in any online advertising campaign, you need to determine whether you want people to click on your ads (conversion) or whether you just want them to see your ad (persuasion). Most advertising networks, including Facebook and Google offer you both options, and you should choose whichever option you are not trying to do. If you expect a high click-through rate it would best to purchase pay-per-impression ads. However, if you don't expect many people to click on your ad then it would be best to purchase pay-per-click programs.

Next, there are many different networks that you can advertise in. For example, Facebook is a great way to reach college students whereas Google has better geographic pinpointing. These are the biggest two, but more should be considered based on who exactly you are trying to reach. Google let's you define keywords that you can be relevant to and Facebook lets you select profile information of the people you'd like to advertise to.

Ensuring that you have something unique to show or give people can't be overlooked of course. If you are running a political campaign, you can even do some negative campaigning on websites where people are likely to be an opponent or undecided because you are not required to publish a 'paid-for' disclaimer in small text ads. Additionally, people often have 'source amnesia,' where they forget where they originally heard something. Although people may say they don't like negative ads, they often use the talking points learned there months later without remembering where they heard it from. If there are issues you need to clear the air with but are worried they might be perceived as negative, use contextual online ads. If people are clicking-through to your site make sure that one click is the last stop. If you're looking for donations, have the landing page be the only page someone needs to visit to complete the transaction. Every additional click people have to make will discourage many from continuing.

Check out the Personal Democracy Forum's website for a plethora of resources, like archived podcasts on exactly this issue.

Also:

http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/23902.asp

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microtargeting