So much has changed in the past year, it’s becoming cliché to mention just how much the world has adapted to its current situation. For most people, the changes have become commonplace and there is no looking back. The massive number of societal changes that took place in a short amount of time leaves me awestruck.
So much has changed in the past year, it’s becoming cliché to mention just how much the world has adapted to its current situation. For most people, the changes have become commonplace and there is no looking back. The massive number of societal changes that took place in a short amount of time leaves me awestruck. Today we work over zoom, much of our socialization is online, our media is streamed directly to our living rooms, and everything you could want to eat comes to your front door.
Consumers now have little need to leave the house. But as advertisers, it’s very important to understand the changes in consumer habits and the evolving lifestyle of consumers. For example, now that fewer people commute to work, billboards, subway, and bus stop advertisements have less viewership and less value. This coupled with the continual decline of radio and television listeners/viewers created the perfect storm that allowed digital advertising to overtake traditional advertising in total ad-dollars for the first time in history. eMarketer predicted accurately that between 2019 and 2020 digital advertising spend would rise to 58% of all advertising spend. They went on to predict that by 2023 digital advertising will account for 66% of all advertising dollars.
The increase in digital advertising was accompanied by an overall decrease in traditional advertising spending. According to Zenith data, this is the first decline since the great recession in 2008. Although, TV and Radio did begin to grow over the next 12 years and is beginning to grow once again.
That said, it is unlikely that traditional advertising will reclaim the ground lost during the height of the pandemic. This is because people are not engaging with radio or television commercials as they once were. While the rise of services like TiVo and DVRs was a big blow to television audience retention the final nail in the coffin was the growth of ad-free streaming services, such as Netflix, Disney +, and so on. This is the continuation of a trend that began in 2012, where less-and-less people were spending time watching traditional television. Outside of the 65+ age group, we saw a drastic decline in viewership. The pandemic only added fuel to this fire with new services like; HBO Max and Peacock allowing people to watch movies that are currently in theaters from the comfort of their home theater or living room.
This is something that traditional advertisers have been keenly aware of and working to counteract. Some of which are now attempting to offer digital advertising in conjunction with their traditional ads. While it may seem like an appealing offer to consolidate all your marketing efforts under one banner, this often leads to lackluster and outdated digital campaigns that are noticeably different from campaigns that are built by seasoned and certified digital marketers. I liken this mix-medium advertising approach to hiring a plumber to fix your roof.
However, this is a notable change for traditional advertisers, as they have spent the better part of a decade suppressing and attempting to devalue digital advertising campaigns. To see them embrace the technology is welcome, but their standardized approach to digital marketing does not work well in this space. This is because Google and Bing are ever-evolving platforms and are not able to be standardized. A fact that is especially evident when you consider that search engines update their algorithms 500-600 times each year. Meaning unless you are keeping up with digital trends, advertising certifications, and continually testing new concepts you will be left in the dust by your competition.
Since 2000 we’ve seen a meteoric rise in digital advertising not because it was new or trendy, rather it’s because they are much more effective and less expensive. With the added benefit of being hyper accountable to the client. Because digital advertising can track the precise number of phone calls, sales, or forms submitted you know exactly how many leads or sales your digital campaigns derived. Whereas with traditional media, you must rely on projections and approximations which tend to overvalue the number of leads or sales you received. In other words, there is no guesswork in digital, you know very quickly whether your advertising dollar was invested well or if the campaign needs fine tuning.
Even before the pandemic, it was inevitable that digital advertising would overtake traditional advertising. The increased screen time and decrease in outside activities simply sped up this process. While there will always be a place for traditional advertising, their time at the top of the pack has come to a close.
One of the best parts of this change is everyone can now become an advertiser without the need to spend large sums of money to produce television or radio content. Video production alone can be thousands of dollars and it is never guaranteed that you will see results from a traditional campaign. With as little as $500 a month anyone can set up and maintain a simple; yet effective, Google or Bing ads campaign. This opens advertising space to many small to medium businesses who previously could not afford traditional advertising (outside of signage). This change is a disruptive and decentralizing system that allows every company to advertise, regardless of budget or business size. If you are interested in learning how to set up a simple Google Ads campaign for your business, I encourage you to join me for my upcoming webinar. Below you will find details for the event and how you can reach me:
A Crash Course in Google Ads & Search Engine Marketing (SEM):
When: October 29th 11:00 am – 12:14 pm (15 minutes of Q&A)
Where: Free Online event, Register Here - https://www.eventbrite.com/e/a-complementary-crash-course-to-create-your-first-google-ads-campaign-tickets-168787894135
Email: Josh@unleaded.digital
Phone Number: 720-515-2351
Thank you for taking the time to review this comparison and I hope to see you at the event!