What is hyper-targeted advertising?

Hyper-targeted advertising is a marketing strategy that aims advertising messages to a very specific group of people. This means that those who do not qualify in the same category will not be able to see the ads. What hyper-targeted ads show to people is based on what online AI (like data gathered by Facebook) knows about them, which means that marketers can narrow their target audience to those with the highest propensity to buy and thus save the company advertising dollars.

The reason why hyper-targeted advertising is gaining a lot of ground in the advertising world is the realization that casting a big net in the wide ocean of people is not resulting in the right catch anymore. Those who still believe in this system are failing to realize that they are wasting advertising dollars on things that don’t drive results. Marketers who do turn to hyper-targeted advertising are realizing that people only pay attention to specific things, thus getting a better ROI for their efforts.

How hyper-targeted advertising works

Hyper-targeted advertising works by targetting the market according to demographics, interests, behavior and more! These targets can also be narrowed down by removing from the list irrelevant categories of interest or demographic segments. But to get positive results, companies have to learn how to target the right audiences or risk getting a negative return on their investment.

The key to launching a successful hyper-targeted campaign is to minimize the target reach as much as possible to define the right target audience. Companies have to know exactly who and what needs their products/services will respond to. These can be formed using data obtained in registrations and profiles, behavioral history, and offline and online data. From these data, marketers must be able to filter out who to and not to target to give their campaign a higher chance to succeed.

Social media sites like Facebook help marketers by giving out targeting options that help advertisers narrow down their audiences. Google also has targeting options with their AdSearch function which directs people who are searching things actively to the company’s product/service. By further segmentizing the market, marketers are able to reach exactly who they want to reach, giving them a higher chance of translating ads into sales. For example, instead of aiming their campaigns on ‘moms’, a marketer can now further narrow this segment into more specific demographics:  moms who are single parents, work-at-home moms, working moms, CEO moms, etc.

Why you need hyper-targeting

Hyper-targeting is becoming more and more relevant to marketers especially with the benefits that come with it.

• Increased ROI – Advertisers who have a good message to the right target audience can see a fraction of the cost for a large amount of return. Take for instance, in a local election, savvy advertisers targetted 1.2 million people with 25% of them clicking through showing great interest. The high user engagement helped the candidate win a seat after the elections. This strategy only cost them less than $3,000 when traditional advertising could have seen them spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to a less interested audience.
• Increased conversion rates – The most important thing about advertising is getting people to buy, and this is where hyper-targeting shines. A study by Impactbnd found that 52% of consumers’ buying decision in both their online and offline purchases was influenced by Facebook. This means that companies can get half of their customers to buy into what they’re selling, which is a far greater rate than traditional advertising methods. With content that resonates with the target audience, conversion rates can even be higher, especially when they address a consumer’s need.
• Decreased customer acquisition costs – Getting new customers is a harder job than keeping new ones because advertisers have to prove that their company is worth the customer’s money. By targeting people who are already interested in the core of what your company offers, even a new brand might see their acquisition costs go down significantly, saving advertising money, time, and effort. This helps companies increase their market share while spending only a fraction of the cost.

The cost of neglecting hyper-targeting

Hyper-targeting comes in the wake of social media and big data–two things that are growing in today’s society. The importance of data cannot be stressed enough for businesses. The adage, “data is the new currency” holds a lot of weight as money can be made by using the right data to cater to company needs.

Having the right information at the fingertips of advertisers, companies can put their offers to people who are most likely to pay for them with less cost than traditional advertising. It saves marketers’ time by filtering out queries that will not result in sales to focus on the ones that do. Hyper-targeting helps the company’s bottom line by cutting on costs and increasing sales.

What more can an advertiser ask for?