If you have an online store on a platform like Shopify or similar, you can use Google Display ads to reach your target market and increase your sales conversions and revenue. Read on and learn the ways that these ‘online’ billboard ads can assist your ecommerce business.

What is a Google display ad?

Google Display ads reach more than 90% of internet users worldwide says Google. They are ads with images in a banner style that show up on websites within Google’s Display Network (GDN) including Gmail and YouTube (owned by Google) and over two million partner websites. For example, you’ll see these banner ads come up, when you’re reading your favourite paper or a recipe on a food website, at the top or along the sides of the webpage; they intuitively change size to fit the dimensions of your screen.

What makes google display ads different?

The genius behind these ads, and what makes them different from paid search ads (that come up when you search something on Google), is that the advertiser can pick who they want to target. Google display ads will help create brand awareness, recall and loyalty from your target audience chosen via specific user demographics.

Benefits of using google display ads

There are many benefits to using Google display ads to grow your ecommerce revenue. Here are some key ones.
1. You can reach a large target market base. As mentioned earlier the GDN includes Google-owned Gmail and YouTube, and around two million partner websites reaching more than 90% of internet users globally.

2. You can develop GDN campaigns based on your specific business aims. You can not only increase awareness of your brand, but you can also increase loyalty for what you are selling, increase sale leads / revenue and generate more traffic to your online store. A good example of a campaign would be one that advertises sale time or an offer incentive for spending more than say $XX.

3. GDN campaigns are not expensive. This type of advertising is a perfect option for online businesses with small ad spends. You can fix a budget per day, and you only pay when a potential buyer clicks on your ad. To read more about specific costs click here.
4. You can make use of the intuitive nature of Google display ads. Display campaigns can automatically leverage intellectual property, tools, and software (machine learning) across a variety of devices. However, they are still easy to use and help your campaign to deliver good results.

5. You can get higher ad rates than other platforms. To do this you can bid in an auction type set-up. This will ensure your ad’s visibility when a potential customer searches for what you sell. The fact you can adjust your bids at the campaign level will power you up to turn your result analysis into tactical campaign choices.

6. You can choose your preferred ad format. Google display ads are flexible, they can be standard still images, animated GIFs or even short videos to entice more visitors to your online store and increase your sales.

7. You can track results. GDN campaigns allow for easy tracking of your sales results such as impressions, clicks and so forth. You can study what is not working and make the changes needed to better your sale outcomes.

8. You can use keywords. Research for your best search terms. Capture the key sentences that receive affordable hits or conversions. These are the words to use / massage for your GDN campaign.

How do Google display ads grow your sales conversions?

• You can develop GDN campaigns that focus on your products or services, making sales, sending potential buyers to your homepage, or fostering brand awareness and loyalty.
• You can launch new product offerings to a specific target market via a GDN campaign
• You can foster new online shoppers by target marketing your ads
• You can get past customers to come back and purchase.
Before you develop and set-up GDN campaigns make sure you research, think about your product offering and your budget spend. When you see your Google display ad campaigns converting to actual sales, they’ll soon become a staple to your overall digital marketing strategy.

Examples of targeted GDN campaigns

Awareness campaigns – These campaigns can garner specific interest in your online store from potential online purchasers who are surfing websites. To make these effective use call to action phrases to get the interest of customers that have broader demographics like ‘go here’ and ‘find out more.’
Supporting brand campaigns – These campaigns can motivate and maintain brand loyalty by targeting your customers who already shop with you regularly. To encourage them to take the further step and recommend your products to others. you can create campaigns that align with your business aims to reach your brand advocates perfectly. Again, use convincing call to actions like ‘find your muse’ and ‘’be your best with us.’
Re-engaging campaigns – These campaigns can assist in bringing past customers back. To make the most of your results run parallel awareness and retargeting campaigns. By doing this you can recapture through incentive offers such as ‘Sign up and receive X,’ ‘Buy X and enjoy X.’

Tips on how to set up your GDN campaigns

You can go here to learn the steps and get tips for setting up a GDN campaign for your Shopify online store. Other tips to help you increase your click rate and help you reach your ad goals include:
• Getting your display ads designed so they catch the eye of potential buyers. It can be as simple as cool fonts and beautiful and inviting colour palettes
• Make sure your ads complement your brand look and feel as this will vibe with your target market well
• Plan and budget for creative photoshoots to generate slick product / service images
• Use consistent phrasing across all kinds of digital ads including your Google display ads.

The importance of developing a multichannel digital marketing strategy

It’s always a good idea to develop an overarching marketing strategy to increase revenue for your ecommerce store. By doing this you can learn and form your target audience as well as research for the right mix of advertising to best service your online store. When it comes to Google display ads there are many types of campaigns to choose from.
How to incorporate your Google Display ads into your marketing strategy

• Target new customers and drive traffic to your online store. For example, an online store that sells all-natural dog food can target new customers by tapping into related markets such as organic dog owners and natural pet products market with the right keyword phrases and images. At first you may not get full sales, but you will, with time, see an increase in sales revenue. If you target the right people, Google display ads can really work to a longer timeline.

• As mentioned before there are re-engaging GDN campaigns. These capture customers who visited and planned to buy your products at a later date. For example, with your all-natural dog food online business, there are a few parallel campaigns that can be set up: 1. To target users who have been on your website in the past fortnight but didn’t quite buy a product in full, 2. To target users who visited your store twice in the past full week and haven’t yet bought and 3. To target customers who did purchase four to six months ago to get them to keep coming back and purchasing.

What are the challenges when using a GDN campaign? 

1. Software that blocks ads – This type of program is often free and can stop your ads from being seen on the websites you have chosen in your strategy. It’s worth mentioning as it may hinder your ad reach and it’s something you can’t control.
2. People blocking out your banner ads – This can a real thing, as people are always on the internet and wanting to get what they need quickly, so they just learn to block out any advertising that could waste their time in reaching their destination. Visit here to learn how to mitigate this.
3. Not so easy to measure ‘guessed’ success of your ads – For example, your Google display ads may reach a relevant audience and introduce them to your products (like in the all-natural dog good example). However, if they don’t actually click and convert on the spot, it can be hard to measure the impact of your ads. They may convert later down the track but through another channel, and this doesn’t entirely mean your ads didn’t help them get there in some way or another, but again this is hard to measure. To mitigate this, make sure your tracking is set up properly and study how Google Analytics can help you assign less obvious credit to your GDN.

Summary

For all ecommerce businesses using a GDN campaign - they will totally help you reach a wider target base and create brand awareness and more sales.

By using a GDN campaign you will be able to use specific demographics and user data to make sure your ads are reaching your chosen target market and websites.

GDN campaigns also make it easy for online retailers to hone in and develop the right key phrases, images and call to actions and send them to your potential buyers at the right customer journey stages to help clinch the full purchase at the end of that journey.

GDN campaigns are easy to add into your overall marketing strategy and easy to set-up and maintain through a business cycle.