Up until recently, internet advertising and advertisements that appeared on web sites
were more a nuisance than anything else. If you used the internet a lot, as a viewer,
you actually started to ingore the ads because they rarely had any direct relationship
to the website that you were viewing, and even less relation to your actual interests.
This has all changed!
In this article, I will explain a little bit about how web advertising works, how it
benefits the consumer, and how it benefits the advertiser. I will also touch on how
the new technologies now being used also effect, and can benefit, the web site itself.
I am going to concentrate on Google Advertising because Google has a unique advantage
over almost all other forms of internet advertising. To understand why this is, let us
first discuss what the viewer sees, and why. Conventional thinking will lead you to think
that if you have a website that talks about art, such as this website, Gallery Direct, that
you would expect to see advertisements on the website that relate to the topic of the
website, art and artists, in this case. Why would you want to spend money to advertise
on a web site about the new cookware your company just came out with, when the website is
about painting and photography?
The answer is actually very simple: The technologies Google uses for advertisement "serving" is
connected to the technology they use for their search engine systems as well as their web
page activity tracking systems. What this means is that Google knows your interests and
targets the ads you see to your interests as well as with the content of the website you are on.
No other advertising system comes close to being as effective at doing this. If you were
online looking for new cookware, and there is a relevant advertisement for cookware, you
may magically see an ad for it when you go to some other website showing you ads!
Why is this a good thing? Advertisers pay to have the viewer respond (or click) to their ads.
It becomes very important to maximize the effectiveness of every ad they pay for. This means
that the advertiser may offer special deals that are only visible to those people seeing
their ads. You may have went to the manufacturer's website and looked around but did not
purchase anything. Then, like magic, you see an add for what you were just looking for, and
maybe even a special price! When you click on that ad, it shows you the special price, deal,
or whatever. The system tracks all this because the advertiser needs to know what ads are
effective, and what ads result in actual sales.
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This also means that a lot of effort is put into making sure the ads that show up are both
relevant and effective. This actually enhances the viewer's experience and helps the viewer
as opposed to just being a nuisance and distraction!
Artists and Advertising
For the artist, exposure is the key to selling your artwork. The internet offers many
oppurtunities to increase your exposure. I always recommend having as much exposure as possible
with as many outlets as possible. But, you still need to have a plan. In many cases,
advertising yourself with internet ads can be an effective way to increase your exposure
that will hopefully lead to sales. I'm not going to get into the details of effective advertising
in this article, but the point is that these new technologies discussed in this article enable
the artist to target their audience more effectively than ever before.
Advertising ON a Web Site
All of this magical technology means that having advertising on a website actually becomes a
helpful service to the viewer, as long as the advertising placement is not obtrusive to the content.
The website can make some money, the viewer sees relevant ads, and the advertiser gets exposure.
It is in the interest of the advertiser to have "good" ads that will cause the viewer to click on
the ad, and hopefully convert to a sale. Everyone is happy! In a perfect world, every advertisement
you see on a website will be so relevant and effective, that you will want to click on them to
go to the advertiser's website and see more about it. Google systems also have quality control procedures
in place for the advertisers that are designed to keep the quality of the ads meeting high standards.
I hope you enjoyed this article and found it to be helpful in understanding a little more about internet
advertising and how it works and why it now benefits the viewer to have it and use it. Happy surfing!
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