Targeting the Dot...

Elsewhere in this issue, there’s mention of online advertising making a
strong comeback–and better still, proving to be an effective promotional
medium, offering greater innovation and response per ad-rupee spent than any
other media segment. I couldn’t agree more...While memories of crashing dot-coms
have made many an advertiser wary of going online, a return to the eyeball era
is inevitable. This time around, though, it will not be eyeballs that will work,
but accurate targeting of the end-customer–the ability to reach out only to
the correct consumer segment.

To make this new phase of online advertising one that lasts, online
publishers have to come up with a revenue formula that works. As for
advertisers, where exactly does one place the ad in this ever-expanding Web to
get the desired results?

Dot-coms are making a re-appearance, and with more robust business models
than before, the number of sites is bound to leapfrog over the next few years.

At the height of the dot-com boom, one media-planner exclaimed–"I’ve
a headache when I have to choose the right vehicle for my client, from among 12
newspapers and five TV channels. Today, with a 100 hot websites around, I am
going cockeyed deciding where to go." The problem is different today, for
the crux is not where, but how to reach the right audience, of the right color,
race and gender, in the right geography, in the right measure, with the right
message, and at the right time.

Today’s advertisers and media-planners need to constantly remind themselves
that advertising–whatever be the medium–is intrusive. It is television that
is most intrusive, and viewers can do little else but twiddle their thumbs while
ads enter their living rooms. The print medium is better–readers have the
option of looking at the ad or moving on to the editorial content. It is online
that is least disruptive, and using the tech backbone, online publishers can not
just make their ads reader-friendly, but can send out only those promos that are
relevant to visitors at any website. Manage to do that and the ads that flash or
twinkle or remain static actually become value-adds, not intrusions!

And here comes the issue of targeted advertising–only possible online, and
with the potential to help sites survive the war of the CPMs (clicks per
million). Using targeting services, advertisers can engage visitor attention by
delivering an ad pertinent to him. Such services can run simultaneous ad
campaigns, delivering in the process highly-targeted ads over many websites.

They’ve been around for years, but haven’t caught on–possibly because
in the hey-days of everything turning to gold, no one bothered. Come the new
era, they will have to.

How does targeting work? Simply, by utilizing filtering technology that
ensures that the right advertisement is delivered to the right person every
time. Targeting is defined by demographic and psychographic parameters–geographic,
time, system, content...that’s just for starters (!)–which assist in zeroing
down on the right set of Net users to be shown any kind of ad. Don’t fall in
that category and the ad will not appear on your screen.

Sure, targeting will need user profiles and this will raise questions of
privacy–it will be up to users to share personal information only with a few
sites, and up to site managers to honor that privilege. And both parties should
go ahead and do it, for this will be an endeavor that’ll benefit both sides.

RAJEEV NARAYAN

(The author is the Executive Editor of Dataquest)