The Audiences

The Basics

You cannot serve a great ad without knowing who it is intended for. Each of the digital platforms offers a variety of audience targeting. The more you tailor your message to the audience, the more effective you will be. Common audiences available include:

• Affinity*
• Behavioral*
• Demographic*
• In-Market*
• Retargeting*

Advanced

One key benefit to digital marketing is the ability to know more about who your message is reaching. Targeting Demographic and Affinity audiences is a much broader approach. Retargeting, Behavioral, and In-Market audiences allow you to tailor your message based on the consumers’ purchase indicators.

In most digital marketing platforms, you have the ability to identify purchase intent at the model level. Creating your advertising message around that information will deliver higher performance than a broad branding message. Target Outlander shoppers with an ad for an Outlander.

There are a variety of ad networks to choose from, and your digital advertising vendor can tell you which ones they are using and what audience strategies they utilize. Some vendors will go direct to Google, Bing, Facebook, etc., but others may run through a 3rd party or utilize Data Management Platforms (DMPs). If the vendor does not go direct, be sure to ask how much of your budget is going towards the actual media as each step between you and the actual network typically ads a layer of cost. If they do go direct, you should be able to see the spend directly in Google, Bing, Facebook, etc. Unfortunately, running through 3rd parties is commonly a way vendors insert margin into their offerings without being fully transparent.