Contextual Advertising

What is Contextual Advertising

Contextual advertising is a type of targeted advertising that considers keywords and website or app content to show relevant ads to the desired audience.

These ads are placed solely based on the content present in the domain and are not dependent on the information gathered about user behavior, preferences, or interests. The resulting ad is more likely to be relevant and targeted, which will encourage users to engage and click on them.

How does Contextual Advertising work

Contextual advertising uses AI or deep-learning algorithms to analyze speech, text, imagery, and location. It makes use of predictive advertising tools to analyze this data and determine user behavior. The deep analysis that is employed by contextual advertising helps understand if an ad placement is relevant and timely and if it interests the user. Doing so helps create a more personalized experience for the user.

First, contextual advertising requires you to narrow down your targeting parameters. It needs you to choose between broad topics and specific keywords. Board topics are general information that is relevant to the product or service. Keywords are specific words that will help in precision targeting. This is the first step to helping an ad network decide where to place the ad.

Next, the publisher will analyze all websites or apps in their network and find the right match for the ad.

After this, the display network will decide if the ad is for a broad or specific audience. A broad audience means your ad will be served based on your target topics. Specific reach means you are displayed only if the contents of the webpage or the app match both topics and keywords targeting.

Types of Contextual Advertising

Some of the most well-known types of contextual ads are as follows.

• In-app Ads: These ads appear inside a mobile app. They are served to targeted users based on user behavior or interests and can be served as display ads, video ads, or native ads.
• Display Ads: They are static or graphical ads served within websites or apps. These ads are served based on the content, topic, or keywords present in the domain. They are designed to be visually appealing.
• Video Ads: They are clips or videos placed within a website or an app. These ads are designed to be engaging and visually attractive to encourage the users to click on the ads.
• Native Ads: These ads blend seamlessly into the app or website's interface so they are non-intrusive and responsive.
• Text Ads: These ads are small bits of text that appear within an app or a website. They are served based on the specific keywords or phrases on the domain and they usually blend in seamlessly with the content that surrounds it.
• Playable Ads: Playable ads are interactive ads that enable a user to experience a demo version of it to test it out before they proceed to download it. By allowing users to experiment with the look and feel of the app, these ads provide an effective preview for the users.

Importance of Contextual Advertising

The key strength of contextual advertising lies in its ability to serve relevant ads to the correct audience and thereby increase the effectiveness of ad campaigns.

Some main reasons for you to opt for contextual advertising are as follows.

• Highly relevant ads: Contextual advertising helps serve ads that are relevant or related to the content a user is already interested in. This helps to view the ad as valuable or informative rather than intrusive.
• High engagement rates: By serving relevant ads, businesses can create more engagement and generate more click-through rates. This will contribute significantly to higher revenue.
• Cost-effective: Contextual advertising involves placing ads in accordance with the content and keywords already present in an app or webpage. So this means the ads can be served in a particular format and at a particular location without having to pay for broad-based ad placements.
• Target a niche audience: As contextual advertising helps serve more relevant ads, it will invariably attract a more relevant audience and help reach a wider demographic that understands the ad better.
• Promotes brand awareness: By appearing on ads frequented by customers of a particular type of product or service, contextual ads expose users to a variety of brands.

Why will Contextual Advertising not work in certain cases

Contextual advertising, like other advertising techniques, comes with its own set of pros and cons. Certain noteworthy disadvantages of contextual advertising are as follows.

• Contextual advertising is highly targeted and only for the niche audience. Only users looking for products or content relevant to the ads are likely to come across these ads. So this might result in reaching a narrow pool audience and thereby result in fewer engagement rates.
• Contextual advertising targets users based on keywords, topics, or domain content. So businesses can't control how the ads will be served to the users and where they are placed.
• Overexposure to contextual ads can cause users to get fatigued and become over-sensitized to these ads.
• Contextual ads rely heavily on the content or topics in the webpage or app. This can cause the ads to be predictive, lack creativity, and have a bland brand message.

How to use contextual advertising to reach your target audience

The common ways to employ contextual advertising to reach a niche group of audiences are as follows.

• Weather-triggered advertising: This involves targeting the audience using data on location and weather. This will help businesses understand user preferences more accurately and thus, help serve more relevant ads.
• Dynamic Creative Optimization: Dynamic creative optimization can help create tailored ads for every user.
• Google AdSense: We know how Google bots serve ads to their users based on relevance and interest. It makes use of a unique algorithm that matches the users with the right ads.
• Conversational marketing: Conversational marketing engages with each user and paves the way for a two-way conversation. This helps deliver more personalized recommendations to customers.