Digital Marketing News 11/22/2022 – 11/28/2022

PPC

TikTok Introduces Audience Insights in Ads Manager

This tool helps advertisers better understand their audiences on TikTok.

TikTok introduced Audience Insights, a new tool in their Ads Manager that helps advertisers gain a greater understanding of their audiences on TikTok. With a better grasp on their market, brands can approach targeting more efficiently and in a way that ensures they connect with their audiences.

Audience Insights is now available globally within TikTok Ads Manager. With it you can explore TikTok user interests, behaviors, and demographics. The tool also allows you to discover aggregate audience information by using the following filters:

• Age 

• Gender

• Language

• Country 

• Interests

• Device type and price

• Video interactions - Filter users by the kind of videos they watch on TikTok

• Creator interactions - Filter TikTok users based on the creators they followed in different categories

• Hashtag interactions - Filter your audience based on the hashtag they engaged with

TikTok also shared four ways how advertisers can use Audience Insights:

• Use data from Audience Insights to plan your campaign Get the most out of Audience Insights during your pre-campaign stage by using a range of filters to explore aggregate audience information. This includes TikTok Custom Audiences, where you can learn about audiences who have seen, clicked, or engaged with your content or audiences you’ve uploaded via Customer File.

• Validate audience information Audience Insights can help answer questions about an audience and validate information through qualitative and quantitative data. Using this tool you can view a high-level snapshot of the audience to gain a quick understanding of demographics, behaviors, and interests.

• Find inspiration for targeting and creative strategies

• Audience Insights can help you discover new audiences beyond those that you traditionally target. If any surprising or unexpected interest categories appear, you can try targeting these to see how they perform.

• Explore top hashtags and interest categories to plan your content You can view the top 10 hashtags and top ad interest categories that resonate with your audience. Consider incorporating these hashtags or interests when targeting in a campaign, planning a theme, or incorporating hashtags in your video content.

PPC

LinkedIn Launches A New Brand Safety Hub for Advertisers

This latest offering aims to protect your brand reputation on the LinkedIn Audience Network.

The LinkedIn Audience Network is getting some upgrades, and headlining it is the new Brand Safety Hub, which gives advertisers the ability to boost advertising performance on the LinkedIn Audience Network while customizing brand safety guardrails. Here’s what you can do with the features included in the Brand Safety hub:

• Download the list of LinkedIn Audience Network publishers Easily access the list of publishers by downloading them from the new Brand Safety Hub in LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager platform. The comprehensive list of publishers that make up the LinkedIn Audience Network is complete with site and app URL information.

• Customize your allow lists and block lists Create, upload, and apply custom allow lists alongside block lists to prioritize the publishers that meet your own brand safety guidelines.

• Leverage Third-Party Brand Suitability and Contextual Alignment via DoubleVerify If you currently leverage DoubleVerify (DV) to avoid unsuitable content and align with contextually relevant inventory, you can now import and apply DV Authentic Brand Suitability and DV Custom Contextual solutions across LinkedIn Audience Network-enabled campaigns.

Through the Brand Safety Hub, LinkedIn is helping advertisers promote content in relevant and brand-safe environments. This way, you can safely scale your campaigns and reach your intended audience without compromising on campaign performance. To learn more about it, visit the Brand Safety Hub Help Center.

PPC

Video Ads Are Now Available on Microsoft Audience Network

Complement your search and image ad strategy with video ads to reinforce your message and encourage customers to take action.

In their blog post, Microsoft announced that Video Ads on the Microsoft Audience Network are now generally available in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Australia, and New Zealand. Video Ads give advertisers an opportunity to drive deeper connections with a highly relevant audience, as you can leverage Microsoft’s audience data to engage your ideal customers where they’re browsing, shopping, and spending time across Microsoft sites.

These audience stats from Microsoft will give you an idea on the reach you can expect:

• 1 in 3 users stay on MSN and Microsoft Edge to get the content they need.

• 72 minutes is the average time spent by a visitor on Microsoft Edge per month.

• 39% of users watch videos on MSN but not on YouTube.

• 57% of users watch videos on MSN but not on Facebook.

Video ads are immersive, and they’re fuelled by powerful intent data like searches, web activity, and browser behavior. With their addition to the Microsoft Audience Network, you can now utilize four ad formats in the platform, which includes Image Ad, Feed Based Ads, and Search Ad.

Microsoft also offers flexible bidding options so you can choose what best suits your goals, and only pay when people watch or engage with your Video Ad.

Set up your Video Ads for success by following Microsoft’s tips and best practices:

• Upload your Video Ads directly to Microsoft Advertising or leverage their Facebook Import tool.

• Set up your audience targeting to boost your audience campaigns’ performance. You can choose from Remarketing, Dynamic Remarketing, In-Market Audiences, LinkedIn Profile Targeting, Similar Audiences, Customer Match, or Custom Audiences.

• Catch your audience’s attention in 10 seconds or less. Although your ads can run longer (between 6 to 120 seconds), the first 10 seconds are critical to land your message.

• Feature your product or brand message early on to make sure people remember it.

• Design for sound off. Video Ads are auto-play and sound off, so use text and graphics whenever possible.

• Adapt your message to the customer journey. To drive action with your customers, use Video Ads to provide more information about a product or service and direct them to sign up or purchase pages.

• See what works for you — try different video lengths, intro text copy, headlines, or landing pages to see what resonates best with your audience.

For a step-by-step overview of how to get started on Microsoft’s Video Ads, visit this link.

Social

WhatsApp Expands Their Business Capabilities

Now customers can find, message, and buy something from a business on WhatsApp as they work on bringing the entire shopping experience to their platform.

WhatsApp and Meta announced the newest features that users and business owners can expect: now, people in Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Colombia, and the UK can browse businesses on WhatsApp by category – such as travel or banking – or search by name to find it. What’s more, they’re also testing secure payments via chat in Brazil with multiple payment partners.

Find a Business

With millions of small businesses and tens of thousands of brands already on WhatsApp, the messaging platform is launching the ability for people to securely browse businesses by category or by name. Meta says:

“We’ve built business search in a way that protects people’s privacy, and what you search for is processed in a way that cannot be linked back to your account.”

To start, WhatsApp is launching this feature in Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Colombia, and the United Kingdom, where people can find companies using the WhatsApp Business Platform. In Brazil, search will help people find small businesses as well.

Message a Business

More business owners are joining WhatsApp and using it to directly connect with their customers. In fact, WhatsApp reports that some of the recent businesses that have joined their platform are helping people open a bank account, purchase their metro (train) ticket, and order groceries.

Buy From a Business

One of the features that WhatsApp is also working on is giving people the ability to make a secure payment right from a chat with their credit or debit card, and they recently launched this experience in India. Now they’re testing this feature in Brazil with multiple payment partners. Meta predicts:

“This seamless checkout experience will be a game-changer for people and businesses looking to buy and sell on WhatsApp without having to go to a website, open another app, or pay in-person.”

Search

Google Search Console Adds New Section for Shopping Tab Listings

This will help online store owners show their products on the Shopping tab on Google.

Google revealed in their Search Central Blog post that starting on November 16, 2022, eligible online store owners that have implemented product markup will see a new section called Shopping tab listings. This change is rolling out gradually over the next few weeks.

From the Shopping tab listings, merchants will be able to easily create a Merchant Center account using a simplified assisted sign-up process without the need to re-verify website ownership. With this new option, there is no need to submit a product feed; merchants only need to keep product structured data up-to-date. This streamlined experience will get products quickly on the Shopping tab on Google and help merchants reach people looking for products.

To get started, navigate to the Shopping tab listings section in Search Console and follow the instructions. Read more about enabling Shopping tab listings in Google Search here.

What you can do next:

• Optimize your targeting, campaigns, and content in TikTok by using the Audience Insights tool to dig deeper into your audience data and discover what resonates with your market.

• Protect your brand reputation when advertising by ensuring that your ads are not appearing in places that are not aligned with your branding and values. Use tools like LinkedIn’s Brand Safety Hub to filter your advertising platforms and to refine your targeting.

• Give customers a more immersive experience with your brand by pairing your existing ad strategy with video ads. Follow the best practices shared by Microsoft to enhance and maximize your video ads.

• Make your business more accessible to customers. Improve your credibility and establish your reliability by ensuring that you respond to customer messages in a timely manner through your communication channels and social media pages.

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