Paid media refers to external marketing efforts that involve a paid placement, such as pay-per-click advertising, branded content and display ads. For online businesses, paid media is a crucial part of revenue growth and brand awareness.

You’ve probably heard of the different types of media: paid, earned, and owned. Although you are aware that each of them is a valuable tool that can assist you in expanding your business, you might not be entirely certain of what each one involves. If you’re not exactly sure what the term “paid media” means, it’s okay, I’ve got you covered.

What is Paid Media?

Paid media refers to the area of marketing and advertising where ad space must be purchased in order to advertise a brand to wider audiences. In order to reach large audiences, brands pay for the promotion of their content. Paid media is a component of a brand’s strategy to boost traffic, sales, and click-through conversions, which in turn increases revenue.

Media is a key element of a digital strategy for brand awareness and revenue growth. Media serves as the conduit and platform for spreading the brand message and promoting the brand. Paid, earned, and owned media are the three different categories of media.

HubSpot compiled some insightful marketing statistics; let’s understand where paid media comes in:

• 63% of companies agree their top marketing challenge is generating traffic and leads
• There was a 220% increase in year-on-year ad spend on Instagram Stories
• 95% of all paid search ad clicks on mobile come through Google
• Banners, native ads, and social media ads are the top display ad types

Brands can reach their target audiences by promoting ideas, goods, and services through sponsored content in paid media. Marketers can also connect with users who are actively looking for comparable services through paid advertising. Pay-per-click advertisements, pop-up advertisements, display advertisements, video advertisements, social media advertisements, retargeting, and more are examples of paid media.

Example: With the help of Google pay-per-click advertisements, you can advertise your content on the search engine, which acts as a suggestion to users looking for comparable goods or services, increasing the number of people who discover your company and its products.

Types of Media: Paid, Earned, Owned

A website, blog, or other web property that you control is referred to as owned media.

Earned or organic media is content that spreads naturally across the internet based on its appeal and inherent worth, like reviews and social media comments.

On the other hand, paid media is more similar to conventional marketing in that you pay a third party to spread your message to other people.

Although it used to be possible to clearly classify all media as either paid, earned, or owned, the cross-channel marketing experience is erasing these distinctions.

Social media, for instance, qualifies as earned media even though paid placements are permitted. As a result, it becomes a platform that encourages the use of various tactics, strategies, and campaign types.

Read about Why Is Social Media An Important Part Of Inbound Marketing? 

Types of Paid Pricing Models

Paid advertisements come in a variety of forms, are paid for in a variety of ways, each with a unique purpose and expected outcome. Let’s examine the two main structures for paid advertisement pricing.

Cost Per Click (CPC)

Cost Per Click (CPC) is a model where a fee is paid for each click, regardless of the number of views or impressions received. You can control your maximum bid amount or set a budget with this performance-based metric’s automatic and manual bidding.

Cost Per Mille (CPM)

Cost Per Thousand/Mille (The model where an advertiser pays per 1,000 ad views is known as cost per thousand (CPM). This is true of banners, native advertising, and other display ads.

Why Use Paid Media?

The purposes of paid media are varied. Paid media is a great way to quickly reach the right leads, even though it might seem like a bit of a traditional advertising strategy. Above all else, it’s a great way to support your company’s messages and promote the content you’ve already created.
When working with content that hasn’t received the organic engagement you’d hoped for and needs a little boost for impressions, paid media is especially helpful.
Paid media advertisements are the best way to immediately reach and engage with your ideal audience because they are designed for segmenting and targeting. They may even be able to connect with audiences who would not normally learn about your business. All that being said, when you complement your inbound marketing strategies with an outbound paid media strategy, you’re sure to expand brand reach, drive exposure and engagement, and generate more leads.

Different Types of Paid Media

There are many options, making it difficult to choose the one that will work best for your company’s strategy. Here is a guide that will help you differentiate between the various ad channels and types. You can thank me later!

Google Ads

Thanks to its advanced targeting and analytics tools, Google is a well-known and successful paid media platform. The platform also allows you to bid on select keywords, which is a great way to maximize your marketing budget and ROI. Of course, Google is the most popular search engine in the country. Within the Google Ads platform, there are three main ad options: search ads, shopping ads, and display ads. Let’s run through them:

Google Search Ads

Native advertising includes Google search ads. After a user conducts a search using keywords related to your advertisement, they show up at the top of the search engine results page. These ads will look very similar to organic search results, but they’ll say “Sponsored” or “Ad” next to them. Additionally, they’re likely to be seen because the majority of search engine users rarely scroll past the first page of results.

Google Shopping Ads

By 2024, it’s estimated that around 280 million people in the United States will shop online. A great place to advertise your B2C product lines is thus Google’s Shopping feature.

Shopping ads are displayed on the search engine results page in a similar way to search ads. However, you’ll find them in the “Shopping” category when a user searches for a particular product. Whether you want to advertise a whole product line or just one particular item, there are a few different ways to optimize shopping ads.

Google Display Ads

A vast network of websites, including YouTube and Weather.com, host advertisements under the Google Display Network. These advertisements are displayed in sidebar or banner formats, directly on the sides. These ads are excellent at targeting audiences based on their location, the websites they are visiting, remarketing lists, and search histories. They may even assist you in reaching potential clients who haven’t yet searched any of your relevant keywords.

Microsoft Ads

Similar to Google ads, Microsoft ads, formerly known as Bing ads, offer search, shopping, and display ads that can be tailored to particular audience segments. But there are a few things that set them apart and might even make them more useful in some circumstances.

How Do Microsoft Ads Differ from Google Ads?

• Microsoft is a PPC behemoth, to begin with. PPC advertisements positioned through the platform appear on the Bing, Yahoo, and AOL search engines. Although none of these search engines is as popular as Google, the three of them taken together have a sizable user base.
• The audience that uses Microsoft’s search engines is another distinguishing feature of its advertisements. In general,Users of the Microsoft search engine are slightly older, more educated, and wealthier than users of the Google search engine. It’s a wise choice to be there if that describes your target market.
• The final defining characteristic of Microsoft ads is that they’re usually a little cheaper than Google ads when you look at cost-per-click rates. Paid search ads are generally a wise investment, but if you’re looking to get the most out of your marketing dollars and your target market uses Microsoft, that’s an added bonus.

Social Media Ads

We’ve talked about the difference between social media marketing and advertising before, but here’s a bit of a deeper dive into the advertising part. Keep in mind that you paid for this. The three main social media platforms we recommend, especially for manufacturing and construction companies, are Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook.

Facebook Ads

Facebook is the most widely used social media site, making it a dominant force in paid media. And despite how strange it may seem that Facebook’s gods have access to user data, they undoubtedly make the site a powerful tool for audience targeting. Your business can use that information to segment by age, occupation, gender, interests, and a plethora of other factors because it provides a wealth of insight into the lives of its users.

There are many different ad formats available on Facebook. Like, there are about ten different formats. Therefore, you have the option of running a straightforward video ad or a more involved instant experience ad. If you do it correctly, you’ll start attracting some highly qualified leads.

LinkedIn Ads

The use of LinkedIn advertising varies by business. But it’s unquestionably a fantastic paid media platform for B2B and professional-focused businesses. Users who want to advance their careers, learn about the industry, and network with other professionals can do so on the platform.

Having said that, LinkedIn enables you to target users based on details relevant to those things, including industry size, job title, function, seniority, field of study, professional skills, and degrees. It can be a really effective way to reach high-level corporate decision-makers with your products and message. There are 5 popular types of LinkedIn Ads to choose from, including these:

• Text and display– What they sound like exactly. Text and an image that appear somewhere other than a news feed (such as sidebars, banners, and messaging inboxes).
• Sponsored content– These are the LinkedIn advertisements that users see in their news feeds.
• Premium display advertising– These are comparable to text and display ads, but they occupy a little more room on a LinkedIn page’s side, top, or bottom banner.
• InMail ads– Compared to other formats, these LinkedIn ads appear more personal because they resemble messages or emails.
• Follow company ads – These LinkedIn ads show up in users’ news feeds but have a “Follow” option that encourages them to follow your company for updates and information.

Instagram Ads

It’s no secret that Instagram gets a ton of engagement, even more than Facebook. This is due to the visual emphasis placed on its photo and video content. All Instagram ads demand a photo, just like regular posting. Instagram ads have some other unique benefits. First of all, engaging with these ads feels simpler and more natural because they resemble regular posts on a user’s feed. Additionally, the majority of ad links open up inside the Instagram app, enabling users to conveniently view more information while staying in the app.
Instagram is owned by Facebook, so available Instagram ad types are similar: photo, video, shopping/collection, explore, carousel, story.

Types of Ad Creatives

Although there are many factors that affect how well an advertisement performs, the visual appeal is one of the most crucial. Users will likely encounter your advertisement among a sea of other content on the internet, on social media, or in the real world, so it’s critical that the creative you use for it is engaging, memorable, and evoking good feelings. Let’s examine the three primary categories of advertising creatives you could produce.

Text

In order to ensure that you capture attention with just words, search ads and native advertisements are typically text-only. This is where your creativity needs to soar to new heights. To guarantee that your text ad gets clicked on or seen in a sea of content, you will need copy that is succinct, clear, valuable, or emotionally stirring.

Display

Images, infographics, gifs, presentations, email banners, and other formats are examples of display advertisements. Up until 2017, display ads were the most successful post type on social media due to their eye-catching visual appeal. However, in 2017, video took the lead. But display ads can be a powerful tool for promoting your brand and products and can be done at a reasonable cost. Effective campaigns are fueled by using original content and experimenting with hues and shapes that appeal to your target market.

Video

With video marketing, it seems impossible to go wrong. It is no secret that both the supply and demand for video are rapidly rising, making it an effective marketing tool. Video marketers receive 66% more qualified leads annually, according to Optinmonster. Videos keep viewers’ attention for longer periods of time, especially on social media, so if you decide to use that platform for your ad campaigns, make sure video is a part of your plan.

Use Paid Media on Social Networks

On various social media platforms, paid media takes on various forms.

Facebook

The most prominent of these platforms is Facebook, which over time has transformed from being one of the many social media options to practically being synonymous with the term.

There are several paid promotional options available with Facebook advertising. The two most commonly used for E-Commerce are:

Carousel ads

Swipeable carousel ads let you see several pictures or videos in a single ad space.

Facebook lets you feature up to ten products in one ad, each with a unique link, allowing you to express your creativity. In a carousel format, you can also include up to 10 videos.

This will allow you to tell a better story, showcase a larger range of products or display a more detailed description of your products.

Compared to single-image link ads, the cost-per-conversion is typically 30 to 50% lower. Carousel advertisements contribute to lower cost per lead and higher click-through rates.

Carousel ads are the best option if you’re just opening a store because you can pick and choose what to display.

The most recent requirements for a carousel ad, as stated by Facebook, are listed below.

Images

• 2-10 Images
• The JPG or PNG file format is advised.
• Image file size: Maximum of 30MB
• Image resolution: 1080X1080
• Text: 125 characters
• Headline: 40 characters
• Link Description: 20 characters

Videos

• 2-10 Videos
• Recommended format: MP4 or MOV
• Image file size: Maximum of 30MB
• Text: 125 characters
• Headline: 40 characters
• Link Description: 20 characters

Dynamic Product Ads (DPA)

The exact same goods or services that customers are interested in seeing are presented by retailers using DPAs.

Facebook’s pixels detect customer activity as they occur, such as when they browse your website, view a product, or add something to their cart.

The products your customer has expressed interest in are then highlighted on Facebook.

Multiple ad units for each product or product line don’t need to be created as often thanks to dynamic product ads.

Additionally, dynamic product ads receive 3X more engagement than a typical Facebook ad.

In just 2 easy steps, you can begin using dynamic product ads.

1. Facebook accepts product feeds in XML or CSV formats.
2. On your website, install the Facebook pixel. Set the time that you want the pixel to fire, for example. add to cart, view Content, or purchase.

You are now ready to proceed.

Facebook has the most active social media users, and you can choose to leverage the platform’s more than 1 billion users and extensive user database by purchasing a Facebook ad.

Facebook lets online businesses target their ads based on metrics such as:

• Geographic locations, filtered by country, region, city or even postal/zip code
• Age
• Gender
• Spoken languages
• Interests, including sport, films and music
• Behaviour, from where and how they shop to whether they’re a house hunter

This enables you to precisely tailor your product to the characteristics of your target market. For instance, if you owned a sports store with a location in a city where Spanish is spoken, you might decide to target users between the ages of 18 and 40 who are interested in basketball and speak Spanish.

Your advertisement will show up on their news feed alongside other products.

Regarding boosting your posts, you can follow the same procedure. Your post will be distributed to a much larger audience after you decide how much money you’re willing to spend and select an audience profile. This is especially helpful if you want to spread the word about a promotion your company is running.

Twitter

Similar services are provided by Twitter, such as its promoted tweets, which function just like regular tweets but are distributed to a larger audience that might be interested in your company.

They will appear on both timelines as well as at the top of users’ relevant search results.

Promoted tweets can be used to inform users of an event or action as well as to increase brand awareness for your company.

You can also pay to have your account promoted, in which case Twitter will entice users to follow your account.

Twitter’s promoted posts can be used predominantly to achieve two major goals:

To drive a particular action:

• Use content that you think will stand out to promote and direct traffic to your website.
• Offer coupons and deals in the copy of your Tweets
• Add a coupon or deal offering to your tweet
• Lead generation cards are a powerful tool that you can use

To drive awareness for your business:

• Use Twitter to publish long-form content
• Spread brand awareness with the help of influencers ensure you get a larger reach
• Design copies that help spread awareness around events and product launches

Instagram

Instagram is a great platform for advertising, with more than 1 billion active users each month.

Make sure your creatives are strong because Instagram is only a visual platform.

Let’s take a look at the four ways you can use Instagram to promote your ads:

Photo ads

You can use a single image in photo ads to market your company or product. It’s an easy way to show off your products to customers.

One image, some copy, and a CTA can make up your advertisement.

Video ads

Compared to photo ads, video ads are much more interactive. You can upload each 60-second video in either square or landscape format.

In the future, 74% of all internet traffic will be made up of video.

Carousel ads

In comparison to link ads, these swipeable ads assist in lowering Cost per Conversion by 69%.

Similar to Facebook, Instagram lets you show 10 images in a single ad space.

Story ads

You can now advertise your products to Instagram stories’ 300 million daily users. In order to test out or experiment with story ads and complete your feed, you can use alternative content.

You can launch your stories using Facebook ads manager or power editor, just like you can with most Instagram ads.

High-quality images should be used when creating Instagram ads because they help to maintain consumer trust while poor images could erode it and make people less likely to buy your product.

A customer will think poorly of you if you don’t put any effort into your visual posts; they may be reluctant to click on a link they don’t trust.

Just keep in mind that, in light of all of these factors, it is not enough to pay to boost your content; in order to be effective, the content must also be well-written.

Also keep in mind that all of this paid content will bear a notice indicating it is so. You won’t be tricking any users into clicking.

Instagram also added “Shoppable” Instagram posts, which let customers add items directly from Instagram photos to an online store.

You can purchase photos or videos on Instagram that will be promoted on user feeds.

Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is a form of advertising that is rapidly gaining popularity in which a brand employs a public figure or thought leader to motivate or advertise your content to his followers.

Influencer marketing has attracted a lot of brand investment; in 2016, $570 million was spent on Instagram alone.

You can really reach an audience through influencer marketing that would be difficult to reach otherwise.

Here are the steps you could use to help build an influencer campaign:

• Identify key brand or product influencers
• Create a marketing campaign targeted at the standout influencers.
• Understand the audience and make sure your campaigns are audience-centric
• Create a secondary marketing campaign for the influencers to drive greater awareness to a larger set of target consumers
• Track key metrics relating to reach, sales and brand awareness

A three-pronged strategy should be used by businesses to promote their brand, one of which should be paid content. For a social media marketing campaign to be successful, paid content should complement owned and earned content rather than be used in opposition to it.

Paid Media and the Future

In social media, online, on connected TV (CTV), in digital out-of-home (DOOH), and elsewhere, we can see examples of paid media everywhere we look. Given that paid media campaigns are the most widely used form of advertising, it’s difficult to ignore the impact and competition, which will only get more intense in the future.

Your brand will undoubtedly advance if you keep up with developments in paid social media activities and Google Ads Smart Bidding.

The same can be said for paid media and programmatic advertising, just as the internet is here to stay. It will be more crucial than ever to invest in the best DSP to efficiently carry out your paid media campaigns as artificial intelligence becomes more adept and reduces the need for manual labor.