OTT Advertising Trends to Watch in 2023 and Beyond

Are you familiar with OTT advertising? This form of advertising is becoming more and more popular as people become more digital, and we are here to help you keep track of the latest OTT advertising trends!

What is OTT Advertising?

OTT stands for ‘over-the-top’ and refers to TV content that is accessed using the internet, rather than a cable connection. More specifically, OTT advertising is the act of marketing to specified audiences, like ‘cord cutters’, on streaming services. Cord cutters refer to the people who have completely stopped using cable/satellite TV and have switched to streaming platforms as a replacement. As of 2021, Cord Cutters represent 27% of the US population! This percentage will continue to increase with time.

It is important to stay up-to-date on the latest trends so that your business can grow. With that being said, here are 4 OTT advertising trends to watch in 2023 and beyond:

OTT Advertising Trends:

1. Increased Spending on OTT Ads

According to Sensor Tower’s study on OTT Advertising in the US, an average of $3.26B was spent quarterly on OTT Ads. This is a lot of money, and these numbers only continue to increase with time. Airlines, travel agencies, and food delivery companies are some of the top contributors when it comes to OTT ad spend.

A recent study conducted by Hootsuite found that 92% of internet users watch video content online weekly. With this increase in streaming channels and online viewing in general, brands need to invest in OTT in order to better reach consumers. If your business is not currently utilizing OTT, reach out to Nartak Media Group today! We can help you get your first OTT campaign ready to launch!

2. OTT Personalization

Although personalization is not new when it comes to advertising, it is a growing and important trend. Personalization helps digital marketers drive higher conversion rates because they can tailor campaigns to specific audiences. Personalized content is more likely gain positive reactions from people because the content itself is more relevant.

Another level of personalized OTT ads is something called dynamic advertising, or “retargeting advertising”. This is when content of an ad changes depending on who is watching it. For example, if a consumer engages with an ad by visiting a brand website, typically, tracking works to show the consumer more relevant advertisements later. Using personalized ads in your OTT strategy can lead to both increased brand awareness and a higher conversion rate!

3. Hyperlocal Advertising

What if you could target your audience by a specific location, like down to an address? With OTT local ads, another rising OTT trend in 2023, you can! Geo-location is an extremely powerful tool that lets you segment your audience by location to increase relevance.

For example, let’s say you are a landscaping company in Pittsburgh. You may choose to hire a local advertising agency to run a geo-targeting ad to new homeowners in the area. Focusing your ads on one specific location will allow you to focus on a smaller segment of people while spending advertising money more efficiently.

End Note

Today, we covered just 3 of the many OTT advertising trends that are making headway in 2023:

Increased Spending
OTT Personalization
Hyperlocal Advertising

If you are looking to grow your sales in 2023, the Nartak Media Group team is here to help! We will work with you to develop a creative, strategic, and results-oriented OTT plan. Contact us today to get started!

Why is Advertising Important in 2023?

Do you ever ask yourself, “why is advertising important?” Well, here’s why.

In today’s business world, advertising is crucial. The market is extremely competitive, and without being out in the public eye, your brand could essentially be invisible to your target marketing. Advertising is important in every business because it is how you connect with your customers in order to increase conversions and revenue. Let’s take a deeper look into why advertising is so important by looking at 5 key aspects.

Brand Awareness

When answering the question, “why is advertising important?,” it is essential to understand the impact of brand awareness. Brand awareness represents how familiar your target market is with your brand/business and how well they are able to recognize it. Advertising is used to create a stronger brand awareness with your target audience. This will help both new companies and companies simply looking for an image makeover. Ultimately, every company benefits from professional branding and advertising.

Persuasion

Another reason why advertising is so important is persuasion. Persuading your audience is one of the top objectives of advertising. Solutions range from analyzing a customer’s buying patterns, consumer testing of new services or products, creation or recreation of a brand image, or development of an encouraging attitude towards a brand. Advertising persuades consumers to act in some way, whether it be purchasing a product or changing their perception.

Reinforcement

You need loyal and returning customers/clients in order to grow your business. Advertising helps you to do this by reinforcing your brand message to existing and potential customers. It also helps to keep your brand on the consumer’s mind, outshining the competitors. The more someone remembers a brand, the more likely they will be to share it with others through word of mouth.

Competition

Like we stated in the previous point, advertising helps your brand to outshine the competitors by reinforcing your message. No matter what type of business you have, there will always be competition. Therefore, advertising’s importance comes from the fact that everyone is doing it. If you are not actively trying to put your brand at the forefront of people’s minds, you are willingly giving your competitors the advantage. To give your brand a bigger competitive edge, you must be utilizing advertising to ensure maximum exposure.

Sales

Finally, to fully understand why advertising is so important in the business world, we have to mention its effect on sales. Ads are powerful tools that can help businesses earn the money they need. Various advertising campaigns can directly increase sales by taking consumers right to your physical store, website, and more. All types of advertising, whether it be TV, digital, print, OOH, and more, can help you increase sales. The more people who are exposed to and aware of yours good and services, the higher your chances are of getting some good sales.

Closing Note

Nartak’s hope is that you now fully understand the importance of advertising. This list is by no means exhaustive, as the benefits of advertising continue to increase. If you are looking to implement an advertising strategy into your own business plan, we would love to hear from you! Nartak Media Group can help you form a plan that implements your ideas into action to achieve your goals! Contact us today.

How Effective is Billboard Advertising?

Billboards are everywhere. Whether you are driving your morning commute to work or taking the trolly into town, you will see at least a few billboards on the way. In today’s day and age, are billboards effective when it comes to advertising? That is the question we will be answering today.

What is Billboard Advertising?

Billboard advertising is a type of traditional OOH (out-of-home) advertising that uses a large-scale print advertisement to market a product, service, company, brand, or campaign. Billboards are effective for building brand awareness and broadcasting a business, product, or service to a high number of people. Because they are typically placed in high-traffic areas, such as highways and cities, billboard advertising also gains a large number of views and impressions, as compared to other forms of marketing.

Are Billboards Effective?

According to the Arbitron In-Car Study, 71% of people look at billboards while driving. More than 50% said that they actively pay attention to the messages of those same billboards. On average, Americans spend about 300 hours total in the car every year. (Source) That is a lot of time. Knowing this, it is safe to say that billboards catch the majority of people’s attention, specifically while in the car. Even though display ads are an advantageous advertising tool, you can block them, whereas you cannot turn off billboards. Even if you choose to ignore what the billboards say, they will be there regardless. You simply cannot escape billboards.

Second, billboards are strategically placed based on your geographic location. This allows you to target a specific location by strengthening your existing marketing or reaching out to a new area. If you are looking to target a specific store location, billboard advertising would be a great place to start!

To truly be effective, billboards need to leave a lasting impression. Each billboard should follow the 8-Second Rule. This means that a person driving by your billboard should be able to understand its message in 8 seconds or less. Also, think about whether or not your product is relevant to a mass audience. If not, billboard advertising might not be the best option. A smartly-designed billboard will evoke many emotions–hunger, happiness, awareness, and more! Who hasn’t seen a huge hamburger on a sign and suddenly felt hungry? Evoking emotion is one of the ways billboards are effective.

Finally, one must consider the costs that come along with billboard advertising. There is more to paying for billboards than just the rental fees. Each company must think about a budget for design, material, and installation costs, depending on the billboard itself and the location.

Billboards ARE Effective!

Depending on your own target market and what you are advertising, billboard advertising is an effective way to market yourself. Always keep in mind the factors that go into creating an effective billboard/OOH campaign.

If you are looking for help with outdoor advertising in Pittsburgh, you’ve come to the right place! Nartak Media Group is here to help you utilize billboard advertising within your campaign. Reach out to us today to get started!

Newspaper Advertising Trends for 2023

What is Newspaper Advertising?

Newspaper advertising is one of the oldest forms of advertising that we see today. These ads do a lot more than just showcasing a single product or service, as each ad works hard to reel in customers and keep them coming back. Not only can newspaper advertising bring in a lot of people, but they are a good way to reach those in the older demographic who tend to read the paper more frequently. Plus, a company can run its ads to the appropriate target audience by requesting them to run in the section(s) that relate the most to that audience, whether it be a lifestyle, business, sports, or something else.

Most print advertisements are viewed by more than just one person because, more often than not, print material remains in a home for at least a day or two. Local newspapers can also be effective for more geographic specifications, like restaurants, community events, and local entertainment.

So what are some of the trends advertisers are noticing in the newspaper landscape? Read on to find out more.

Newspaper Advertising Trends

With the COVID-19 Pandemic, the past 2.5 years have made it extremely difficult to predict what the future holds. Amid these challenges, advertisers and marketers had to navigate changes and try new strategies.

While readership of newspapers may be on the decline throughout the U.S., there are a few newspaper advertising trends that seem to be making their way forward.

Newspapers are Still Vital

Despite the pandemic, newspapers are still vital! Consumers are seeking accurate, unbiased information, and newspapers remain one of the most trusted sources. According to a Nielson Report, newspapers are rated as a source that both operates ethically and has the public’s best interest in mind. Additionally, people are more inclined to pay attention to advertisements from news sources they trust.

Storytelling is Growing

Storytelling is an essential tool for all marketers, and it is a trend that continues to be on the rise in newspaper advertising. Brands that use storytelling to connect with consumers build a greater level of trust and brand loyalty. Storytelling offers the opportunity for brands to make themselves stand out among competitors by connecting with people through emotion.

More specifically, newspapers are a great medium to share stories. That is why this newspaper advertising trend will continue to grow in 2023. There are multiple options for newspaper advertising, such as sponsored content or advertiorals. Newspapers offer a variety of possibilities in order to share your story!

Increased Advertising Budgets

In 2023, it is predicted that companies will continue to increase their advertising budgets. This is a trend that has been on a steady rise since emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic. Within the newspaper industry, we are seeing more clients exploring newspaper advertising on both paper and digital mediums.

Newspaper advertising provides more brand safety

Brand safety has become of utmost importance to a lot of marketers and business owners. Especially with controversy around different social media outlets, and various website scandals, advertisers want to ensure that where they’re advertising will not damage the brand’s reputation. Newspapers are increasingly becoming the platform of choice for marketers who want to build the image of their brand in the marketplace.

Digital Newspaper Advertising

While print newspapers are still making an impact, trends show that digital newspaper advertising will overtake print newspaper advertising by 2026. According to Marketing Charts, digital newspaper spending will rise to $5 billion in 2026. It is also worth noting that digital newspapers have been very successful in recent years in building online subscription bases. This trend will continue to increase in the coming years.

If you are looking for some help with newspaper advertising for your company, you’ve come to the right place. Nartak Media Group is here to help you utilize newspaper advertising as a means to reach your target audience. Reach out to us today to get started!

What is Media Planning and Buying?

Trying to adapt to the ever-evolving advertising and marketing climate can be a challenge! Whether you are a media planning expert or someone just trying to understand how to navigate their company’s advertising, knowing the ins and outs of media planning and buying is crucial.

To say that media planning and buying have changed significantly over the last 20 years due to technological advancements is an understatement. That takes us to the question, “What is media planning and buying today?”

What is media planning?

Media planning is the process of identifying, assessing, and selecting various media channels to reach a defined audience. A media planner works to determine how, where, and why a business will share media content. Through strategic media planning software and a deep understanding of media, media planners can develop efficient, successful advertising campaigns.

One of the biggest challenges of media planning is determining how to serve consumers with the right message, at the right time, on the right channel. Luckily 3 questions can help you to figure out these “rights”:

What is your advertising strategy?
Who do you want to reach?
How do you want to communicate?

Some benefits of media planning include improved efficiency, saved resources, better budget tracking, improved ROI, and a better understanding of your audience.

What is media buying?

Before we talk about how media planning and buying go hand-in-hand, let’s define media buying. Media buying is the process of purchasing space and time on digital and online platforms to house advertising. These ads can be found anywhere on websites, radio, TV, YouTube, and more.

More specifically, a media buyer is responsible for negotiating with publishers for ad space, managing budgets, and optimizing ads so that they improve overall performance. Typically, media buying is done in 4 ways:

Direct Buy
Programmatic Buy
Manual Bidding
Real-time Bidding

Media Planning vs. Media Buying

While media planning and buying often get lumped together in the same category, they each have distinct processes within advertising. Media buying typically focuses on purchasing ad space across various channels, while media planning focuses on the strategy behind the campaign. In short, media planning sets you up to buy while media buying does the actual purchasing.

Let’s take a look at the differing roles of media planners and buyers:

Media Planners

Conduct both internal and external market research:
- Media planners need to conduct internal research to understand the client they are working with. Internal research includes things such as the client’s brand identity, positioning, and unique selling points.
- External research is important to understand the overall advertising landscape, competitors, target audience, and most effective media channels.
Set campaign goals:
- Based on information gathered from research, media planners are tasked with setting goals for their advertising strategy.
Determine budget:
- This is important for ensuring the profitability of a campaign. Media planners work to decide what percentage of the budget will be spent on advertising in each channel.

Media Buyers

Leveraging relationships:
- Media buyers must leverage trusted relationships within the industry to help them drive impressive ROIs.
Negotiating with vendors:
- This task helps to bring down the price of media placement pricing to stretch the budget further and run cost-effective campaigns.
Tracking and tweaking active campaigns:
- While media planners build the strategy, media buyers track their performance in real time. This allows media buyers to make quick adjustments when needed to help the media planners achieve campaign goals.

How To Measure Success In Radio Advertising

Radio Advertising is a tool that has been used for decades to reach consumers across every industry. However the power of radio advertising has changed. Despite it being a solid form of communication, one must ask, “how do I measure if my radio advertising campaign is a success or not?” Today, you will learn which KPIs to pay attention to to understand the success of your radio advertising campaign.

1. Increase in reach

Radio advertising is able to reach thousands of listeners across many different demographics. Therefore, it is inevitable that if you have a healthy radio advertising campaign your reach will increase.

2. Increase in Google searches for your business

If your radio advertising campaign is reaching the right people, then the number of Google searches for your business will also increase. Radio is a fun platform to advertise on because you have the opportunity to get a jingle, slogan, or message stuck in people’s heads. In fact, radio advertising has the potential to increase brand awareness by 18-50%.

3. Increase in website traffic

Now that you have the attention of your consumers, the hope is that website traffic will increase. Radio advertising is effective in communicating messages people will remember and if you are having a successful run with radio then website traffic should increase over time and hopefully lead to new leads/transactions. When measuring your website traffic during the course of your radio campaign, be sure to check the total website visitors directly before the campaign, and for a while before.

4. ROAS (Return on Ad Spend)

If you are having a successful radio advertising campaign then you should receive a neat ROAS. ROAS is measured by (Ad revenue – ad investment) / Ad investment = ROAS. For example, if you are receiving $5,000 worth of service from the radio ad and you are investing $100 into the ad your equation would look like ( $5,000 – $100 /$100) leaving you with a ratio of 49 to 1. This indicates that the radio advertisement is indeed working. It is important to measure your ROAS on every type of advertising to ensure that you are getting the most out of the service!

At the end of the day, radio advertising can be a complementary tool to use when you are trying to grow your media presence. While it may seem a little more broad, it’s still definitely possible to measure your radio advertising successfulness. At Nartak Media Group, we can craft a creative, high-impact message with a minimum budget that will make you STAND OUT and be noticed. We work with our clients to ensure that their message is heard on the right radio stations, at the right times, with great efficiency and enough reach and frequency to generate results. We also work to create some very unique, memorable radio commercials that help our client’s message stand out and bring them results.

Reach out to us TODAY to learn more!

How to measure TV advertising

Measuring TV advertising performance is not a walk in the park. As much as we wish this wasn’t the case, there is no singular tool or measurement solution that is guaranteed to work for every campaign out there. Although, as technology advances, our understanding of TV’s effects also improves. That being said, we are sharing 5 tips on how to measure TV advertising.

Measure Primary Impacts

1. 1. To measure TV advertising, start small by evaluating the responses to ads within minutes after each airing. Track the responses through calls, texts, or the web to evaluate performance. These numbers can provide an early indication of how people are responding to the ad.
  2. Evaluating these primary impacts can serve as an indicator of success for TV advertising, but keep in mind that it is not the full picture.

Don’t Ignore Secondary Impacts

1. 1. When viewing an ad, most people won’t be inclined to act right away. That is why it is extremely important to look at the secondary impacts TV ads can make. Say a person sees your ad today but doesn’t act upon it for a few weeks. They were still influenced by the TV campaign but weren’t inclined to take action immediately.
  2. To keep track of secondary impacts like these, pay attention to see if the total number of new customers increases, or if your web traffic increases due to consumer searches. Both of these are great signs of effective TV advertising! One more thing to consider is adding a survey to your website asking visitors how they initially learned about your brand. This will help narrow down your measurements as well.

Pay Attention to Big-Picture Impacts

1. 1. Although both the primary and secondary impacts of your TV campaign will give you some good information and measurements to go off of, always pay attention to big-picture impacts as well. Not everyone will act on a TV advertisement immediately, or even within a week, so it is important to consider the lasting brand effects a campaign can have.
  2. To do so, conduct surveys to look for changes in the way people think about or react to your brand. Also, make sure to notice if there is a greater range of opportunities for partnerships or an increase in overall revenue. All of these can be used to measure TV advertising.

Strive for Transparency

One of the biggest difficulties you will face when measuring TV advertising is the lack of transparency in the industry. Unfortunately, many companies make it difficult to evaluate the opportunity and overall performance. You want to strive to find a company that will give you full transparency when it comes to the performance data they collect. Here at Nartak, we believe our clients to be of the utmost importance, so transparency comes naturally. We always strive to provide the best strategic advertising services.

Optimize Based on Performance

If you have recently launched a TV campaign but you have not seen improvement, that does not necessarily mean that TV advertising doesn’t work for you. Throughout the duration of the campaign, it is important to measure the performance using these tips, but also optimize and adjust the strategy based on those measurements. Working to improve the campaign will help you to have more confidence in the end result.

By themselves, the above tips could not satisfy as a singular measurement approach for TV ads. However, when the different effects that TV has are all taken into consideration, then you will get an overall, clearer picture.

Are you interested in learning more about TV advertising? Be sure to contact Nartak today.

What Effect Did The Pandemic Have On Print Media Marketing?

The pandemic has had an impact on every other corner of our lives but as marketing professionals, we must ask ourselves, did it completely kill print media? As digital marketing is taking the world by storm, some would assume that print media has gone extinct. We are here to tell you, that it has not.

Why Print Media Is Still Relevant?

There are many businesses that question the viability of print media when many newspapers and magazines are transitioning online and social media is taking over. But, print media is not dying, it is merely evolving.

Print media is still making its way into our lives whether we want to believe it or not. If you have ever seen a billboard or poster driving to the grocery store, or accepted an informational brochure about your dream vacation, then you have exposed yourself to print media. It is still everywhere.

The Effects of the Pandemic

It is well known that print media has been on the decline for years now. The industry itself is changing and COVID-19 exemplified that change. Even though change is not a bad thing, we are finding that there are many consumers out there that prefer to consume information through physical print.

Consumers to this day find print ads to be more trustworthy. According to a consumer survey, 42% percent said that print advertising was either somewhat or very trustworthy. In comparison, only 29% answered the same for search engine advertising and a meager 18% trusted internet websites. This showcases how consumers’ trust still leans towards the print media. They tend to become wary of online advertising (especially if they are not familiar with the brand) and this is made obvious by how many people utilize ad-blocking software.

Especially with the rise of the pandemic, we can see how consumers began relying on print media. Believe it or not, during quarantine more people began reading again. Reading regained traction and this can be seen by the dramatic increase in print and digital subscriptions.

As the media is evolving, we are seeing the print media industry evolve as well. Studies have shown that when print media is used heavily in omnichannel mixes. The collaboration of omnichannel mixes shows that print is actually boosting digital channels to help them score impressively high audience engagement and brand awareness. In all actuality, digital media needs print media to exist.

Even with the hit of COVID-19 and the decline of the print industry, print media is still a very lucrative business. In the United States, the total ad spend surpasses $60 billion in 2020.

Ending Note

When questioning if traditional print media is dead in the marketing industry, it would be a resounding NO. There are still plenty of ways to reach your target audience through traditional print. Overall, print is trustworthy, a brand booster, a breath of fresh air, and evolving with the times.