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Five reasons why you should worry about where your online ads are shown

There is no denying that publicity via online advertisements can help take your business to new levels, as it allows a huge audience of people to see what your business has to offer. Online advertising is a cost effective way to be seen and increase sales, but it can also backfire if you end up placing your ads in the wrong places. Let’s take a look at five particular spots that you do not want your ads to be shown:

Illegal sites

Let us imagine for a moment that you have a great little website that sells movie posters for all the big Hollywood hits. Placing ads on movie sites may seem like a great idea, but do you really want to be on a website that is on the wrong side of the law. There are a ton of sites that allow users to download or stream illegal copies of movies. Yes, they may get a ton of targeted traffic, but you do not want your business to be a part of such a site, as it brings the legality and ethics of your own operation into question.

Wrong audience

When you place ads, you want them to appear in front of the people that are truly interested in what you have to offer. You may land a great advertising space on a busy website for a great price, but it will just be a waste of money if the said website has nothing to do with what you have to offer. The people that visit will simply disregard your ad in favor of something that does interest them instead.

Foreign market

Similar to the last point, advertising to foreign markets that simply have no interest in your products because of a difference in culture is useless. Furthermore, you may be advertising to a market that is even unable to purchase or make use of what you have to offer if they decide to click on your ad. It has been shown many times that aiming at a local audience always yields the best results. A good adserver with geotargeting capability can limit ad serving to the correct groups of people.

Site content

It is crucial that you understand the site and theme you are planning on placing ads on. Giving the site a quick look is not good enough. For example, giving a site a quick look helps you determine it is about sports and hence seems like a great place to sell your boxing equipment. But, if the site regularly runs articles about how violent the sport is and how it should be banned, you are essentially, once again, trying to sell to the wrong audience.

The message

At the heart of every advertising campaign lies your company message, where you essentially tell the consumer what you are all about. If you spend a great deal of time talking about family values and other similar details, do you really want your ads running on a site devoted to gambling or X-rated content? Again, these types of sites pull in a huge audience, but not necessarily the type that you are targeting.
Posted in Ad Fraud Ad Blocking September 08, 2016 (first published September 2014) Was this helpful? Yes / No

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