Why advertise online?

To succeed on the Internet, marketers need to provide relevant and personalised content to attract traffic and encourage repeat visits.

Successfully done, the Internet can provide returns in one of six areas:

Brand Building: The Internet plays an important and cost-effective role in building brand awareness among consumers. Unlike other media that expect little involvement from the consumer beyond passive attention, the Internet enables users to interact and build a relationship with the brand. Companies that harness the interactivity of the Internet in their campaigns will win over competitors that don't, both in terms of brand development and sales.

Direct Marketing: Online databases, coupled with email and action-oriented campaigns make the Internet a powerful direct marketing tool. The ability to understand, reach and reward users enables the Internet to deliver high quality leads without the costs normally associated with traditional direct mail.

Customer Service: Customer service is a key differentiator for many firms. The Internet provides the ability to listen to and communicate with consumers immediately and at low cost. Firms can use the Internet to enhance customer service in one of three ways: feedback: email reduces response times, costs and improves image; loyalty programs: rewards users resulting in longer-term relationships; service and post-purchase: maintains open communication channels.

Online Sales: E-commerce is a booming market. The development and acceptance of secure payment technologies has enabled firms to broaden the payment options offered to consumers to the Internet.

Market Research: Visitors to websites automatically provide information about their interests as they visit and navigate through the site. When this information is captured in a database and viewed in aggregation, a detailed consumer profile is created. The Web also provides the opportunity to survey users effectively at low cost.

Cross Promotion Opportunities: The Internet allows advertisers to integrate their marketing and communication strategy like no other medium. Online promotion spending currently lags behind online ad expenditures. The tables will turn, however, as promotions exceed expectations by providing relevant offers, immediate participation, reasonable value, and low participation effort.

Competitions: It's a simple fact that people love to win. Ninemsn has had great results running online competitions for clients as well as its own brands. Online competitions can be built around online voting, email responses or interactive games.

News

Spam Act now in force
Australia now has a spam act to protect citizens from unsolicited email sent from within Australia.

To see how this affects your e-business click here to read.