Many advertisers are turning to social media over other advertising channels. According to research from Invesp and AdWeek, brands are expected to spend $15 billion on social advertising in 2018.
Some social media sites are taking advantage of big data to offer better services to their advertisers. As a result, demand for social advertising is expected to rise further in the coming years.
Big Data is Revolutionizing Digital Marketing
The cost of Facebook ads rose 122% between 2014 and 2015. Why are advertisers willing to pay so much more to reach customers through Facebook?
Facebook collects a tremendous amount of data on their users. This allows advertisers to carefully tailor their ads to their target demographic.
Facebook analytics chief Ken Rudin told CIO Journal that big data gives it a tremendous edge over other social media sites.
“Before placing ads directly into mobile user new feeds, the company ran data analysis to gauge both user reaction as well as the optimal ratio of ads to user-generated content. ‘Data analysis had a huge impact on the development of mobile advertising,’ Mr. Rudin said. ‘I am not sure we would have had the nerve to throw ads into the news feed without it.’”
How Do Social Advertisers Leverage Big Data?
Facebook stores a tremendous amount of data on its users. Savvy advertisers take advantage of this data to create highly profitable campaigns. Here are some of the ways Facebook advertisers are taking advantage of big data.
Retargeting
The average customer needs to interact with a brand seven times before making a purchase. Retargeting is a very effective way to get repeat exposure for your ads.
Facebook stores data on various websites its users visit. This allows advertisers to create display ads to people that have previously interacted with their website. In 2014, 67% of advertisers used this feature.
Track Popular Content
Identifying your target market is the first step to creating a successful advertising campaign. You also need to create content that appeals to your users. Facebook Graph Search allows advertisers to identify the most popular content on the web, so they can create similar content for their own campaigns.
Match User Ad Tastes
Facebook requests feedback from their users to improve the quality of their advertising platform. This ensures users only see ads that relate to them.
Use Smart Forms For Users:
Many eCommerce forms are very bland. Fortunately, there are a number of custom forms available. These forms are much more visually appealing and are designed to boost conversion rates.
Real-time Data Analysis
Digital marketers need to rely on up-to-date information to create effective campaigns. Facebook stores data in real-time, which allows advertisers to react to new trends.
Monetize with Data
Data is an extremely valuable commodity. According to some experts, companies like appnext will purchase nearly $40 billion worth of big data in 2016. Facebook and other social media companies are mining as much data as possible, because it is so beneficial for their advertisers.
The Cloud Will Boost Social Advertising and Big Data Use
Big data plays a very important role in social advertising. However, social networking sites need to use sophisticated hardware, such as SSD solid state drives, to store it. Without this technology, Facebook and other social media platforms would be unable to store the data their advertisers need.