What is the bare minimum needed to launch a Digital Advertising campaign?
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If you are a small business owner and you are looking to purchase advertisements online, below is an overview of the bare minimum that is needed to start that first campaign. Keep in mind- this is the bare minimum needed to get your campaign up and running and is by no means what it takes to launch a successful Digital Advertising Campaign. If you want to know more details on how to start a successful Digital Advertising campaign, check out more details in - What is needed to start a successful online Digital Advertising campaign?
Budget
Before you start any advertising campaign, you want to first outline a specific budget for your Digital Advertising campaign. This may sound like a no-brainer, but it’s important to outline specifically how much you are willing to spend over the life of the campaign, and how much you want to spend over a given period (weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc). Depending on what type of Digital Advertising Campaign you want to run, budget minimums can vary. If you have small budgets (under $1,000 up to $50k), I recommend starting with a Digital Advertising Network with mass scale such as Facebook- (Meta Ads Manager), Amazon (Amazon Ads Manager), or Google (Google Ads), as they tend to have mass reach and can be more efficient with pricing. Any type of high impact takeover or tentpole sponsorship (such as the Super Bowl) would typically require larger budgets and a minimum spend. If you have budgets over $50k and are looking to spend more than $100k over the course of a year, it may be best to work directly with a content provider’s digital advertising sales team
Targeting
What is your targeting audience? Are you looking to reach anyone (General Market or P2+ or “Persons Age 2 years+), or are you looking to reach a specific targeting audience using data targeting? For more information about Data Targeting, check out- Digital Advertising and Data Targeting- What is it, and How does it work? Targeting options vary and are dependent on the content provider.
Flight
Most content providers will need to know your flight dates, or simply the dates that you want to start and end the campaign. These dates are important because inventory availability and pricing tend to shift and vary based on many factors including how much inventory is available during a given flight.
Creative Assets
What assets do you have, and what assets can you create? Do you want to run Banner Ads, Video Ads, or maybe a combination of both? Always make sure that creative assets match the spec requirements required. For more information about this, check out- Digital Advertising and Creative Assets for more details.
Content
What type of content are you looking to run in? Do you want to run in health-related content or Sports content? Do you specifically want to run across CTV or Connected TV, or are you open to running across the entire online digital advertising landscape, including social media?
Once you have figured out your budget, targeting, fight, assets, and content that you want to run in—you essentially have everything that is needed to start a Digital Advertising Campaign. You would then work with your preferred content providers either via a self service platform— Facebook- (Meta Ads Manager), Amazon (Amazon Ads Manager), or Google (Google Ads) to name a few—- or by working with a Digital Content Provider’s advertising sales team through an RFP process to purchase the inventory.
As I mentioned previously, this is the bare minimum needed to get your campaign up and running and is by no means what it takes to launch a successful Digital Advertising Campaign. I highly suggest that you check out- What is needed to start a successful online Digital Advertising campaign?, and take the time to build out your campaign’s strategy, goals, objectives, KPIs, and pricing goals prior to starting any Digital Advertising Campaign.
