When your ad keeps on getting deliberately skipped, you are most probably targeting the wrong audience and providing content that they do not appreciate. Ads that don’t get skipped are those that are made with content that stirs the emotions of a targeted market. When you display your ads on the right platform, one where your target thrives, and construct it with the right narrative that moves the feelings of the audience, then you are on the right road to potential sales.
The Nitty Gritty
To appeal to your audience, you must know who they are, what they want, how they like things presented to them, and why they do the things they do.
More-often-than-not, people go to social media, streaming, games, podcasts and other platforms to fill their emotions and to be entertained. These outlets create dopamine and make the user feel good. If your ad feels like its stopping people from getting their dopamine fix, it will be seen as irritating and most likely will be skipped.
Imagine playing an online game and you’re in the zone. You’re transitioning to one of the most exciting levels and it is loading to get there. You land on the level but it pauses for 30 sec so you can watch a forced ad to be gifted with extra equipment. Annoying right? Why can’t they just let you play!?
If your ad blocks potential customers from getting what they want, they will get irritated and skip or close it. That is not good news. This makes your ad useless and useless ads waste money.
The What About Ads
Pop-ups, page takeovers, online ads that play automatically and commercials that interrupt someone’s Spotify playlist are just a few of the methods advertisers try to get consumers to give them attention.
One of the most prevalent forms of digital ad format is the “pre-roll,” which shows before a video or a game, and can be skipped after a certain duration. In 2020 around $17bn in the U.S. alone was spent by businesses on digital ads.
IPG’s statistics says 65% of individuals skip online video promotions, and they do so as soon as they are allowed to. Most of them skip ads out of habit, with 76 % confirming that they do so because it’s an embedded behaviour.
Therefore you should be careful when posting ads online – they can be costly if you don’t optimize your goal, form and content. Paying for ads that don’t work is a sink hole you want to avoid.
The Skip/Close Zone
Ads get closed or skipped because the people watching them are disinterested in them and don’t want other material to get in between them and the consumption of the desired material.
It is wise to have a good understanding of the characteristics of skip-worthy ads. Knowing these, you’ll see the holes you will want to stay away from and avoid altogether stumbling onto wasted resources and efforts spent on materials that people will eventually dismiss.
Remember that when people start skipping your ads, they can develop a habit of discarding your brand in any form. You don’t want your brand to be associated with the words “skip”, “close” or “not this again”. Such terms need to be avoided at all costs as changing your brand’s perception in the public eye after these terms have stuck is a very, very difficult and costly exercise. Sometimes the damage can be permanent with disastrous impacts on the reputation of your business.
When you know the things that make ads ugly, you’ll know what not to do with your promotions.
It’s Not For Me
People skip ads because the content, context and product line promoted is not for them. If you’re a DIY junkie, you’ll readily skip cosmetics ads. Many marketers think they can just place ads everywhere and hope to catch prospects. If you don’t know how to use digital technology that places your ads in the right place, at the right time, and displays them to the right people, your marketing campaign is in peril.
It’s Not Interesting
Even if you your viewer is interested in your product or service, if the way your ad plays doesn’t stand out, it might get skipped. Ads that sell the same or similar product or service over and over get closed more often. People skip ads for products they have already seen especially if they don’t give users an emotional impact. An ad that doesn’t appeal to one’s emotions, no matter the product, will result in no other action but a skip. Ads that do not create feelings of curiosity are bound for the skip-zone.
It Looks Too Good To Be True
Many people dislike advertisements that are cocky and full of “basic” clichés or bad, tacky over-acting dialogue. Digital marketers are best to leave the fabricated-feeling ads to big companies who only need to inform people, not move people. It works for them, but not us.
It is Hard-Selling
Too many times, marketers advertise brand-heavy. This is an overbearing way to appeal to people. It gives ads a pretentious, self-absorbed, plastic, inauthentic feel. Testimonials that are clearly canned and scripted are cringe inducing. Displayed content that an ad doesn’t deserve makes an ad send a message of a brand’s self-worship.
It’s Too Much
When ads have too much action in them, too many things happening, it gives a chaotic, itchy feeling you want to escape. Ads like these veers away from the focus you need audiences to have on the feelings you want to induce and the products you want to associate with them.
For example very time Old Spice releases new ads, almost nobody skips them. Furthermore, people become reminded of the old adverts and start re-watching them. Why? Because the ad design is far from being basic, they have a properly thought-of narrative, they imbue the right production quality and are generally very funny. Their hyper-masculine comedy ads have even become something people look forward to watching. Now that’s good advertising.
Ads that Work
Ads that work are those that are well-done, have authenticity, have a certain audience care feel to them, and trigger emotions that attract attention and convince people to learn more about the product or service. Furthermore they only work if they are shown to the people who are interested in the type of product or service in the first place. Also they are shown to the audience at the right time and on the right platform – and proper SEO content services can help you with all of this.
To help you know more about interesting ads that work, re-watch Super Bowl commercial favourites and dissect them – you’ll find there’s a lot to learn from those expensive ads. In 2019, the average cost of a 30-second ad was $5.25 million. These advertisers make sure they get the money back with arguably the best ad content in the country.
PPC services by Kas Andz Marketing Group can help you optimize the way you find who your products and ads will work best with.
We can help grow your business exponentially. Knowing the right way of online advertising can get your audiences from prospect to loyal customer, increasing sales and expanding your enterprise.
