So your digital media campaign is in full swing. Now, what? By taking an analytical, objective look at what is and isn’t working throughout the duration of your campaign, you can enhance overall performance. Depending on your campaign’s main KPI, there are different optimizations to be considered. For example, a branding campaign may be focused on driving as much traffic (sessions) to a landing page as possible. A more defined digital campaign could be focused on increasing the number of a specific conversions on a site, such as hotel bookings.

While in-flight optimizations vary according to the specifics of a digital campaign, below are some places to look when getting started:

Ad performance

Overall impressions, clicks and click-through rate (CTR): Your click-through rate is the best jumping off point when assessing the success of a display campaign. For standard display ads, aim to decrease your overall cost per click (CPC). At the same time, be wary of tactics delivering a CTR that is too high, this may be proof of click fraud or bot traffic.

Click-through rate by creative, ad size, ad type (image vs. video vs. HTML, etc.): If you’re running multiple creative versions, it’s important to understand which message is resonating most with your audience. This knowledge will help you optimize the current campaign by increasing the weight of impressions being delivered by way of the most popular creative. This type of insight into your audience will also be helpful when planning future marketing initiatives down the road.

Study and compare publisher and platform performance as well. Inevitably some sites are going to generate greater traffic than others, so optimize accordingly. Communicate with the vendor reps constantly to work toward growing conversions for the campaign. And never be afraid to shift budget away from those that are not pulling their weight.

Landing page behavior

Sessions: Studying sessions – and what people are ultimately doing during those sessions – is paramount. Determine which tactics are your highest sessions drivers. Analyze efficiency. Are there tactics that are driving up your overall cost per session?

Bounce rate: Sessions are important, but only if the people who visit your landing page stay and engage with your content, as opposed to “bouncing” straight off the page. Benchmarks for paid media vary by industry, but if your bounce rate is high, adjust your tactics.

Time on site, pages per session: Are certain tactics driving more engaged visitors to your site than others? Are visitors clicking through to various pages of the site for more information? Engaged visitors – those spending more time on your site – can equate to greater value for the brand and lead to greater conversion.

Events/custom conversions: Arguably the most important elements you want to study, these will depend on your landing page. When running a campaign with a more focused KPI, we tend to see more success from clients utilizing landing pages with specific calls-to-action that can be counted as a conversion, rather than just driving visitors to the homepage. Examples of conversions on a landing page include filling out a form, completing a video, downloading a brochure, completing a booking, etc. Keeping an eye on your cost per event/conversion is another great way to assess which tactics are outperforming others.

Here at Morgan & Co., in-flight optimizations are a crucial part of every campaign we run. By understanding how all components of a digital media campaign are performing and interacting with each other, and how they drive sales and growth, we help our clients knock their marketing goals out of the park. To explore how we can help you reach your business goals, contact us today.