A question any business owner will ask themselves throughout their career is, “how do I get my name out there?” Properly getting the business name out there too, with front page Google results and high social media views is very difficult and can take years to accomplish. However, there is a solution for this that can boost your business to the front of these platforms' pages and into your prospects’ minds as a result. Online paid ads can accomplish a significant amount of your visibility and if done properly and funded well, your client base could skyrocket. There are a number of different options that can get confusing for business owners but wrapping your head around it is the first step.

Search Ads

Pay ads tend to be split up into two different categories- search ads and display ads. Search ads appear when a specific request has been typed into a search engine. Depending on how much you are willing to pay for these ads, they have the potential to appear at the top of the Google search bar when a user types in the words you have requested. “Financial Advisor New York” for example would be a highly competitive set of keywords and would cost more than an obscure set of words. Many search ads are structured as PPC, which stands for Pay Per Click. Your bill is dependant on how many times users are clicking on your ad, which gives you confidence that you are getting value for money. For search engine ads, you will be allocated a particular amount of keywords so it is important to do your research and find out exactly what words will be associated with your business. 

Display Ads

Unlike search ads, display ads can be placed anywhere around the internet. They are paired with a picture of some kind and have evolved over the years to blend in more smoothly with the website it inhibits. they were typically an annoying, flashing bar beside a website, but now display ads have made an effort to ‘fit in’ with the website in order to increase click through rate. Best strategies would be to include words displaying deals or direct questions in the text of the ad. Although this is a bit of a dying area of paid ads, there is still a lot of potential if the advertiser can choose effective websites to use.

Social Media Ads

Social media ads are the up and coming movement of paid digital ads. The way these ads can blend into a newsfeed seamlessly and come across as a post in itself can create a large amount of traffic. Not to mention that you can create ads through social media via free posting as well. Facebook has received unrelenting criticism for its strategy on ad placement, but as a business owner this is an excellent place to start for social media. The platform is the most used outlet and offers a way to set specific audiences, placements and budgeting so you can have the ideal ad spreading your name. LinkedIn and Instagram both offer very customizable and effective paid ad schemes as well.

Paid ads can be overlooked by many and viewed as not being worth it because it can be difficult to see direct results from the money you're spending. However, digital ad spend will grow over $129 billion in the US and it is rapidly becoming the highest spend in marketing for businesses. You won’t want to be left behind your competitors after they have spent a portion of their budget on digital ads. Getting your name out there and creating a positive representation for your business in the online space will grow your advising practice.