Digital marketing opens your business to a demographic incomparably larger than what can be attracted locally. It is cost-effective, and it is measurable. Using it will enable you to interact with potential clients and learn more about their needs, it will extend your reach globally, it will save you money, it will create brand loyalty, and it will give you instant feedback. So why the procrastination? Why isn't every single large and small business using it? 

The fact is, its very potential and size can be daunting, I could throw a dollar at the new york stock exchange, but it will be a dollar lost unless I direct it to the right place. Digital marketing sounds great, but if we trivialise it, then we run the risk of losing our money by buying something that's of no use to us. 

For that reason, we have decided to offer a very approachable and peek at five of the best performing digital ad formats that will give you the most bang for your buck. 

Digital Marketing is here to improve the customer experience, solve a problem and make money.

Liquid skins

Liquid Skins is a fully responsive format that works on desktop, mobile, and tablet screens, enabling high-impact creative solutions. For multi-device activations, it allows buyers to enable multi-platform campaigns from their own DSPs, agencies, advertisers, and publishers to exchange via Google's DoubleClick Bid Manager, Appnexus with enhanced creatives and high-impact formats.

Appetite first applied for the new format in a programmatic advertising campaign for Nissan across the Middle East, a dynamic clock promoting the brand's 100-hour sale, sold through Appetite's partner, MMP WorldWide is the leader in programmatic advertising space in the MENA region. The campaign ran in both Arabic and English and earned a CTR of over five times the industry average.

Jenny Stanley, founder, and CEO of Appetite Creative, said:

"We've always prided ourselves on our creative ability, and we love to combine that with new technology. We are excited to offer this new format and the specific CTR it provided since our initial launch with Nissan in the Middle East.

You can see how good it can be right here.

With such a vast range of options available such as carousels, video, moving parallax images, Liquid Skins are the largest format available that is compliant with Google and IAB guidelines.

Advertising through WhatsApp: An undervalued opportunity

WhatsApp has 1.5 billion users in 180 countries, and 65 billion messages are shared per day through it.

Whereas Facebook, Instagram, and most of your ¨usual¨ social media feeds are overwhelmed with marketing promotions messages, WhatsApp engagement is still very underused by brands. WhatsApp ad share message is less common and therefore more efficient in driving engagement.

We innovated by being the first global agency in the world to enable WhatsApp sharing in a banner ad. We did it for Pandora, who asked us to help them with their marketing. We came up with the idea of creating a display ad that enables WhatsApp. In fact, we realised that click to WhatsApp ads is more effective than the usual click-to-call ads. The user can click on the WhatsApp icon and choose to share the message with a contact or send a message directly to the brand. The results were impressive: 7% CTR, which is way higher than the benchmark. Moreover, we innovated by being the first in the world agency to create a WhatsApp shareable banner ad.

This type of ad is particularly effective for customers who would like to give gift hints to their families or partners, check out hotels and holiday destinations, share vouchers and offers.

And then there's our direct messaging option. Have your audience start a conversation with your brand immediately after seeing an offer of a product they like. There is no reason that we can't book a test drive, ask a question or even purchase a service - all from WhatsApp.

Forget click to call, or email... have a direct instantaneous conversation with your audience where they are!

Shimmer Banners

Simmer Banners such as this one for Adidas are available on both mobile and desktop. A new and innovative solution to bringing your product to your customer, they are high impact and offer the invaluable option of containing a video. Video is more engaging to the senses, so it can convey more information by showing and telling at the same time, short videos are becoming more important as companies like Amazon reporting that adding a video ad to a product description increases the chances of a shopper buying that item by up to 35%.

On top of that is the sharing option, a lot of people who like your video will share it with their followers and friends on social media. In fact, more than 700 videos are shared by Twitter users every minute. 

Instant Purchase 

Today, customers want to have fast and quality services or products at the click of a button. Audiences are getting smaller and abandoned shopping carts are increasing, so we need to find a way to establish a direct, safe, and quality purchase method.

Imagine that you want to buy your favourite product and that you want to do it quickly, easily, and safely, just one click away. Instant purchase format increases purchases by 60% because it makes them easy and safe. No more worries about slow loading websites, long shopping processes, or waiting for consumers to fill their baskets. This format simplifies the shopping process and encourages customers to buy faster and more securely. The option to share and buy increases traffic, brand awareness, and sales.

We set up a secure and straightforward instant purchase option for pharmaceutical giant Boots, a quick and easy format to speed up the buying process and increase sales. By using electronic payment technology, we enable users to buy directly from the ads. In this case, users can pay with PayPal directly from the ad. This facilitates the payment process and consequently increases purchases. All sales and delivery channels are recorded and handled by the retailers' current processes, without the need for changes. For the user: no time-consuming and complicated shopping processes, no wasted time, and no abandoned carts due to lack of time and desire. Research tells us that, on average, there are six steps to a retailer's payment process with more than half of its users abandoning the purchase. With our adform Instant Purchase, users can purchase the desired product in seconds.

Playable Ads

Playable ads achieve positive results by tapping into the potency of gaming. While being entertaining and engaging, they also collect rich pools of engagement data that allow brands to optimise their offering, understand consumers better or match the correct product or services to an audience. With a voucher redemption rate of only 3%, Starbucks knew that it needed to offer more. Appetite Creative devised a game based on the classic, and addictive, cup flip challenge, using the instantly recognisable Starbucks cup. Scores were shareable, and points added up to earn vouchers that could be used in the store. The game had an average 30-second dwell time, a massive 90 percent engagement, and an average of 60 secs engagement time per user. Crucially, voucher download targets were smashed by over 110%.

Digital advertising has become the norm. With every generation that comes, more is demanded from it. With options such as buying programmatically on many of the above, costs will be lower, and impressions will be higher. They are safe, contextual, relevant, and respectful of consumer privacy. Whether you're an experienced tech-savvy entrepreneur or you'd just like to take a curious look, We would love to have a chat and answer any questions you might have.