• The Google Display Network has partnered with a range of platforms, allowing businesses to create targeted ads that reach their audience.
• The clever targeting options mean you can more or less create a profile for your customers and align your ads with the demographics to improve ROI.
• Don't know where to start? Don't worry. In this guide for small businesses, we break down how the Google Display Network works and how to get started.

Google’s Display Network allows businesses to advertise on websites that have partnered within Google’s network. This means websites have opened in to allow other websites to advertise on their page. Google’s Display Network allows businesses to advertise using text adverts, images and videos in different sizes.

According to Double Click Ad Planner, Google’s Display Network reaches over 83% of unique Internet users around the world, with the ability to include people who speak more than twenty languages over a hundred countries.

With the ability to use other websites to advertises, SME’s can unquestionably benefit from using the Display Network as an adverting medium.

Undeniably, SME’s can consider the ability to improve brand awareness, reaching more potential customers, and being able to reconnect with their target market in a unique way.  

This article will demonstrate:

• How the Google Display Network works,
• How SME’s can target their market using Google’s Display Network and;
• Six unique benefits to using the Display Network for SMEs.

What Is the Google Display Network Ad Planner?

Google’s Display Network allows advertisers to use text, image and video adverts to appear on websites that have a partnership with Google. The text adverts, images and videos are required to be formatted in accordance with Google’s guidelines. Some of Google’s partnership include:

• Google Finance
• Google Blogger
• YouTube
• Gmail
• Many more beyond the Google affiliate network itself.

How Can SMEs Reach Their Target Market on the Google Display Network?

Google’s Display Network is unique in the way you can target your market. When people visit a page, Google can track their cookies; this allows Google to identify information about the person using the computer.

This information is recorded in the Display Planner, which shows a percentage of the gender, age, and location within each topic and interest available in Google’s categories. With Google’s ability, you may set your campaign to contextual target your campaign by matching keywords with webpage’s or choose the websites or placements you appear on using managed placements.

Targeting Options on Google's Display Network

The four main methods of targeting on Google Display Network are:

1. Interest Categories 
2. Topic Targeting
3. Contextual Targeting
4. Remarketing

1. Interest Categories 

There are over 1000 categories that you can choose, this will show your advert to people based on what they like. For example, you are a travel agent, and then you can choose ‘travel’ as an interesting topic.

This will deliver your advert to people that Google has browsing history that suggests they are interested in ‘travel’, even though their site they are on maybe on another topic, for example ‘computers’.

2. Topic Targeting

Advertisers can link their site to topics that are more relevant to their product and/or service. For example, an ecommerce store that sell cricket material, you may choose the topic ‘Cricket’ and appear on sites that are about cricket.

3. Contextual Targeting

Contextual targeting allows advertises to match keywords that are automatically built based on keywords used on an advertiser’s webpage.

4. Remarketing

Remarketing allows advertisers to show their advert to customers that visited their webpage. This gives advertisers the ability to re-engage customers, or up-sell related products and or services. 

The Benefits of Advertising on Google’s Display Network

Evidently, Google’s Display Network has the ability to advertise to your target market in a very unique way. It allows advertisers to think about their customer in a different capacity – more or less being able to create a profile for their customer.

In addition to being able to appear on different websites, you also have to ability to control your advertising in various ways. The benefits of advertising on the Google Display Network are:

1. Target a specific gender
2. Target a specific age demographic
3. Choose which device to appear on
4. Remarketing
5. Brand awareness
6. Geo-targeting 

1. Target a specific gender

Only want to advertise to men or only women? Well, due to Google’s ability to collect browsing cookies, and create gender profiles from this information, your advert can appear to either or both gender.

2. Target a specific age demographic

With the collection of cookies, Google has separated ages into brackets; this gives the advertisers the power to choose which ages they want to market to. In turn, giving control of the market back to the advertiser. 

3. Choose which device to appear on

Google’s Display network has the ability to record which medium you are advertising on. For example, potential customers viewing you from mobiles, mobile apps, tablets and/or desktops. This allows you to manage your budget according to based on your sales. With the increase of downloading and engagement with apps, being able to appear on relevant apps and websites, allows you to expand your advertising.

4. Remarketing

When someone visits your website using Google’s Display network and did not perform a favourable action, such as sign up to your newsletter or buy anything, then you can have your adverts follow them. With Google’s ability to collect browsing cookies, advertisers can use this to target potential customers that were interested in your offer in the first place.

5. Brand awareness

Brand management is of the most important aspects of marketing. Investing in your brand’s positioning, that being how your customer’s view of your brand, gives advertisers the ability to build an appropriate association with your brand. Respectively, you are able to expand your brand name and even logo to a larger audience.

6. Geo-targeting

Whether or not you can service a whole city or only your local community, you can still use Display advertising. With Google’s geo-targeting, advertisers are able to have radius targets around campaigns, which can have their adverts appear to their market.          

Final Remarks   

This article aims to show SME’s how Google’s display advertising can work for you. Regardless of your goal on Display, it is indisputable to say that Google’ display network is a unique method of advertising to your target market.