Online Advertising: The 20 Ad Formats with the Best ROI

When we advertise online today, marketers have so many different ad formats at their disposal that the decision may seem impossible. We don’t want to miss any business opportunities, but being present everywhere is impossible, so we have to know how to filter and choose the most effective strategies.

To make this choice, the first thing we have to look at is the stage in which users are in the conversion funnel. It is not the same to target someone who barely knows our brand as it is to someone who is comparing prices to buy. To make the decision easier for you, here are the 20 ad formats with the best ROI, divided by stages. Here we go!

The Best Ad Formats for Online Advertising

Ad formats with the best ROI for the TOFU phase

In this phase, the best online advertising formats are the ones that manage to attract the user’s attention and encourage their interest in the brand, since they do not yet know enough about it.

• 1) Video Ads. Video is one of the most successful content on social networks over the last year. Take advantage of this trend with videos that tell a story while conveying your brand’s values.
• 2) Content marketing. A classic, but no less effective. With a good long-term content strategy, you will attract new users to your brand.
• 3) Digital Signage. This ad format combines outdoor advertising (ads in shopping malls or on the street) with digital elements transmitted through screens.
• 4) Display advertising. Display is very appropriate for campaigns focused on generating brand awareness. Today, you don’t have to limit yourself to banners with text and images, but you can bet on video and interactive elements. Of course, you will have to be careful with ad blockers.
• 5) Social Ads Acquisition (Exploration phase). Social media ads are one of the most flexible online advertising formats, so we’ll see how they are repeated throughout the different phases. In this case, we’ll focus on ads to engage new users through their interests and behaviors.
• 6) Social Awareness. Simply put, it’s about letting consumers know who we are and what our brand is about.

Ad formats with the best ROI for the MOFU phase

In this intermediate phase of online advertising, consumers are in the middle of the buying cycle. They have already identified their need, have become aware of different products or services that solve it, and are comparing their options.

• 7) Social remarketing. In the MOFU phase, we seek to influence users who already know our brand but have not yet made a purchase. For this reason, we will focus our remarketing options on users who have simply visited our website.
• 8) Social Ads Acquisition (discovery phase). Here we can refine the focus of our social ads a little more, for example, by carrying out acquisition campaigns based on the competition.
• 9) Social Ads Lead Generation. At the moment, this ad format is exclusive to Facebook. As the name suggests, it is based on capturing new leads through social networks. The user can leave their contact details without having to visit another page.
• 10) Social Ads Prospecting. This type of ad selects the audience based on the data we have provided, for example, a database of users interested in our brand.
• 11) Affiliate marketing. The middle phase of the conversion funnel is the right time to start affiliate marketing, where our ads or promotions are run on third-party sites, whether individuals or businesses.
• 12) Recruitment emailing. It is based on impacting users by email, but instead of using our database, we resort to that of a third party whose contacts may be interested in our brand.

Ad formats with the best ROI for the BOFU phase

We are already in the final phase, in which the user is ready to make the decision to buy. Getting the right format and communication right is essential to getting the maximum number of conversions possible.

• 13) Social retargeting. Here we will focus on users who have already expressed a very clear interest in the product, that is, who are in the decision phase.
• 14) Remarketing or retargeting of acquisition. Aimed at repeat purchases, that is, we will only target users who have already purchased from our e-commerce.
• 15) Social lookalike (similar audiences). Similar audiences are a targeting option available on Facebook and Instagram and are based on targeting audiences that are very similar to an already defined audience, for example, the buyers of our products. To achieve the best ROI, we can restrict the similar audience to the 1% most similar to our base audience. In this way, we will only target the users who are most likely to convert.
• 16) SEO. Although this type of advertising on the internet is useful in all phases, we must not forget that we can use it for keywords aimed at purchase.
• 17) SEM. Here we can launch both branded campaigns (users who search for the specific product) and non-branded campaigns (in which the keywords do not include any brand).
• 18) Cash-back affiliation. This type of affiliate marketing is characterized by the affiliate (company or website) receiving a commission when users perform some action on the site, for example, clicking on an affiliate link.
• 19) Affiliation by coupons. Similar to the previous one, but the commission received is of the coupon type.
• 20) Affiliation in comparison sites. An online advertising format that is characterized by making use of websites for comparing offers and prices, making our product or service stand out from the competition in some way.