Many events and developments had an impact on how online advertising works today, but two of them stand out. The first is Facebook’s decision to incorporate ads into its users’ feeds. Other than the fact that this changed the way people saw and responded to advertisements online, it also gave smaller players a huge opportunity to enjoy profit – out with the bold banners on big portal sites, in with specifically targeted and budgeted campaigning.
The second event is Donald Trump’s rise to presidency. With that, came a surge of popularity to the term “fake news”. Sadly, it seems today that something is labeled that way, not as a result of fact-checking or crossing of information – people label something as “fake news” simply because they don’t agree with its content. That was bad news for the small players since social media tycoons (with Facebook on top) constantly change their advertising policies so they won’t be labeled as spreaders of such “fake news”.
The Alternative
Let’s take a step back to understand how this phenomenon actually happened. The fact that ads on Facebook and other social media platforms are seen as an integral part of a user’s post, means that the advertisers need to put an emphasis on the content of the ad. But, as we’ve seen, the content is very sensitive to being labeled as fake. The bottom line is that what started out as a battle against traditional media outlets ended up harming people who just want to make money from social media advertising.
All in all, it means small budget advertisers need to find another way to be noticed since Facebook and its peers are not going to give them an easy time. Lucky for those small advertisers, there is an alternative. Digital marketing platforms offer a different path to campaigning. We tried one of them out – Crystalead, and here are our thoughts.
The platform itself is very simple and easy to operate. It lets you create a digital campaign of your own and define its metrics (budget, spread, targeting, and so forth) without being complex – a three-step process. If you still feel this is too much work for you, you can also choose one of their tried and true templates. Once that is done, Crystalead publishes and distributes your ad through its many partner websites and technological tools.
Source: https://crystalead.com/index.html
Pros and cons
As we stated above, the upside is the fact that campaigning has become very simple with this tool. In addition, the agency supplies users with tutorials, guides, and live assistance on demand. All of that pretty much ensures you know what you are doing. Other than that, there’s also a team of expert analysts who examine your campaign’s data and success. They can advise you regarding further steps, but they also give you the data so you can analyze it by yourself (if you desire to do so).
On the downside, there is the matter of pricing. Naturally, it is more expensive than doing things on your own since there is an obvious commission for the use of the platform. On the other hand, people who have little understanding of campaigning should seriously consider paying a bit more to get the assurance their content is seen in the age of “fake news”. Moreover, the site offers different packages to suit all kinds of budgets once you enroll.
Bottom line
We took our time to get familiar with Crystalead’s tools and overall, we were quite impressed. While it is not the perfect platform for online advertising, such a thing probably doesn’t exist and Crystalead’s efforts seem close enough. Our review of the product is a positive one and our recommendation is to give it a try, especially if you’re new to the business.
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