For our TrustED Conf 2021 VR World Tour, we heard from James Ohlson, an experienced Paid Media Specialist on how personas can be translated into paid media strategy.
First, we’ll dive into the 3 pillars of paid media: Search, Social, and Display & Programmatic, then we’ll take a look into the different platform targeting options before we jump into how you can define a paid media strategy for personas (with examples).
Paid Pillars
Search
- Keyword and Intent-based targeting primarily. Users know what they’re looking for.
- Behavioural and Interest-based audience targeting
- Geographical & Demographic targeting
- Custom audience lists and segments, similar audiences
Social
- Behavioural and Interest-based audience targeting. Users are relevant but may not be showing intent just yet.
- Custom audience lists and segments
- Lookalike Audiences
- External Platform Integration
- Geographic & Demographic targeting
Display Programmatic
- Behavioural, In-market, geographic and demographic audience definitions
- Custom audiences segments and similar audiences
- Ability to designate particular websites for placements and get highly targeted
Platform targeting options
Google Search Ads targeting options
- Keyword Targeting
- Demographic
- In-market / Affinity
- Custom Audiences / Similar Audiences
- Parental Status
- Marital Status
- Education
- Home-Ownership Status
- Employment
- Apparel & Accessories
- Arts & Crafts
- Autos & Vehicles
- Baby & Children’s Products
- Beauty & Personal Care
- Business Services
- Employment
- Event Tickets
- Financial Services
- Food
- Home & Garden
- Real Estate
- Software
- Telecom
- Travel
- And more….
Microsoft Search Ads targeting options
- Keyword Targeting
- LinkedIn Targeting
- Demographic
- In-market / Affinity
- Custom Audiences / Similar Audiences
- Apparel & Accessories
- Arts & Crafts
- Autos & Vehicles
- Baby & Children’s Products
- Beauty Products & Services
- Business & Industrial Products
- Business Services
- Seasonal Shopping
- Social
- Software
- Sports & Fitness
- Telecom
- Travel
- Vehicles
- And more….
Display & Programmatic targeting options
- Placement Definitions
- Demographic
- In-market / Affinity
- Custom Audiences / Similar Audiences
- Parental Status
- Marital Status
- Education
- Home-Ownership Status
- Employment
- Apparel & Accessories
- Arts & Crafts
- Autos & Vehicles
- Baby & Children’s Products
- Beauty & Personal Care
- Business & Industrial Products
- Business Services
- Computers & Peripherals
- Consumer Electronics
- Dating Services
- Education
- Employment
- Event Tickets
- Financial Services
- Food
- Gifts & Occasions
- Home & Garden
- Media & Entertainment
- Musical Instruments & Accessories
- Real Estate
- Seasonal Shopping
- Software
- Sport & Fitness
- Telecom
- Travel
- And more
Facebook Ads targeting options
Standard Targeting
- Location
- Age
- Gender
- Language
Detailed Targeting
- Education
- Financial
- Life Events
- Parents
- Relationship
- Work
- Business & Industry
- Entertainment
- Family and relationships
- Fitness and wellness
- Food and Drink
- Hobbies and activities
- Shopping & Fashion
- Anniversary
- Consumer Classification
- Digital activities
- Expats
- Mobile Device User
- Politics (US)
- Purchase behaviour
- Soccer Travel
- .. and more
Custom Audiences
- Website Users
- App Users
- Customer Lists
- Offline Activity (In-store)
- Video
- Lead form
- Instant Experience
- Shopping
- Events
- Facebook Page
- On-Facebook Listings
Lookalike Audiences
- Targets users similar to a defined custom audience segment, 1% degree of similarity to 10%
Here are statistics on Facebook and Instagram’s users by age group and gender in Australia:
Twitter Ads targeting options
Standard Targeting
- Location
- Age
- Gender
- Language
Advanced Targeting
- Keyword
- Follower Look-alikes
- Conversion Topics
Custom Audiences
- App Activity
- Customer List
- Website Activity
Lookalike Audiences
- Targets users similar to a defined custom audience segment
Interest Targeting
- Automotive
- Beauty
- Books & Literature
- Business
- Careers
- Education
- Events
- Family and Parenting
- Food and drink
- Gaming
- Health
- Hobbies & Interests
- Home and garden
- Law, government and politics
- Life stages
- Movies and TV shows
- Music and radio
- Personal Finance
- Pets
- Science
- Society
- Sports
- Style and fashion
- Technology and computing
- Travel
Statistics on Twitter users by age group in Australia:
LinkedIn Ads targeting options
Standard Targeting
- Location
- Language
Custom Audiences
- Company List
- Contact/Customer List
- Retargeting
- Company Page
- Events
- Lead gen form
- Video
- Website
- Third-Party Company
- Third-Party Contact
Lookalike Audiences
- Targets users similar to a defined custom audience segment
Detailed Targeting
Company
- Category
- Connections
- Followers of
- Growth Rate
- Industries
- Names
- Revenue
- Size
Demographics
- Age
- Gender
Education
- Degree
- Fields of Study
- Member School
Job Experience
- Job Functions
- Seniority
- Titles
- Member Skills
- Years of experience
Interests & Traits
- Member Groups
- Interests
- Traits
Illustration of LinkedIn users by age group in Australia:
Pinterest Ads targeting options
Standard Targeting
- Location
- Age
- Gender
- Language
- Device
Custom Audiences
- Pinterest Engagers
- Website Visitors
- Customer List
Actalike Audiences
- Targets users similar to a defined custom audience segment.
Detailed Targeting
- Keyword Based targeting
- Animals
- Architecture
- Art
- Beauty
- Children’s Fashion
- Design
- DIY
- Education
- Electronics
- Entertainment
- Event Planning
- Finance
- Food and Drinks
- Gardening
- Health
- Home Decor
- Men’s Fashion
- Parenting
- Quotes
- Sport
- Travel
- Vehicles
- Wedding
- Women’s fashion
Statistics of Pinterest users by age group in Australia:
Tik Tok Ads targeting options
Standard Targeting
- Location
- Age
- Gender
- Language
Custom Audiences
- Website Traffic
- Customer List
- Engagement
- App Activity
- Lead Form
Lookalike Audiences
- Targets users similar to a defined custom audience segment.
Detailed Targeting
- Education
- Automobiles
- Baby, Kids & Maternity
- Financial Services
- Beauty & Personal Care
- Tech & Electronics
- Appliances
- Travel
- Pets
- Apps
- Apparel & Accessories
- News & Entertainment
- Games
- Food & Beverage
- Sports & Outdoors
- Video Interactions
- Creator Interactions
Statistics of TikTok users by age group in Australia:
Sources: Social Media News and Napoleoncat
Let’s get into Personas
Men’s Clothing & Fashion Brand
Let’s use Dan as an example. A 28-year-old male living in Sydney, Australia who currently works as a Graphic Designer. Here are Dan’s challenges, behaviour, goals, and interests.
With all of this information from Dan’s persona, we were able to come up with an approach to a possible paid media strategy.
Persona into paid media strategy
Paid media strategy approach
Marketing Automation Software
Another example is Kate, a 35-year-old marketing director from a marketing automation software company. Kate has identified areas of improvement for her team and conducted some initial research into automation tools to help improve workflow.
With this information from Kate, here would be a possible paid media strategy:
Persona
Paid media strategy approach
If you want to see how you could be targeted by audience definitions (on google), head to this URL https://adssettings.google.com/
It works better if you log into your personal Google account. This is how Google sees my work profile:
