IP Targeting: the Next Generation of Internet Advertising
By Kevin Reynolds, Director of Client Strategy, TruStar Marketing, LLC
The browser cookie transformed digital marketing by serving relevant ads based on user behavior. But a rising tide of privacy regulations and cookie-blocking technology has made it now harder for digital marketers to manage and measure targeted campaigns.
While cookie-based ads still work, digital marketers will need a new and better method to reach consumers, one that is reliable and compliant with the security measures of today’s browsers.
And that’s where Internet Protocol Targeting comes in.
Internet Protocol (IP) Targeting is a hyper-targeted advertising practice that allows marketers to reach specific addresses, office buildings and even suite numbers based on their physical location. This advertising method uses IP addresses, which are a series of numbers assigned to every device that uses the internet.
The location of these internet-connected digital devices can be identified and differentiated from other devices using IP addresses. Each individual IP address can be used to connect marketers and businesses to their prospects.
IP Targeting vs. Cookies
Cookies are small files sent by a website and stored on your computer to be used by a web browser like Chrome or Safari. Tracking cookies can travel with your visitors to other webpages and notify retargeting platforms, which can serve relevant ads based on behavior. For example, when someone visits your product landing page and leaves with a cookie, you can send ads for your product even when your visitor goes to another website.
Since these tracking cookies can compile long-term records of someone’s browsing history, it sparked privacy concerns. Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) provide consumers more transparency of when cookies are present and whether they can track their web browsing.
IP targeting works without cookies because IP addresses cannot be blocked or deleted. This means you can stay connected to your prospects every time they visit websites that display ads.
Target ads with precision
IP targeting gives you the ability to deliver incredibly relevant ads to only your target.
For example, with IP targeting, advertisers can show a digital ad only to homeowners that are about to be 65 years old, have a household income of $70,000, are single and love traveling.
TruPoint Account-Based Marketing, TruStar’s IP targeting service, can match physical addresses to IP addresses with extreme precision. Once a match is confirmed, we can begin serving your display or video banner ad on websites that only those people visit. Since your ads reach the exact target household, you will have zero wasted impressions or budget.
This is much more precise than geotargeting, a similar technology that uses groups of IP addresses to target a certain location. Geotargeting blankets an area, while IP targeting reaches an exact target.
Once the home IP address is identified, the mobile IP address can typically be found as well, or vice versa. IP identification technology allows you to reach your leads whether they are on the internet, on their home desktop or mobile device.
Who is IP targeting useful for?
IP Targeting is useful for any business that wants to reach a specific audience with a relevant message, such as banks, credit unions, car dealerships and even colleges. IP Targeting also provides countless marketing opportunities for healthcare companies since they can target specific households or businesses.
For example, pediatricians may want to reach households with children under the age of 12. By using a mailing list of women with children in the household, they can show their digital ads to those individual households rather than displaying their ads to all the viewers of a certain website or social media network.
How are results measured?
Results for an IP targeting campaign can be measured in a couple of ways:
● Click-through rate in real-time
● Conversions, once the data is available to match
Since individual households are targeted, marketers can match new appointments or patient data to those individual households and see if they clicked. Marketers can determine if the patient was on their target list and if they clicked prior to their appointment.
Matching real patient data to a target list is a more reliable ROI calculation method than relying on a patient to indicate that they saw your print ad or received a mailer.
For a demonstration of how TruPoint Account-Based Marketing can help send the right message to the right person at the right time, contact me at kreynolds@trustarmarketing.com, call 615.371.6112, or click the button below.
TruStar Marketing fuses the art and science of marketing to improve your business. We specialize in health care, insurance and high-tech manufacturing industries. Digital marketing that works stars with a free introductory call.