November 26, 2024 • 19 mins
Join Anthony Karls, President of Rocket Clicks, and digital marketing expert James Patterson as they dive into effective platform selection for paid media. Learn about the five stages of customer awareness, using CTV/OTT, search ads, and crafting compelling offers to boost your local business’s revenue.
00:00 Introduction to Revenue Roadmap
00:20 Reflecting on Marketing Careers
00:49 The Importance of Sales Experience in Marketing
03:44 Choosing the Right Platforms for Paid Media
04:35 Understanding the Five Stages of Awareness
06:58 Applying Awareness Stages to Platform Selection
09:31 Examples and Strategies for Platform Selection
12:22 Creating Effective Ads for Different Platforms
17:14 Measuring Success in Digital Marketing
18:58 Final Thoughts and Best Practices
Check out our blog!
https://rocketclicks.com/client-education/platform-selection-paid-media/
#DigitalMarketing #PPC #BusinessGrowth
Curious to discover your personalized roadmap to scaling a law firm, no matter where you are in the business?
Follow these steps:
1. BOOK A FREE 30-MINUTE AUDIT WITH US: https://rocketclicks.com/schedule-a-family-law-quick-audit/
2. CONNECT WITH US:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthonykarls/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/rocket-clicks
Facebook: http://facebook.com/2311.karls.anthony
http://facebook.com/RocketClicks
Instagram: http://instagram.com/karls.anthony
https://www.instagram.com/rocketclicks/
3. TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT:
Tell me in the comments if you liked this podcast and what other kinds of topics you would like to see.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Anthony Karls (00:00):
All right, this is Revenue Roadmap, where we
talk about driving revenue andincreasing profits in local
businesses.
I'm Anthony Carls, president ofRocketClicks.
Today I'm with Mr.
James Patterson again.
Thank you for joining me again,James.
So today we're going to talk alittle bit about platform
selection in the area of paidmedia.
(00:20):
Before we jump into that, I'vegot a question for you here,
James.
So, If you were, if you could goback in time, uh, at the start
of your career and give yourselfone piece of advice related to
marketing, what would it be andwhy?
James Patterson (00:41):
Yeah.
Oh, that's a, yeah.
Hit me with the tough questions
Anthony Karls (00:43):
it.
Good.
Getcha.
If
James Patterson (00:45):
spot.
Um, yeah, it's an interestingquestion.
So if I could go back in time,what piece of advice would I
give myself from a marketinglens?
I would probably say one of thethings that I've learned at this
point of my career, some likeabout seven years into my
digital marketing career, is thesales experience that I got, um,
(01:06):
in my initial internship, Ithought was totally unrelated
to.
Marketing.
Um, you know, I think we're allkind of taught in college or in
different experiences that saleshere.
Marketing is here.
Kind of a thing.
it's actually not really true,right?
Everything flows together.
Like, if you don't have a goodmarketing team, you can't really
have a good sales team and youcan.
(01:27):
Have a great marketing team, butnot a, not a good sales team.
And that's not going to work.
Right.
So really it would have been,um, to embrace, um, the sales,
um, opportunity to kind of learnmore and gain skills in that
because it translates so well tobeing better at marketing to
help both teams obviously, um,achieve, um, their goals.
So outside of a cliche, youknow, always be curious.
(01:48):
I would say that was my, uh, uh,biggest thing is, is how much,
um, those two.
Different, you know, kind ofjobs play together.
Anthony Karls (01:57):
I recall correctly, you were, you were
slinging some direct media atthe local Costco, I think.
Is that, am I rememberingcorrectly?
James Patterson (02:05):
Not Costco Menards, but yes.
Otherwise.
Anthony Karls (02:10):
This is our, uh, this is our local satellite
retailer.
James Patterson (02:15):
Hey, I, I did pretty well too.
Anthony Karls (02:17):
Like my first marketing experience was at
Sterling Commerce Group and wesold Dish Network.
So we were, we were competitors,
James Patterson (02:25):
Yeah, I know they're going toe to toe
Anthony Karls (02:26):
meeting each other up.
Awesome.
Yeah, I think that's so true.
Uh, I did sales for severalyears, uh, selling cell phones
at sprint.
Um, and some of the things thatI didn't know would be related
to this career in marketing werereally about kind of similar to
what we're gonna talk abouttoday, which is choosing,
choosing platforms, which wasunderstanding your audience.
(02:49):
Um, the thing that I figured outreally quickly was when I sold
cell phones, that was back inthe early two thousands.
And I had to figure out, wereyou an early adopter or did you
just need a cell phone when youwalked through the store or
walked in the door of the store?
Um, cause if you were not anearly adopter of technology and
I walked you over to the newsmartphone, I think I was
(03:11):
selling the Palm, Palm pilot andthe BlackBerry, like those were
the big things here.
But if I took, if I took someonewho was a neophyte.
Over to those, they weren'tbuying a phone that day.
They, they, what they wanted todo is go over to the flip phone.
It's like, maybe they could dealwith the razor or the, uh,
whatever the sidekick thing was,or you could, you get the whole
keyboard.
(03:33):
Maybe they could deal with that.
Uh, it was all aboutunderstanding the audience, like
ask them questions.
Increase my sales definitelyrelates to what we're going to
talk to today.
Cause it was, it's veryrelatable.
So choosing platforms.
So what are, what do you have totell us about this?
Like, so where do we, whereshould we start thinking about
how do we choose platforms thatwe're going to be on?
(03:53):
There is.
Tons of them.
There's a lot of places to buymedia.
The big ones, obviously Google,you know, Facebook's another
huge one.
Where should I be?
How should I think about thiswhen I'm starting?
James Patterson (04:04):
Yeah.
So, you know, just kind of kickit off.
I feel like a lot of businesseswhen they're first kind of
starting to look at, you know,adopting digital marketing
strategy and stuff like that,they'll often go, okay, what are
my competitors doing?
Or, Hey, I've heard Facebook issomewhere we might want to
advertise and things like that.
Um, obviously that's not thebest way to do this.
You don't want to just kind ofgo into a platform and Kind of
(04:26):
willy nilly.
You want to have a reason to geton there.
And, um, usually the way that weapproach it here at Rocketflix
is we want to base it off theaudience that you're going
after.
So we can compare this to thefive stages of awareness.
So, um, let's say, you know,you're a more mature business
and you're trying to reallybuild up your upper funnel.
Anthony Karls (04:44):
Yeah.
Before we go into that, what arethe stages of awareness?
James Patterson (04:47):
Yep.
So the five stages is unaware,problem aware, solution aware,
product aware, and then mostaware.
Anthony Karls (04:53):
Nice.
Okay, cool.
And then can you give a brief,brief definition of each of
those?
James Patterson (04:59):
Yep.
So unaware is basically thatthey have no idea that they need
this.
So think like, you know, whenyou're going through your day to
day life, right?
Like we deal with, you know,either issues or problems and
stuff like that, but maybe wedon't really realize that's
become a problem.
We're just kind of dealing withit.
So that's where somebody whereit's like, they're actually
probably a good fit for.
you know, working with abusiness for a service or
(05:19):
getting a new product, but theyjust haven't really clicked yet
that it's something that theyneed, you know?
So think like, it's like whenyou see an ad and then all of a
sudden it's like, Oh wow.
Yeah.
I hate, you know, doing this orwhatever.
My hose always messes up andthere's cool new hose that came
out or something.
Right.
It's those types of momentswhere it's like, man, I never
really thought about it.
Um, problem aware would be then,you know, kind of the second
(05:40):
level to that would be thenlike, you are aware that.
You know, the hose that you haveat home is always leaking and is
inefficient or whatever thattype of deal.
Um, so you're start, you're,you're aware that the problem
exists, but you're not to thepoint yet to where you're
actively looking at, you know,replacing that or, or what
alternatives exist out there.
Solution aware, then is the nextlevel down.
So then you are, you know,obviously aware of the of the
(06:02):
problem.
You're now aware of solutions.
Um, really what you're lookingat this point is trying to
figure out like what potentialalternatives exist out there.
Um, so that's more so weighing.
So now you're to the point whereit's like, okay, I know I need
to replace this.
What companies provide this andwhat other options to replace it
are out there.
product aware then again, iskind of the next level down.
(06:23):
It's, you know, you're notreally necessarily convinced at
this point.
You're usually down to probablylike one to two options.
You're really in a.
I have a more considerationphase.
Like you're, you're pretty closeto buying at this point.
Most aware then is like, youknow, basically you're moving
forward with the product thatyou're going, you're going to
buy today, um, again, you know,doodling down your kind of, you
know, evaluation of differentproducts or services to, to meet
(06:46):
your problem.
Um, and ready to, to make apurchase decision, you know,
Basically now.
Anthony Karls (06:52):
Got it.
So how does that, how does thatrelate to then selecting
platforms?
So we got our five stages ofawareness and how does that as
understanding that.
Um, in relation to our productand our potential customer help
us choose what platforms weshould go to and when.
James Patterson (07:12):
Yeah, exactly.
So every platform is going tokind of play into these
different stages a little bitmore effectively.
Let's put it.
So, um, if I kind of start atunaware, unaware, if we're
looking to really prospect tonet new people, right?
They've never heard of ourbusiness.
They may not be aware that ourservice or product will solve a
potential problem that they havegoing after platforms like
(07:34):
programmatic.
So using a DSP.
Um, you know, that's usuallyconsisting of display ads,
native ads, uh, CTV, OTT, thosetypes of ad placements or social
are going to be best there.
So, right.
So you're disrupting people'skind of everyday flow.
So going back to my, you know,example previously, like, when
people kind of go from unawareto, to, to, uh, potentially
(07:55):
problem or in solution to where.
Sometimes they'll just see an adon TV, for example, and go, Oh
yeah, that's right.
I never really thought about thefact that I've been really
disappointed with this currentservice or product that I'm,
that I'm currently using.
So usually the more upper funnelyou are in that kind of series
of five.
awareness stages, the moresocial and programmatic type
(08:16):
platforms are going to be yourbest bet.
Anthony Karls (08:19):
Nice.
James Patterson (08:21):
So then as you kind of work down from there,
um, problem aware, solutionaware, and product aware, it's
all going to kind of fall, uh,in a combination between both
using some of those more higherfunnel tactics like social
programmatic, but then alsostarting to layer in more
search.
So obviously as you go fromproblem aware To potentially
solution aware and productaware, people are going to be
actually seeking out thisinformation online.
(08:43):
So one of the best ways tocapture that intent is through
search ads.
Um, so that can be a reallyeffective way to start to
really, uh, directly get ads infront of people that are most
likely going through the phasesof.
Either research consideration toI'm buying right now to make
sure that you get your ads infront of them.
So really an effective strategyis using a combination of this,
(09:03):
but depending on where you're atas a business, it might make
more sense to, you know, if youdon't have a humongous budget,
maybe you want to really justcapitalize on the search that,
you know, the, uh, search volumethat already exists for people
in a buy stage for your productor service, maybe if you have a
more mature model and you canreally focus on more of the
upper funnel stuff, which is a.
You know, kind of a more of along term play, right?
(09:24):
You have to get them all the waydown.
Um, you're probably playing morein that of, of kind of
prospecting to net new folks outthere.
Anthony Karls (09:30):
Got it.
So, so in your, in your example,um, I guess let's, if we could
use a, an example of a clientthat we, we work with generally
actually, um, so one of theclients, one of the clients we
work with is, um, They, they dostretching and they're most men
(09:52):
are more, more towards me, butyou're getting there.
So like, don't, don't worry thatyou're, you know, only a couple
of years behind me.
Uh, but generally men don'tstretch.
Like I've worked out my wholelife.
I stopped stretching once I gotout of college sports because no
one forced me to do it anymoreand I've gotten very stiff.
(10:13):
So my wife makes fun of me allthe time.
Uh, we were in, I think,literally this last weekend we
were, I forget where we weredriving, but I turned around to
look at my daughter behind meand I like, I had to like really
turn all of the way because Icouldn't turn my neck all the
way because.
I don't keep myself, uh,stretched.
Um, I didn't, I didn't realizethat one of the potential
(10:37):
solutions that I could have,other than like just stretching
and doing the thing that I hateto do, and I'm probably not
going to do, cause I reallydon't like doing it, is going to
one of these, uh, stretchplaces.
Um, and then once I understoodthat, then I, then I started
doing research.
I started searching for like,who's, who's in this space.
(10:58):
What are the different.
Uh, competitors that areproviding the solution.
Some are massage therapists.
Some are very specific, like oneof the clients we work with,
that they are just stretching.
And then there's, uh, PTs thatdo this as well, that are kind
of more on the advanced and, uh,advanced end, where you kind of
get into the medical, uh,treatment portion.
(11:19):
Um, and then you can go in.
All right.
Now I know my options locally.
Now let me start comparing them,uh, going through that.
And then finally I went tostretch zone in Delafield and
actually got, got stretchedfinally.
And it was, it was a goodexperience, but I didn't enjoy
it that much because, uh, ithurts, but I actually felt
(11:41):
really better after.
James Patterson (11:43):
Yeah.
Anthony Karls (11:44):
One of those, like, you know, the pain is
worth it after type scenarios.
Um, and that's actually helpedlike, so, uh, it's one of those
scenarios as you kind of godown, like you, you hear of an
idea, you see something and thenyou kind of explore it and you
might go to search and then youunderstand your options and then
maybe you go to Reddit and youdo a lot of research on those
brands and then you keep goingdown that, down that funnel of
(12:08):
awareness before you actuallymake a decision,
James Patterson (12:10):
Yeah.
Anthony Karls (12:11):
um, what are some other, what are some of the ways
that, uh, The ads will manifestin into reality.
So like when we're way up ontop, these are, you said, these
are like, what is CT, CTV, OTT,what does that, what does that
mean?
Like, where are these placed?
I think one of the, one of theprevious podcasts we talked
(12:33):
about, I think you said likenative ads and like different
things, like what are someexamples of these where they'll
be placed?
And then kind of what is the,what are the next types of
assets that we'll see?
James Patterson (12:44):
Yeah.
So starting with connected TV,CTV.
Um, so the main way that you getads placed there is generally a
15 second or 30 second, um, um,video ad.
So, uh, generally speaking,that's going to be in your
traditional wide format for TVscreens.
Um, that can be shown on some,um, potentially, um, you know,
like cable networks and thingslike that.
(13:05):
But generally what we're lookingat are those on demand type
platforms.
So thank Hulu.
Uh, Peacock, um, Paramount plusthose types of, um, apps that,
that exist.
Um, generally when we sayconnected TV, it's got TV in the
name.
Um, you're going to get on aplacement specifically on
television screens.
So usually from, um, the top setbox or through apps, uh, in the
(13:27):
TV itself.
From there, OTT is going to kindof expand your video ad
placement opportunity.
You can potentially still beshown on a TV per se, but
generally when we talk aboutOTT, we're talking about mobile
devices, desktop, tablet.
you can still get ad placementon some of those apps through
OTT as well.
(13:48):
it may expand to some otherareas as well.
on websites and things likethat, that have video embedded
onto their site.
You could have video then playin front of that.
That would also fall in the OTTkind of, um, strategy and, and
placement opportunity there.
Anthony Karls (14:03):
So if we're way up funnel, what type of
messaging are we?
We typically trying to send outinto the world.
James Patterson (14:11):
yeah, so obviously, you know, if you're
in the unawares, um, you know,kind of bucket in terms of your
audience, targeting one of theseplatforms, um, you know,
obviously making sure you, youhave your brand very visible.
You always want to hook in anoffer and they're going to be
really critical to getting yourmessage across.
Um, you know, Um, I think a lotof times where we see, um, you
know, brands that we work withthat maybe have challenges with
(14:32):
seeing the effectiveness in someof their CTV or OTT strategy.
A lot of times it's because thecreative side of that doesn't
have those three elements.
Um, so going in here reallyintentionally to have a good
offer for somebody who'sunaware, right?
So, um, for the, the stretchclient that we have, one of
their big offers is you can comein and get a free stretch.
So that's really great forsomebody who's unaware because
they're sitting on their couchand they're like, I'm like Tony
(14:54):
here and I've, you know, Ihaven't really thought about it,
but I have been turning weirdlately and I'm feeling stiff.
I'm getting older.
Um, boom, free stretch.
Right.
You know, so that's a reallygood offer.
Whereas if they just came in andsaid, you know, this is what we
do.
This is our brand that may notcompel somebody, especially
upper funnel.
Um, it may resonate better withsomebody who's in the
consideration phase.
(15:14):
Cause now they've kind of gonethrough the research.
They understand that a stretch.
Um, type business might, mighthelp their, their problem that
they're dealing with.
Um, so that's kind of where wewant to look at it.
It's really critical for peoplethat are really net new to your
either service product or brandto have some type of compelling
hook and offer to get themobviously engaging with your
(15:35):
brand later and in other areasof the funnel.
Anthony Karls (15:38):
Nice.
Um, so as we're moving down, howdo these assets in a digital
landscape, how do they changefrom kind of what you described
and CTV and OTT, and then how dothey, how do they continue down?
Like where these continue tolook like.
James Patterson (15:51):
Yeah.
So, so one of our, you know,kind of most successful
strategies generally is like, ifwe kind of started at the top
is, is like I said, so we havesome type of hook and offer out
there, get some in the door, getsome starting to get the gears
moving in terms of, you know,you know, I'm basically
experiencing this problem.
Um, this service provider existsout there, um, ultimately
getting them, um, to get to thesite in one way or the other,
(16:13):
obviously CTV and OTT can be alittle bit more difficult, but
you can use systems like GA4 orother tools to kind of build
that attribution to see.
Folks, hopefully getting to thesite and interacting with your
brand.
Then online, you would then getthem through, obviously the
conversion funnel through a kindof standard landing page or
something like, uh, to thateffect from there, you can then
kind of go backwards once again,and now you're going to actually
(16:34):
hit those people again, throughsome tactics like display, um,
native social, potentiallyanother CTV ad again, more.
Potentially branded focused,opposed to that, uh, original,
um, offer, um, to get, to keepthem engaged as they go through
the sales pipeline.
So for somebody with thestretch, right, they sign up for
the free stretch.
We want to make sure that theyactually go to that free
stretch, right?
Just because they gave us alltheir information doesn't mean
(16:56):
necessarily they're going toshow up so we can deploy
different areas of those tacticsthat obviously are specific to
different audiences.
To kind of repurpose them tokeep folks engaged as they move
through the funnel.
Anthony Karls (17:07):
Got it.
Awesome.
Cool.
Any other, any other tips forsuccess here?
I guess another like this, youknow, as we've been talking
through with the differentconversations we've been having
on our podcasts, how do wemeasure, how do we measure
success here?
Because like we, I know this issomething that we have to
educate clients on quite oftenbecause we're looking for a lot
(17:29):
of times clients are lookingfor, I have a CTV ad, how many
sales did I get from that CTVad?
So talk a little bit about howwe, how we think about
measurement and how we coach ourclients through this, because it
looks a little different thanthat.
Yeah.
James Patterson (17:43):
for sure Yeah, if you are measuring your ctv ad
sales, you're probably not goingto be running ctv ads much
longer That's the realitybecause it's it's incredibly
hard to measure directly.
Of course, there's someattribution modeling And tools
that are out there that can helpyou get directional evidence
that obviously it's influencingpeople Um the best way to
measure it though is through thewaterfall Reporting that we've
(18:04):
talked about a bunch in in ourprevious podcasts So really when
we have this marketing thesemarketing platforms and tactics
out there, are we seeing?
More users to the site.
Are we seeing more leads duringthis time period?
Are we seeing the quality oflead improving?
Are we, you know, if it's an, ifit's a specific offer, that's
maybe a promo code or somethinglike that, that's measurable.
Are we seeing people actuallytake advantage of that and
(18:26):
signing up for that offer?
So really going back to thebusiness KPIs is going to be
critical to it.
Um, or you're going to turnthings off.
And ultimately the reality is,is that when you look at a, at a
good, successful marketing,holistic strategy.
It does have all these differenttactics.
It's not, Oh, we'll just do CTVor we'll just do paid search.
The best misses out there do allof this stuff.
(18:47):
And that's just kind of thereality that can be most visible
when you do measure it, um, byusing your marketing, your, your
business KPIs in your waterfallreporting.
Anthony Karls (18:57):
Awesome.
Anything else before we wrap uptoday?
Appreciate it.
This is a lot of great stuff,James.
James Patterson (19:01):
Yeah, no, I would say the biggest thing is,
like I said, don't, don't jumpinto it willy I know it's a can
be, um, you know, can beattractive to do that or
whatever.
You just want to get the get theshow moving, so to speak.
But the reality is you should bereally intent to your audiences.
And then being really careful toabout the creative that you have
out there.
Um, if you're just throwing whatyou have from two years ago, and
(19:23):
you used it for You know thisrandom youtube campaign you did
sure it can go out there But i'mi'm telling you it's probably
not going to be as successful ifyou get really intentional and
come up with compelling offersOr compelling messages to match
with the different audiencesthat you're going after so be
intentional think it through Um,and you're going to have more
success that way.
Anthony Karls (19:42):
Awesome.
Appreciate it, James.
Thank you very much.
James Patterson (19:44):
Thanks
All right, this is Revenue Roadmap, where we
talk about driving revenue andincreasing profits in local
businesses.
I'm Anthony Carls, president ofRocketClicks.
Today I'm with Mr.
James Patterson again.
Thank you for joining me again,James.
So today we're going to talk alittle bit about platform
selection in the area of paidmedia.
(00:20):
Before we jump into that, I'vegot a question for you here,
James.
So, If you were, if you could goback in time, uh, at the start
of your career and give yourselfone piece of advice related to
marketing, what would it be andwhy?
James Patterson (00:41):
Yeah.
Oh, that's a, yeah.
Hit me with the tough questions
Anthony Karls (00:43):
it.
Good.
Getcha.
If
James Patterson (00:45):
spot.
Um, yeah, it's an interestingquestion.
So if I could go back in time,what piece of advice would I
give myself from a marketinglens?
I would probably say one of thethings that I've learned at this
point of my career, some likeabout seven years into my
digital marketing career, is thesales experience that I got, um,
(01:06):
in my initial internship, Ithought was totally unrelated
to.
Marketing.
Um, you know, I think we're allkind of taught in college or in
different experiences that saleshere.
Marketing is here.
Kind of a thing.
it's actually not really true,right?
Everything flows together.
Like, if you don't have a goodmarketing team, you can't really
have a good sales team and youcan.
(01:27):
Have a great marketing team, butnot a, not a good sales team.
And that's not going to work.
Right.
So really it would have been,um, to embrace, um, the sales,
um, opportunity to kind of learnmore and gain skills in that
because it translates so well tobeing better at marketing to
help both teams obviously, um,achieve, um, their goals.
So outside of a cliche, youknow, always be curious.
(01:48):
I would say that was my, uh, uh,biggest thing is, is how much,
um, those two.
Different, you know, kind ofjobs play together.
Anthony Karls (01:57):
I recall correctly, you were, you were
slinging some direct media atthe local Costco, I think.
Is that, am I rememberingcorrectly?
James Patterson (02:05):
Not Costco Menards, but yes.
Otherwise.
Anthony Karls (02:10):
This is our, uh, this is our local satellite
retailer.
James Patterson (02:15):
Hey, I, I did pretty well too.
Anthony Karls (02:17):
Like my first marketing experience was at
Sterling Commerce Group and wesold Dish Network.
So we were, we were competitors,
James Patterson (02:25):
Yeah, I know they're going toe to toe
Anthony Karls (02:26):
meeting each other up.
Awesome.
Yeah, I think that's so true.
Uh, I did sales for severalyears, uh, selling cell phones
at sprint.
Um, and some of the things thatI didn't know would be related
to this career in marketing werereally about kind of similar to
what we're gonna talk abouttoday, which is choosing,
choosing platforms, which wasunderstanding your audience.
(02:49):
Um, the thing that I figured outreally quickly was when I sold
cell phones, that was back inthe early two thousands.
And I had to figure out, wereyou an early adopter or did you
just need a cell phone when youwalked through the store or
walked in the door of the store?
Um, cause if you were not anearly adopter of technology and
I walked you over to the newsmartphone, I think I was
(03:11):
selling the Palm, Palm pilot andthe BlackBerry, like those were
the big things here.
But if I took, if I took someonewho was a neophyte.
Over to those, they weren'tbuying a phone that day.
They, they, what they wanted todo is go over to the flip phone.
It's like, maybe they could dealwith the razor or the, uh,
whatever the sidekick thing was,or you could, you get the whole
keyboard.
(03:33):
Maybe they could deal with that.
Uh, it was all aboutunderstanding the audience, like
ask them questions.
Increase my sales definitelyrelates to what we're going to
talk to today.
Cause it was, it's veryrelatable.
So choosing platforms.
So what are, what do you have totell us about this?
Like, so where do we, whereshould we start thinking about
how do we choose platforms thatwe're going to be on?
(03:53):
There is.
Tons of them.
There's a lot of places to buymedia.
The big ones, obviously Google,you know, Facebook's another
huge one.
Where should I be?
How should I think about thiswhen I'm starting?
James Patterson (04:04):
Yeah.
So, you know, just kind of kickit off.
I feel like a lot of businesseswhen they're first kind of
starting to look at, you know,adopting digital marketing
strategy and stuff like that,they'll often go, okay, what are
my competitors doing?
Or, Hey, I've heard Facebook issomewhere we might want to
advertise and things like that.
Um, obviously that's not thebest way to do this.
You don't want to just kind ofgo into a platform and Kind of
(04:26):
willy nilly.
You want to have a reason to geton there.
And, um, usually the way that weapproach it here at Rocketflix
is we want to base it off theaudience that you're going
after.
So we can compare this to thefive stages of awareness.
So, um, let's say, you know,you're a more mature business
and you're trying to reallybuild up your upper funnel.
Anthony Karls (04:44):
Yeah.
Before we go into that, what arethe stages of awareness?
James Patterson (04:47):
Yep.
So the five stages is unaware,problem aware, solution aware,
product aware, and then mostaware.
Anthony Karls (04:53):
Nice.
Okay, cool.
And then can you give a brief,brief definition of each of
those?
James Patterson (04:59):
Yep.
So unaware is basically thatthey have no idea that they need
this.
So think like, you know, whenyou're going through your day to
day life, right?
Like we deal with, you know,either issues or problems and
stuff like that, but maybe wedon't really realize that's
become a problem.
We're just kind of dealing withit.
So that's where somebody whereit's like, they're actually
probably a good fit for.
you know, working with abusiness for a service or
(05:19):
getting a new product, but theyjust haven't really clicked yet
that it's something that theyneed, you know?
So think like, it's like whenyou see an ad and then all of a
sudden it's like, Oh wow.
Yeah.
I hate, you know, doing this orwhatever.
My hose always messes up andthere's cool new hose that came
out or something.
Right.
It's those types of momentswhere it's like, man, I never
really thought about it.
Um, problem aware would be then,you know, kind of the second
(05:40):
level to that would be thenlike, you are aware that.
You know, the hose that you haveat home is always leaking and is
inefficient or whatever thattype of deal.
Um, so you're start, you're,you're aware that the problem
exists, but you're not to thepoint yet to where you're
actively looking at, you know,replacing that or, or what
alternatives exist out there.
Solution aware, then is the nextlevel down.
So then you are, you know,obviously aware of the of the
(06:02):
problem.
You're now aware of solutions.
Um, really what you're lookingat this point is trying to
figure out like what potentialalternatives exist out there.
Um, so that's more so weighing.
So now you're to the point whereit's like, okay, I know I need
to replace this.
What companies provide this andwhat other options to replace it
are out there.
product aware then again, iskind of the next level down.
(06:23):
It's, you know, you're notreally necessarily convinced at
this point.
You're usually down to probablylike one to two options.
You're really in a.
I have a more considerationphase.
Like you're, you're pretty closeto buying at this point.
Most aware then is like, youknow, basically you're moving
forward with the product thatyou're going, you're going to
buy today, um, again, you know,doodling down your kind of, you
know, evaluation of differentproducts or services to, to meet
(06:46):
your problem.
Um, and ready to, to make apurchase decision, you know,
Basically now.
Anthony Karls (06:52):
Got it.
So how does that, how does thatrelate to then selecting
platforms?
So we got our five stages ofawareness and how does that as
understanding that.
Um, in relation to our productand our potential customer help
us choose what platforms weshould go to and when.
James Patterson (07:12):
Yeah, exactly.
So every platform is going tokind of play into these
different stages a little bitmore effectively.
Let's put it.
So, um, if I kind of start atunaware, unaware, if we're
looking to really prospect tonet new people, right?
They've never heard of ourbusiness.
They may not be aware that ourservice or product will solve a
potential problem that they havegoing after platforms like
(07:34):
programmatic.
So using a DSP.
Um, you know, that's usuallyconsisting of display ads,
native ads, uh, CTV, OTT, thosetypes of ad placements or social
are going to be best there.
So, right.
So you're disrupting people'skind of everyday flow.
So going back to my, you know,example previously, like, when
people kind of go from unawareto, to, to, uh, potentially
(07:55):
problem or in solution to where.
Sometimes they'll just see an adon TV, for example, and go, Oh
yeah, that's right.
I never really thought about thefact that I've been really
disappointed with this currentservice or product that I'm,
that I'm currently using.
So usually the more upper funnelyou are in that kind of series
of five.
awareness stages, the moresocial and programmatic type
(08:16):
platforms are going to be yourbest bet.
Anthony Karls (08:19):
Nice.
James Patterson (08:21):
So then as you kind of work down from there,
um, problem aware, solutionaware, and product aware, it's
all going to kind of fall, uh,in a combination between both
using some of those more higherfunnel tactics like social
programmatic, but then alsostarting to layer in more
search.
So obviously as you go fromproblem aware To potentially
solution aware and productaware, people are going to be
actually seeking out thisinformation online.
(08:43):
So one of the best ways tocapture that intent is through
search ads.
Um, so that can be a reallyeffective way to start to
really, uh, directly get ads infront of people that are most
likely going through the phasesof.
Either research consideration toI'm buying right now to make
sure that you get your ads infront of them.
So really an effective strategyis using a combination of this,
(09:03):
but depending on where you're atas a business, it might make
more sense to, you know, if youdon't have a humongous budget,
maybe you want to really justcapitalize on the search that,
you know, the, uh, search volumethat already exists for people
in a buy stage for your productor service, maybe if you have a
more mature model and you canreally focus on more of the
upper funnel stuff, which is a.
You know, kind of a more of along term play, right?
(09:24):
You have to get them all the waydown.
Um, you're probably playing morein that of, of kind of
prospecting to net new folks outthere.
Anthony Karls (09:30):
Got it.
So, so in your, in your example,um, I guess let's, if we could
use a, an example of a clientthat we, we work with generally
actually, um, so one of theclients, one of the clients we
work with is, um, They, they dostretching and they're most men
(09:52):
are more, more towards me, butyou're getting there.
So like, don't, don't worry thatyou're, you know, only a couple
of years behind me.
Uh, but generally men don'tstretch.
Like I've worked out my wholelife.
I stopped stretching once I gotout of college sports because no
one forced me to do it anymoreand I've gotten very stiff.
(10:13):
So my wife makes fun of me allthe time.
Uh, we were in, I think,literally this last weekend we
were, I forget where we weredriving, but I turned around to
look at my daughter behind meand I like, I had to like really
turn all of the way because Icouldn't turn my neck all the
way because.
I don't keep myself, uh,stretched.
Um, I didn't, I didn't realizethat one of the potential
(10:37):
solutions that I could have,other than like just stretching
and doing the thing that I hateto do, and I'm probably not
going to do, cause I reallydon't like doing it, is going to
one of these, uh, stretchplaces.
Um, and then once I understoodthat, then I, then I started
doing research.
I started searching for like,who's, who's in this space.
(10:58):
What are the different.
Uh, competitors that areproviding the solution.
Some are massage therapists.
Some are very specific, like oneof the clients we work with,
that they are just stretching.
And then there's, uh, PTs thatdo this as well, that are kind
of more on the advanced and, uh,advanced end, where you kind of
get into the medical, uh,treatment portion.
(11:19):
Um, and then you can go in.
All right.
Now I know my options locally.
Now let me start comparing them,uh, going through that.
And then finally I went tostretch zone in Delafield and
actually got, got stretchedfinally.
And it was, it was a goodexperience, but I didn't enjoy
it that much because, uh, ithurts, but I actually felt
(11:41):
really better after.
James Patterson (11:43):
Yeah.
Anthony Karls (11:44):
One of those, like, you know, the pain is
worth it after type scenarios.
Um, and that's actually helpedlike, so, uh, it's one of those
scenarios as you kind of godown, like you, you hear of an
idea, you see something and thenyou kind of explore it and you
might go to search and then youunderstand your options and then
maybe you go to Reddit and youdo a lot of research on those
brands and then you keep goingdown that, down that funnel of
(12:08):
awareness before you actuallymake a decision,
James Patterson (12:10):
Yeah.
Anthony Karls (12:11):
um, what are some other, what are some of the ways
that, uh, The ads will manifestin into reality.
So like when we're way up ontop, these are, you said, these
are like, what is CT, CTV, OTT,what does that, what does that
mean?
Like, where are these placed?
I think one of the, one of theprevious podcasts we talked
(12:33):
about, I think you said likenative ads and like different
things, like what are someexamples of these where they'll
be placed?
And then kind of what is the,what are the next types of
assets that we'll see?
James Patterson (12:44):
Yeah.
So starting with connected TV,CTV.
Um, so the main way that you getads placed there is generally a
15 second or 30 second, um, um,video ad.
So, uh, generally speaking,that's going to be in your
traditional wide format for TVscreens.
Um, that can be shown on some,um, potentially, um, you know,
like cable networks and thingslike that.
(13:05):
But generally what we're lookingat are those on demand type
platforms.
So thank Hulu.
Uh, Peacock, um, Paramount plusthose types of, um, apps that,
that exist.
Um, generally when we sayconnected TV, it's got TV in the
name.
Um, you're going to get on aplacement specifically on
television screens.
So usually from, um, the top setbox or through apps, uh, in the
(13:27):
TV itself.
From there, OTT is going to kindof expand your video ad
placement opportunity.
You can potentially still beshown on a TV per se, but
generally when we talk aboutOTT, we're talking about mobile
devices, desktop, tablet.
you can still get ad placementon some of those apps through
OTT as well.
(13:48):
it may expand to some otherareas as well.
on websites and things likethat, that have video embedded
onto their site.
You could have video then playin front of that.
That would also fall in the OTTkind of, um, strategy and, and
placement opportunity there.
Anthony Karls (14:03):
So if we're way up funnel, what type of
messaging are we?
We typically trying to send outinto the world.
James Patterson (14:11):
yeah, so obviously, you know, if you're
in the unawares, um, you know,kind of bucket in terms of your
audience, targeting one of theseplatforms, um, you know,
obviously making sure you, youhave your brand very visible.
You always want to hook in anoffer and they're going to be
really critical to getting yourmessage across.
Um, you know, Um, I think a lotof times where we see, um, you
know, brands that we work withthat maybe have challenges with
(14:32):
seeing the effectiveness in someof their CTV or OTT strategy.
A lot of times it's because thecreative side of that doesn't
have those three elements.
Um, so going in here reallyintentionally to have a good
offer for somebody who'sunaware, right?
So, um, for the, the stretchclient that we have, one of
their big offers is you can comein and get a free stretch.
So that's really great forsomebody who's unaware because
they're sitting on their couchand they're like, I'm like Tony
(14:54):
here and I've, you know, Ihaven't really thought about it,
but I have been turning weirdlately and I'm feeling stiff.
I'm getting older.
Um, boom, free stretch.
Right.
You know, so that's a reallygood offer.
Whereas if they just came in andsaid, you know, this is what we
do.
This is our brand that may notcompel somebody, especially
upper funnel.
Um, it may resonate better withsomebody who's in the
consideration phase.
(15:14):
Cause now they've kind of gonethrough the research.
They understand that a stretch.
Um, type business might, mighthelp their, their problem that
they're dealing with.
Um, so that's kind of where wewant to look at it.
It's really critical for peoplethat are really net new to your
either service product or brandto have some type of compelling
hook and offer to get themobviously engaging with your
(15:35):
brand later and in other areasof the funnel.
Anthony Karls (15:38):
Nice.
Um, so as we're moving down, howdo these assets in a digital
landscape, how do they changefrom kind of what you described
and CTV and OTT, and then how dothey, how do they continue down?
Like where these continue tolook like.
James Patterson (15:51):
Yeah.
So, so one of our, you know,kind of most successful
strategies generally is like, ifwe kind of started at the top
is, is like I said, so we havesome type of hook and offer out
there, get some in the door, getsome starting to get the gears
moving in terms of, you know,you know, I'm basically
experiencing this problem.
Um, this service provider existsout there, um, ultimately
getting them, um, to get to thesite in one way or the other,
(16:13):
obviously CTV and OTT can be alittle bit more difficult, but
you can use systems like GA4 orother tools to kind of build
that attribution to see.
Folks, hopefully getting to thesite and interacting with your
brand.
Then online, you would then getthem through, obviously the
conversion funnel through a kindof standard landing page or
something like, uh, to thateffect from there, you can then
kind of go backwards once again,and now you're going to actually
(16:34):
hit those people again, throughsome tactics like display, um,
native social, potentiallyanother CTV ad again, more.
Potentially branded focused,opposed to that, uh, original,
um, offer, um, to get, to keepthem engaged as they go through
the sales pipeline.
So for somebody with thestretch, right, they sign up for
the free stretch.
We want to make sure that theyactually go to that free
stretch, right?
Just because they gave us alltheir information doesn't mean
(16:56):
necessarily they're going toshow up so we can deploy
different areas of those tacticsthat obviously are specific to
different audiences.
To kind of repurpose them tokeep folks engaged as they move
through the funnel.
Anthony Karls (17:07):
Got it.
Awesome.
Cool.
Any other, any other tips forsuccess here?
I guess another like this, youknow, as we've been talking
through with the differentconversations we've been having
on our podcasts, how do wemeasure, how do we measure
success here?
Because like we, I know this issomething that we have to
educate clients on quite oftenbecause we're looking for a lot
(17:29):
of times clients are lookingfor, I have a CTV ad, how many
sales did I get from that CTVad?
So talk a little bit about howwe, how we think about
measurement and how we coach ourclients through this, because it
looks a little different thanthat.
Yeah.
James Patterson (17:43):
for sure Yeah, if you are measuring your ctv ad
sales, you're probably not goingto be running ctv ads much
longer That's the realitybecause it's it's incredibly
hard to measure directly.
Of course, there's someattribution modeling And tools
that are out there that can helpyou get directional evidence
that obviously it's influencingpeople Um the best way to
measure it though is through thewaterfall Reporting that we've
(18:04):
talked about a bunch in in ourprevious podcasts So really when
we have this marketing thesemarketing platforms and tactics
out there, are we seeing?
More users to the site.
Are we seeing more leads duringthis time period?
Are we seeing the quality oflead improving?
Are we, you know, if it's an, ifit's a specific offer, that's
maybe a promo code or somethinglike that, that's measurable.
Are we seeing people actuallytake advantage of that and
(18:26):
signing up for that offer?
So really going back to thebusiness KPIs is going to be
critical to it.
Um, or you're going to turnthings off.
And ultimately the reality is,is that when you look at a, at a
good, successful marketing,holistic strategy.
It does have all these differenttactics.
It's not, Oh, we'll just do CTVor we'll just do paid search.
The best misses out there do allof this stuff.
(18:47):
And that's just kind of thereality that can be most visible
when you do measure it, um, byusing your marketing, your, your
business KPIs in your waterfallreporting.
Anthony Karls (18:57):
Awesome.
Anything else before we wrap uptoday?
Appreciate it.
This is a lot of great stuff,James.
James Patterson (19:01):
Yeah, no, I would say the biggest thing is,
like I said, don't, don't jumpinto it willy I know it's a can
be, um, you know, can beattractive to do that or
whatever.
You just want to get the get theshow moving, so to speak.
But the reality is you should bereally intent to your audiences.
And then being really careful toabout the creative that you have
out there.
Um, if you're just throwing whatyou have from two years ago, and
(19:23):
you used it for You know thisrandom youtube campaign you did
sure it can go out there But i'mi'm telling you it's probably
not going to be as successful ifyou get really intentional and
come up with compelling offersOr compelling messages to match
with the different audiencesthat you're going after so be
intentional think it through Um,and you're going to have more
success that way.
Anthony Karls (19:42):
Awesome.
Appreciate it, James.
Thank you very much.
James Patterson (19:44):
Thanks
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.