Whether you’re selling an electric razor or an artisanal chocolate bar, product advertising can help you reach your target audience and boost sales. Compelling product advertisements showcase your product’s unique features and value proposition, persuade potential customers to choose your offering over those of competitors, and fosters long-term brand loyalty.
As part of your company’s marketing strategy, product advertising can transform your unknown commodity into a widely recognized and beloved product. But product advertising can be tricky, with so many types and channels available.
Learn more about the various types of product advertising, the most effective product advertising channels, and tips for creating successful product advertising campaigns.
What is product advertising?
Product advertising is a marketing strategy that promotes a specific product or service to a target market by highlighting its features, benefits, and unique selling points.
You can execute a product advertising campaign across channels like television, radio, and print media, and find product-specific campaigns in outdoor advertising, social media platforms, and email marketing.
Unlike brand advertising, which aims to create a positive perception of a brand’s identity and values, product advertising is designed to drive sales and generate revenue by convincing potential customers to purchase a particular product or service.
Types of product advertising
Product advertising comes in various forms, each used to achieve specific goals and cater to different stages of a product’s life cycle. Understanding these types of product advertising examples can help product advertising marketers create compelling campaigns to resonate with their target audience and drive sales.
Here are three types of product advertising:
Comparative advertising
Comparative advertising directly compares a product with its competitors, highlighting its advantages and unique selling points. This approach is particularly useful for products in the growth or maturity stages of their life cycle, helping persuade customers to choose one product over another by emphasizing specific attributes or features.
For example, a high-end skin care brand might run a campaign comparing the effectiveness of its anti-aging serum to leading competitors, highlighting clinical trial results and customer testimonials to demonstrate superiority.
Competitive advertising
Competitive advertising generates brand-specific demand by highlighting unique benefits and attributes. Competitive advertising can help establish a strong brand identity and build long-term relationships with existing customers.
A premium coffee brand might launch a product marketing campaign highlighting the unique, sustainably sourced, hand-picked beans used in their coffee, emphasizing the elevated taste and aroma.
Innovative advertising
Innovative advertising, also known as pioneering advertising, is designed to create initial demand for a new product—particularly in the introduction phase of its lifecycle. This type of advertising often involves in-depth explanations of the product’s benefits and features to improve public awareness, generate interest among potential customers, and establish a competitive edge.
Dapper Boi is a body-inclusive apparel line founded in 2015 by Vicky and Charisse Pasche. After frustrating experiences shopping in both men’s and women’s clothing sections, Vicky was determined to create gender-neutral, size-inclusive clothing. When she began considering product advertising options to build a strong brand image, it was important to highlight a gap in the market to prospective customers.
“Our very first video that we made, it was actually showcasing the problem first. We use humor in a lot of our content, but it’s in this vulnerable, relatable, problem-solving kind of way,” Vicky says in an interview with the Shopify Masters podcast.
“[We spoke] to a problem that they needed solved for themselves. People were ready and felt they could trust us in trying us for the first time. This created a tribe of loyal customers throughout these years.”
Product advertising channels
You have numerous channels to promote your products. Understanding each channel’s strengths and limitations will help you create an effective advertising strategy.
Here are product advertising channels to consider:
Digital advertising
Digital marketing is popular because businesses can target specific audiences and track performance. It takes many forms, including:
- PPC advertising. Use online or pay-per-click (PPC) advertising to create a digital campaign, placing banner ads or sponsored listings on search engine results pages, websites, or social media platforms and paying each time a user clicks on the ad.
- Content marketing. Create and distribute valuable and relevant content—such as blog posts, infographics, podcasts, and videos—to attract and retain a digital audience.
- Social media marketing. Leverage social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok to promote products, engage with customers, and build brand awareness.
- Influencer marketing. Collaborate with influential social media personalities in a specific niche to promote products or services, using their engaged followers to build trust.
- Email marketing. Send promotional messages, newsletters, or product updates directly to customers’ email inboxes to foster relationships and drive sales.
- SMS marketing. Use text messages to send promotional offers, updates, or reminders directly to customers’ mobile devices.
Dapper Boi has explored a range of digital marketing channels to drive growth, building customer personas and corresponding messaging to attract new shoppers. It experimented with Facebook, Instagram, and email marketing.
“Email [marketing] accounts for 54% of our sales,” Vicky says. “We use Klaviyo; it integrates within Shopify. We’re able to segment all of our customers based on different events going on—if they’ve shopped with us recently, what they’ve shopped for. It’s incredible the information we’re able to grab and how efficient we can be with our marketing efforts.”
Print advertisements
Print advertisements—in newspapers, magazines, and brochures—offer a tangible and lasting way to promote products. These ads can be particularly effective for reaching local audiences or targeting specific demographics who prefer traditional media.
A high-end watch manufacturer could place a print ad in a luxury lifestyle magazine, showcasing its latest collection and emphasizing the brand’s craftsmanship and prestige.
Outdoor advertising
Outdoor advertising includes billboards, bus shelter ads, and other forms of promotion in public spaces. It’s highly visible and can be effective for building brand awareness and reaching a broad audience.
A new energy drink company might launch an outdoor advertising campaign featuring eye-catching billboards in high-traffic areas, encouraging consumers to try their product for a quick energy boost.
Television and radio advertising
Television and radio advertising remain powerful channels for reaching a wide audience and creating emotional connections with consumers through multimedia. TV commercials, in particular, let you showcase your products with storytelling and visual elements to capture attention.
For example, a green cleaning product company can create a TV commercial emphasizing the natural ingredients and environmental benefits of its cleaning products. The commercial might depict a family using these products in their daily cleaning routine, showcasing how they effectively clean without harmful chemicals.
How to create a product advertising strategy
- Define your target audience and craft a compelling value proposition
- Set specific objectives and allocate a budget
- Select advertising channels and execute campaigns
- Measure campaign performance and analyze key metrics
- Iterate and refine your product advertising strategy
Developing effective product advertising strategies can help you achieve your product advertising objectives and stand out. Use these strategies to improve your marketing efforts, boost sales, and foster long-term growth:
1. Define your target audience and craft a compelling value proposition
Identify and understand your target audience by conducting market research to gather demographic, psychographic, and behavioral data about your ideal customers. Use this information to create a strong value proposition, communicating the unique benefits and features of your product, setting it apart from competitors.
An ecommerce store specializing in outdoor gear might research its target audience’s favorite activities and pain points. It then uses this info to emphasize its extensive product range, detailed product descriptions, and user reviews to help customers make informed decisions.
A well-defined value proposition attracts new customers, reinforces brand image, and builds brand recognition. This makes it easier for your target audience to remember and choose your product over others.
2. Set specific objectives and allocate a budget
Establish clear, measurable, and achievable goals for your product advertising campaigns, such as increasing brand visibility, increasing website traffic, or boosting sales. Align these objectives with your overall business goals and marketing efforts.
Then, determine a realistic marketing budget for your advertising initiatives, considering factors such as your target audience and advertising channels.
An online home decor store might allocate a smaller budget for a targeted email marketing campaign to re-engage past customers. A larger budget would be necessary for a broad, multi-platform campaign to attract new customers during the peak holiday shopping season.
3. Select advertising channels and execute campaigns
Choose the most appropriate advertising channels based on your target audience, objectives, and budget. This may include social media platforms, search engine marketing, display advertising, email marketing, or influencer partnerships. Develop engaging and informative content tailored to each channel, showcasing your product’s features, benefits, and use cases.
Ensure your messaging and visuals align with your brand identity and value proposition. These tactics are particularly effective if you want to increase your reach and attract new customers.
4. Measure campaign performance and analyze key metrics
Monitor and evaluate the performance of your product advertising campaigns using relevant marketing metrics such as reach, engagement, click-through rates, conversions, and return on investment (ROI). Use tools like Google Analytics, social media analytics, and advertising platform dashboards to track and analyze these metrics.
Review your campaign data regularly to identify areas of success and improvement. Measuring campaign performance helps you understand the impact of your advertising on customer loyalty, repeat purchases, and organic traffic.
5. Iterate and refine your product advertising strategy
Continuously gather customer feedback and analyze campaign performance data to identify opportunities for campaign optimization. Use this information to refine your product advertising strategy, adjusting your targeting, messaging, visuals, or advertising channels as needed. After reviewing email open rates, you might adjust the timing and subject lines of your campaigns to improve customer engagement.
Test and experiment with new ideas and approaches regularly to stay ahead of the curve. By iterating and refining your strategy, you can achieve your product advertising objectives.
Product advertising FAQ
What are product ads?
Product ads are promotional messages showcasing a specific product, highlighting its features, benefits, and unique selling points to persuade potential customers to purchase it.
How does product advertising work?
Product advertising works by targeting a specific audience through various channels—such as social media, search engines, or traditional media—and presenting them with compelling messages and visuals that communicate the product’s value and encourage them to take action.
When should you advertise a product?
You should advertise a product to increase brand awareness, drive sales, differentiate your product from competitors, or target a new market segment.
