What is an Advertising Campaign? Definition, Types, and Examples

Laura Kloot

2 weeks ago

Key takeaways

An advertising campaign generates excitement about a product or service through a unified theme across various media channels.
Digital ad campaign strategies include social media, email, influencer marketing, affiliate marketing, and native advertising, among others.
Precise targeting and strategic planning are key to success. You need to deliver messages that align with the target market’s familiarity with the problem your product or service solves.
Be adaptable. Monitor campaign performance carefully and adjust your tactics based on real-time data.

When you hear the words “advertising campaign”, what do you think of?

Maybe it’s a well-known series of TV commercials like Nike’s “Dream Crazy” ads with Colin Kaepernick.

Or if you’re more old school, you might think of famous print ads, like the VW campaign from the swinging ‘60s.

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These days, the most common way to run an advertising campaign is online. In this guide, we’re going to explore different types of ad campaigns and how to create one that works for your brand.

What is an Advertising Campaign?

You could ask 100 different people for a definition of an ad campaign and you’d probably get 100 different answers. Why? Because there are lots of factors at play, such as:

The product or service being advertised
Target market and their pain points, fears, frustrations, wants, and aspirations
Medium through which the ad campaign is being delivered
Ad platform or tools being used

Here’s a very loose definition of an ad campaign:

An advertising campaign is a set of advertisements designed to get people excited about a product or service, often based on a unifying theme or idea that runs throughout. Ad campaigns are typically built towards particular success parameters, and if possible, the results are measured and quantified.

A famous example of an advertising campaign was Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke”. The simple idea was swapping their famous logo with people’s first names. The TV and print ads that went with the campaign showed people sharing Cokes with each other and became a huge hit around the globe.

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The aim of an advertising campaign depends on the stage of customer awareness among the target market.

Unaware: At this stage, your audience doesn’t even know they have a problem, much less that your product can solve it. The campaign should focus on making them aware of the problem first.
Problem-Aware: Here, people know they have a problem, but they don’t know that there are solutions available.

An example of a problem-aware stage ad campaign is “Red Bull Gives You Wings”. The ads showed animations of tired or drained characters sprouting wings after drinking the energy drink.

Solution-Aware: Your audience knows solutions exist now, but they aren’t aware of your specific product yet, or why it’s the best choice.

Product-Aware: People know about your product now but aren’t convinced they need it or that it’s worth the price. This is where more targeted ads come in. You can use free trials and discount offers here.

Most Aware: At this final stage, your audience is fully aware of your product and just needs a push to make the purchase or a reminder to keep your brand top of mind.

Types of Advertising Campaigns

Advertising campaigns can take many forms. In this section, we’ll explore the most common types of digital ads with some examples of each.

Whether you’re on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok or X, a social media ad campaign shares a common goal, whether that’s bumping up your website traffic, boosting sales figures, getting customer feedback, or just making more people aware of your brand.

A social media campaign might include organic posts that feel personal or set up paid ads for more reach. The key is to get people to do more than just like your posts. You want them interacting, sharing, and talking.

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The International House of Pancakes (IHOP) briefly rebranded as IHOb to promote their new burger range. The aim of their social media ads was to promote the rebrand and broaden their brand beyond just breakfast. It worked. The campaign created a buzz and burger sales went up.

Email advertising campaign

Email is a direct line to your customers which makes it a powerful way to advertise. If you can get your emails to stand out in someone’s inbox, then you’re onto a winner. The best way to do this is by making them highly targeted to people’s interests or past purchases.

As a nice bonus, email ad campaigns are very affordable and you can track almost everything – open rates, clicks, purchases, etc. This means you can track performance in real-time and tweak your strategy to suit.

Email advertising campaign example

Example of an email advertising campaign

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Uber’s email campaigns mirror the simplicity of their app. They stick to the basics, highlighting promotions and offers. Each message is brief and ends with a clear call to action, perfect for busy customers. They also make sure the emails look good on mobile screens, sticking to their sleek black-and-white color scheme and fonts that are easy to read.

Affiliate advertising

Affiliate marketing is a partnership where you team up with individuals or companies to promote your products. These affiliates use their own platforms, like blogs or social media, to advertise your offering. They get a special link to track their sales, and earn a commission on each sale.

This means you can tap into new markets with relative ease. You give your affiliates ad creatives like promotional images and product images and they do the rest.

Influencer advertising

An influencer campaign is when a brand teams up with someone who has already built an audience in the niche they’re targeting. The idea is that the influencer promotes your product or service in return for payment or free products.

There are several types of influencer:

Nano-influencers: Typically have 1,000 to 10,000 followers. Known for high engagement rates and intimate audience relationships.
Micro-influencers: Boast 10,000 to 100,000 followers. Niche experts, often with a deeply engaged following.
Macro-influencers: Have between 100,000 and 1 million followers and offer wide-reaching exposure.
Mega-influencers: More than 1 million followers, often celebrities, with broad but sometimes less engaged audiences.

Brands might ask influencers to post sponsored content, giveaways or contests, or even host events.

Influencer ad campaign example

Example of an influencer advertising campaign

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For example, Gymshark teamed up with fitness influencer @SopheAllen to show off her Black Friday haul and encourage her followers to click the link for a 60% discount.

Native advertising

If you want high engagement, native advertising and content do the trick. Native ads come in many ad formats that fit in with the content on editorial web pages, news, and entertainment sites, so they don’t look or feel like ads. This means they don’t interrupt people’s online experience as much, making them less annoying.

The fact that people interact with native ads more than traditional ads, means that you often see a higher ROI especially compared to display ads.

How Much Do Digital Advertising Campaigns Cost?

How long is a piece of string? The cost of digital advertising varies, depending on what strategies you’re using, who you’re targeting, and how much reach you’re looking for. One thing is for sure – the pricing models are very different to traditional print or broadcast ads.

In general, digital advertising gives you more control than traditional methods. You can target more carefully and get lots of data on how your ads are doing. With traditional ads, you pay a fixed price regardless of results, whereas you pay for digital ads according to results.

For example, the Cost Per Click (CPC) model means you pay each time someone clicks on your ad. This is great for driving traffic to your site and is common on social platforms like Google and Facebook. The cost depends on how competitive your keywords are.

Then there’s Cost Per Acquisition (CPA), where you only pay if a specific action is taken. This might be more expensive, but you’re paying directly for real money results.

Advertising Campaign Strategies

Let’s break down in clear steps how to make a winning strategy for online advertising campaigns.

Step 1: Set clear goals

Start by setting the goal or goals you want to achieve. This could be growing your audience, boosting revenue, or launching a new product. Whatever it is, set a specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) goal. Having a clear target to hit makes your decisions easier and more focused.

Step 2: Choose your tactics

Decide the tactics you’re going to use to hit your goal. For instance, running highly targeted Facebook ads for 12 weeks.

Step 3: Tailor ads to your audience

You need to know your audience really well and create ads that speak directly to them. The ads might point out common pain points, connect emotionally in some way, or make them aware that your product or service is the solution they’re looking for. An approach that’s growing in popularity because it works so well is driving people to your content through native advertising.

Step 4: Pick a primary channel

Start with one channel where you believe you’ll make the most impact. For B2B companies it could be LinkedIn, for B2C it could be Twitter (X) or Instagram. Focus on just one initially and expand later.

Step 5: Monitor and adjust

Use tools to track what’s working and what isn’t. Be flexible and ready to tweak your tactics based on real-world results.

Step 6: Combine and integrate

As you start seeing results from your primary channel, begin to integrate other channels. This might mean starting Google Ad PPC campaigns to support social media ads.

What are the Most Popular Brand Advertising Campaigns?

Dove: Real Beauty Sketches YouTube campaign

Dove’s Real Beauty Sketches is one of the most viral video advertising campaigns ever. The videos features an FBI sketch artists who drew women based on two things:

a) their own descriptions

b) descriptions given by strangers

As you might expect, the differences were profound. It showed the discrepancy between how others see us and how we see ourselves. The tagline was “you are more beautiful than you think”. The campaign got more than 114 million views in the first month.

Wendy’s: #NuggsForCarter Twitter campaign

Wendy’s campaign began with a tweet from a teenager named Carter Wilkerson asking Wendy’s how many retweets he needed to get a year of free chicken nuggets.

Wendy’s response of “18 million” went viral. Although Carter didn’t reach 18 million, the tweet received over 3.5 million retweets. Wendy’s gave him the nuggets anyway, along with a $100,000 donation to a charity of his choice.

Apple: 1984 Super Bowl ad

Directed by Ridley Scott, Apple’s “1984” commercial introduced the Macintosh computer. The ad depicted a dystopian future akin to Orwell’s novel with a lone heroine symbolizing the Mac as a rebellion against conformity.

Although specific viewership numbers from that era are not as precise as today, the ad reached millions during the broadcast and has since been viewed millions of times online, being studied and lauded as a watershed moment for advertising.

Advertising Campaigns Dos and Don’ts

When you’re creating an advertising campaign, there are some essential dos and don’ts to keep in mind to help make sure your efforts hit the mark.

Dos

Target precisely: Know your audience well. The more targeted your campaign, the better the results.
Keep it clear and compelling: Your message should be easy to understand and grab attention quickly.
Use various techniques: Try different ways to catch attention, such as mastering powerful techniques like native advertising copywriting.
Test and optimize: Always test different elements of your ads, like headlines and images. Use the data to optimize future campaigns.

Don’ts

Overpromise: Avoid making promises your product or service can’t keep. It damages credibility.
Neglect mobile: With the majority of users on mobile, ensure your ads are optimized for mobile devices.
Ignore feedback: Pay attention to how your audience reacts to your ads and adjust to suit. Ignoring feedback is costly.

Advertising Campaign Success Stories

Orange France AI video advertising campaign

Orange France clever ad campaign made you think you’re watching some of soccer’s big male stars like Mbappe and Griezmann doing what they do best. But here’s the twist – it’s not them at all. The campaign used VFX and AI tech to swap the men’s faces onto the bodies of players from the French women’s soccer team.

The ad got more than 5 million views and made a statement about how we view men’s and women’s sports differently. It’s backed by some telling stats, such as 44% of sports fans believing women’s sports deserve more media spotlight, challenging sporting perceptions and disparities.

Marc O’Polo native advertising campaign with Outbrain

Marc O’Polo, a premium lifestyle and clothing brand aimed to pull in more online customers. To do this, they partnered up with Outbrain and used their Standard ad experience.

The successful ad campaign led to an incredible return on ad spend (ROAS) of 1500% on mobile for their men’s campaign and 484% on desktop for their women’s campaign.

The strategy was straightforward, yet highly effective. They worked closely with Outbrain’s local account management team to pinpoint ads that resonated with their target audience’s diverse preferences. They used Outbrain’s Conversion Bid Strategy tool to automatically adjust bids to target users most likely to convert.

Outbrain’s tech and Marc O’Polo’s creative ads drove impressive results. And it’s not a one-off. Marc O’Polo plans to keep this partnership going and expand their use of native advertising solutions with Outbrain.