1.
Idea to IPO
Optimizing Your Digital Marketing
Campaigns
October 2014
Arjun Dev Arora

2.
Follow me!
@arjundarora
#RTChat

3.
Arjun Dev Arora, Chairman and Founder of ReTargeter
Arjun was the founding CEO of ReTargeter and bootstrapped
the company to be in the top 100 of Inc's Fastest Growing
Companies list. He is a recognized expert in display
advertising and retargeting. Arjun also advises various
advertising and technology start-up companies.

4.
Table of Contents
1 Core Metrics
Impressions, Clicks, Conversions, RoAS
2 Core Dimensions
Inventory, Creatives, Time, Landing Page
3 Intelligent Spending
CPM, CPC, and CPA
4 Execution & Optimization
5 Summary & Conclusion

5.
Core Metrics
1

6.
Impressions
Core Metrics
• Whenever your creative is displayed, it’s considered an impression.
Why they matter
Impressions are the point of contact and between you and your
audience.
Campaign optimizations focus on serving impressions at the right
time, to the right people, and in the right place.
What they tell you
The way viewers respond to impressions gives you insights into
your audience and brand.
What they don’t tell you
You can apply some learnings across campaigns, every
campaign is different and requires its own set of tests and
optimizations.
How they can change
Impressions vary dramatically depending on your campaign and
spending goals.
Do you care what websites display your ads? Or are you interested in
displaying as many impressions as possible, regardless of location?

7.
Clicks
Core Metrics
• A click occurs when a user clicks your advertisement
Why they matter
If an impression is the point of contact between you and a
viewer, a click is the viewer engaging in the conversation.
Although clicks are a common way to measure campaign
performance, it should not be the main driver of your campaign
What they tell you
Clicks can tell you how effective your creatives are.
You can also gather intelligence about how much demand there is
for your offering.
What they don’t tell you
Bot traffic skews click data.
You can identify bot traffic and segment this group to be excluded
from your campaign.
How they can change
Clicks are desirable because they imply inbound traffic.
Sometimes however, all that matters is that somebody saw the ad.
A campaign urging people to “tune in” to a sitcom is pushing for
awareness. The number of people who click through isn’t as
important as whether or not they watch the show.

8.
Conversions
Core Metrics
• Conversions occur when a user performs a desired action and differ depending on the individual
campaign goals.
Why they matter
Conversions are often the end goal of display campaigns and are
affected by numerous factors.
What they tell you
Low conversion rates can have several causes:
- poorly designed creatives,
- wrong audience,
- not serving enough impressions,
- poor landing page UX.
What they don’t tell you
If you aren’t satisfied by your conversion rate, it could be an issue
with your display advertising, but it could also be an issue with
your pricing, website, messaging, etc.
How they can change
Conversions will vary depending on your business and campaign
goals.
Conversions can be as small as a social share, or as big as purchasing
a vacation package. The most common conversion types are a
purchase, a share, and data submission (e.g.
subscriptions/registrations)

9.
Click Through Conversions
Core Metrics
• Attribution: Click through conversions are easier to attribute than view through conversions. You
know what creative a person saw, when they saw it, and you know that they engaged with it before
actually converting.
• Measurement: Click through conversions are measured by click through to conversion rate
conversions/clicks.
• What does it mean? A low click through conversion rate could mean that your creative isn’t
displaying to the right audience. It could also suggest that your landing page needs work to move
visitors to convert.

10.
View Through Conversions
Core Metrics
• Attribution: Attribution is hazier for VTCs but it’s still an extremely valuable metric. Although viewers
don’t click on the creative, studies have shown that display campaigns result in an 80% increase in
branded search, meaning people see the creative and use a search engine to find the business
later.
• View through window: View through windows help define VTC attribution. For example, a 14 day
view through window will attribute conversions to a creative if it was viewed within 14 days of the
conversion.
• Intelligence: The VTC rate is an important measurement of the value and effectiveness of your
campaign. A low VTC rate could indicate that you’re serving the wrong audience. Is this audience
behaving differently than other audience segments that you are not targeting/retargeting? You might
even set up a test to find out!

11.
Core Metrics
Ad Spend, Revenue, and RoAS
Ad Spend
Ad spend is simply the amount you paid for advertising.
• Spend = Impressions/1000 x CPM
Revenue
In this case, revenue refers to any income that results from your campaign.
You can usually use a revenue pixel to track your revenue and tie it to a
specific campaign.
Return on Ad Spend RoAS
If you know your ad spend and your revenue, you can calculate your RoAS
(Return on Ad Spend).
• RoAS = (Revenue – Spend) / Spend
You should define what RoAS works for your goals and use this metric to
compare your overall advertising efforts.

12.
Core Dimensions
2

13.
Inventory Source
Core Dimensions
• Inventory source refers to the particular ad network that provided the inventory space. Understanding
how your campaign performs against different inventory sources will help you optimize.

14.
Creatives
Core Dimensions
• Creatives are the actual ads you display. Continuously test and optimize your creatives.

15.
Creatives
Core Dimensions
• These are the most common inventory sizes

16.
Time of Day
Core Dimensions
• Your audience may be more active online at certain times of the day. Tailor your campaign to fit your
audience.

17.
Landing Pages
Core Dimensions
A well-designed and relevant ad, will probably drive a lot of clicks. But what happens after the visitor
clicks your ad? Your ads and landing pages should align so the user has a smooth path to conversion.
• The role of the landing page
o The landing page links your creative and your offering
o The landing page should move users through your funnel
• Optimize forever
o Keep an eye on: bounce rate, conversion rate, and quality score (a propriety measure built by
Google that indicates how relevant your ads, keywords, and landing page are to a person seeing
the ad).

18.
Landing Pages
Core Dimensions
• Elements of a good landing page
o Design and messaging of your
landing page should be
consistent with your creative
o Should reiterate what was in
the ad and specify what the
visitor can expect
o Clearly communicate the
conversion action

19.
Intelligent Spending
3

20.
Inventory Buying Methods
Intelligent Spending
There are three main ways to buy ad inventory in display advertising. The standard buying method
is CPM, but depending on your campaign goals, it may be more appropriate to pay on a CPC or
CPA basis:
CPM
Cost-per-mille
CPC
Cost-per-click
CPA
Cost-per-acquisition

21.
Cost-per-mille
CPM

22.
CPM
Cost-per-mille
Intelligent Spending
How it Works Advertisers pay per 1,000 impressions.
Cost Range
Programmatic: $0.50-$3.00
Programmatic Premium: $5-$15
Premium Direct: $10-$100+
Who it benefits
• Industry standard for purchasing display media.
• Appropriate for most display campaigns.
• Works to the advantage of advertisers and adtech
companies.
Campaign Goals
Works for just about all campaign goals (brand
awareness, click through, reach, conversions)
because it allows room for optimization toward any goals.

23.
Cost-per-click
CPC

24.
CPC
Cost-per-click
Intelligent Spending
How it Works
Advertiser pays for every click, regardless of the number
of impressions displayed
Cost Range
Programmatic: $0.50-$5.00
Premium publishers don’t typically allow CPC
Who it benefits
• Best for advertisers that care less about brand
awareness and more about site traffic
• Doesn’t always work for adtech companies looking to
protect their downside risk
Campaign Goals Advertisers focused on generating site traffic

25.
Cost-per-acquisition
CPA

26.
CPA
Cost-per-acquisition
Intelligent Spending
How it Works
Advertisers pay by conversion, regardless of number of
impressions and clicks.
Cost Range
Highly variable depending on the campaign. For example,
pricing will differ if the acquisition is the sale of $10,000
software product versus a $3 pair of sunglasses.
Who it benefits
• Good for advertisers trying to drive conversions
regardless of traffic source.
• Can be VERY difficult for adtech companies as they
take all the inventory risk.
Campaign goals
Company needs to drive conversions within a fixed cost per
conversion.

27.
Buying methods
vs.
Campaign Goals

28.
Intelligent Spending
Pay by CPM While Optimizing Toward CPA/CPC Goals
Set up and optimize toward CPC and CPA goals even though you pay on a CPM basis
Measure
CPC/CPA
CPA
• Paying by CPM gives advertisers and clients the opportunity to see campaign conversion performance
Cost-per-acquisition
• Reach the largest possible audience
So why not pay on a CPA/CPC basis?
• For CPA, view-through and click-through attribution must be defined before campaign launches
• CPA and CPC pricing can result in less flexibility for your campaign manager to test
• CPA/CPC pricing structures don’t always work well with adtech companies since they might not have great
control over campaign assets and performance (creative, landing pages, pricing, etc.), but take on the risk
of the actual media cost.

29.
Execution & Optimization
4

30.
Execution & Optimization
Time of Day
Is your audience really looking at 3AM on a Sunday?
• Part of understanding your audience involves knowing when they browse the web. If you know this,
you can tailor your campaign to display ads when they are online. For example, B2B sellers may find
that they are most successful during business hours while an entertainment company may do better
showing impressions in the evening.

31.
Execution & Optimization
Creative
Test, test, test
• Different ads appeal to different kinds of audiences
• Your audience will get bored of even the best ads, it’s imperative to constantly rotate creatives
• How do you know what creatives work best? A/B test and iterate!
• Decide what element you want to test, then make an alteration to your existing creatives. For
example, try changing the color of a CTA or the wording of a tagline. Then compare the
performance of the creatives. Make sure you don’t alter too much in the test version, that way
you know exactly what drove a change in the creative’s performance.

32.
Execution & Optimization
Segmentation
Organizing your audience
• Segmentation is a way to decide who is being targeted based on where they are engaging with your
website. Segments can be as complicated as SKU based or as simple as choosing between two
sections of the site.
Two different products Two different ad experiences

33.
Execution & Optimization
Frequency Caps
How to use them properly and with different segments
• Display advertising is great for reconnecting with site visitors, but extra care should be taken not to
overexpose yourself. Setting a frequency cap will limit the number of times tagged users see your
ads and will prevent potential customers from feeling bored, overwhelmed, or stalked. We
recommend showing 17-20 ads per user per month.

34.
Execution & Optimization
Browser/Device
Only show ads to certain types of devices or browsers
• Don’t waste your ad spend showing advertisements to an unqualified audience. If you’re selling an
app that is only compatible with iPhone, don’t advertise to Windows phone users.
• A more advanced optimization would be to target based off conversions driven by browser type. For
example, if Chrome users tend to convert more, you may place more of your budget advertising to
Chrome users.
Image Link

35.
Execution & Optimization
Inventory Sources
Remove the wrong inventory sources, and get more from the right inventory sources
• Some inventory sources focus on specific site types like sports, gaming, entertainment, news, etc.
Depending on your audience, it may make sense to concentrate your ad spend on some inventory
sources while avoiding others. Similarly, you should remove underperforming inventory sources and
optimize for top performing sources.

36.
Execution & Optimization
First Party Data
What is your audience telling you?
• First party data is any information you collect about your audience. In the context of display
advertising, first party data is cookie-based data, and it’s the most valuable data you can collect
about your audience.
• Because first party data specifies your users, it’s the key component to site retargeting, facebook
retargeting, and CRM retargeting.
• You will probably find yourself in a position where you want to reach an audience that you don’t have
information about. This is where second party and third party data can come in handy.

37.
Execution & Optimization
Second Party Data
Can you get proprietary access to transparent data?
• Second party data is essentially somebody else’s first party data. Second party data isn’t usually
commoditized, but you can work out an arrangement with trusted partners to share customer data.
For example, a high-end watch company might partner with a yacht blog to find new customers. The
possibilities are endless, but the key is to form and maintain good partnerships.

38.
Execution & Optimization
Third Party Data
What’s out there, and what’s right for your business
• Companies such as BlueKai, Peer39, and eXelate sell third-party data. These companies are also
known as DMPs or Data Aggregators and they are the behemoths of the data world. Their data is
typically purchased on a large scale from publishers. The benefit of third party data is the sheer
volume of user data you can access, but this data is also widely accessible to competitors so you
aren’t necessarily gaining unique audience intelligence.
• Third party data is great for demographic, behavioral, and contextual targeting, but can also be used
to remove bot traffic
• Third party data providers charge a fee to use their segments, usually on a CPM basis. Depending
on the the data, the CPM can be anywhere from $0.50 to $5.00

39.
Execution & Optimization
Bidding Styles
Bid to win all vs. bid to win most
Bid to Win All Bid to Win Most
Win as many impressions as quickly as possible
Manage your costs so inventory is cheaper,
willing to lose some bids
Appropriate for hard-to-win audiences
Ex: High-level Executives
Appropriate for easy-to-find audiences
Ex: College Students
Exhausts budget rapidly Preserves budget longer

40.
Execution & Optimization
First Mover Advantage
Using and building new solutions
The world of display advertising is fast-moving and ever changing so it’s imperative to keep
up, or else you might be left behind. Keeping up can mean building new technologies in-house,
but it can also mean finding novel ways to combine existing technologies.
In-House
If you want something done right, sometimes you’ve got to do it yourself. Unsurprisingly
this takes a lot of time and effort, but it can pay off if it makes you stand out in the
marketplace.
Example: Trulia dynamic creatives
Partner Up
Innovation doesn’t have to mean building a new solution from the ground up. Existing
technologies can be combined in novel ways to create brand new solutions. The key is
to identify these technologies, and forge a strong partnership with the technology’s
providers.
This form of innovation is faster and requires less effort. However, it can leave you at
the mercy of another organization that you have little control over, so make sure to
choose your partners wisely.

41.
Execution & Optimization
First Mover Advantage
Partners sharing technology to provide new solutions to customers
CRM ReTargeting – This is a product that ReTargeter offers, and is built using technology from LiveRamp.
CRM ReTargeting lets you show advertisements to an audience defined by your CRM data.
Conversation ReTargeting– ReTargeter has also taken on the role of technology provider to power other
company’s products. PrimeLoop recently announced Conversation ReTargeting, a tool that allows advertisers
to tag users who click on links that don’t lead to their website. PrimeLoop uses ReTargeter technology and
combines it with their own link-shortening technology to offer a new solution to its clients.

42.
Real Optimization
Tests and Results

43.
Optimization: Dayparting (Time of Day)
Execution & Optimization
We set a group of campaigns to only display ads from 7am-10pm and compared the results to letting the
campaign display ads throughout the day.
Impressions 34%
A decrease in impressions expected, as
you’re displaying impressions for a smaller
window of time
Clicks/CTR 5% 59%
Clicks and CTR rate both increased,
potentially because the campaigns didn’t
engage night owls.
Conversions/Click 38%
Conversions per click decreased, suggesting
that dayparting generated greater interest but
the audience may not have been ready to
convert
The decrease in conversions is accompanied by an increase in CTR may be caused by
people browsing more during the day while at work, but not actually spending money until
they’re at home at the end of the day.
What’s next: A next step would be to test this hypothesis by focusing more impressions on
times when people are at home, and advertising less during work hours.

44.
Optimization: Bot Traffic
Execution & Optimization
Bots are an unfortunate part of the ad industry but if you identify and remove bot traffic, you will likely see
an improvement in your ad spend. Here’s the result of excluding some segments identified as bot traffic.
Impressions 4% A decrease in impressions reflects the bot
traffic that has been weeded out
Clicks/CTR 17% 20%
Clicks and CTR rate both decreased, both
promising results as this was probably all
bot traffic
Conversions/Click 13%
Conversions per click increased, suggesting
that at least some bot traffic has been
successfully removed and ads are now
being more concentrated on an engaged
and interested audience
No advertiser wants to waste their ad spend on bots so making any effort you can to
minimize bot traffic should only have a positive impact on your campaign.
What’s next: Unfortunately fraudsters are extremely adaptable and optimize quickly so
always be on the lookout for ways to eliminate bots.

45.
Optimization: Inventory Quality
Execution & Optimization
Some advertisers only want to display ads on certain sites while others appreciate as much exposure as
possible. We tested what happened when we only displayed ads on select inventory.
Impressions 38% A decrease in impressions is caused by the
decrease in overall available inventory.
Clicks/CTR 20% 28%
The decrease in overall clicks is likely
driven by the decrease of impressions. Of
the impressions displayed however, there
seems to be more audience engagement.
Conversions/Click 75%
Again, although overall impressions and
clicks went down, the rate of conversions to
clicks went up substantially. This suggests
that displaying ads on quality inventory
reaches a more qualified audience.
What works for one advertiser won’t necessarily work for another. You should always test
your own campaign.
What’s next?: More optimizing, always.

46.
Summary and Conclusion
5

47.
Summary
What you know:
Summary and Conclusion
Core Metrics
Impressions, Clicks, Conversions, RoAS
Core Dimensions
Inventory Source, Creatives, Time of Day, Landing
Page
Intelligent Spending CPM, CPC, CPA
Execution and Optimization
There are a myriad of ways to optimize your
campaign once you have an understanding of your
core metrics

48.
Conclusion
Main Takeaways
Summary and Conclusion
Congratulations! You’re ready to create, manage, and optimize your own display campaigns. Don’t forget
that just about anything is possible with RTB, make sure you constantly test, and always be optimizing

49.
Questions?
Arjun Dev Arora
Chairman/Founder
ReTargeter
@ArjunDArora
arjun@retargeter.com

50.
Thank You