Yesterday Aileen Apolo, country consultant of Google Philippines met up with SEO professionals in Davao. (This was her second meet-up with them, the first being in November last year.) Aileen’s talk focused on Google AdWords. Simply put, it is an online service by which advertisers can promote and market their products / services via Google’s ubiquitous Internet presence.

Myriads of businesses — as well as innumerable organizations and individuals — place online ads in the extensive Google network. In my estimation, this is because of two fundamental factors: 1) Google ads are seen by 90% of Internet users worldwide; 2) Google ads are targeted and contextual.

The second factor means that the advertiser has the power to make his ads appear in websites, or types of websites, of his choosing. Other configurations and settings are possible. This translates to targeted viewership of ads. Meaning, if you aim to reach a specific market or age group or even ethnicity, that is easily accomplished through Google AdWords.

The term "contextual ads" refers to Google’s system of serving ads that are related to a website’s content. For example on this site, you will see that the Google ads appearing here are related to the general topics of I.T. Talks!. You will never see ads that are non-IT- or non-Davao-related here.

Davao companies stand to benefit from Internet advertising campaigns. This is, however, not a commonly-held notion at present. Perhaps this is due to the misguided perception that the Internet is too widespread, too chaotic. Ergo, advertising online is overkill? Wrong. On the contrary, Internet-based marketing and promotions are more cost-efficient.

How much does it cost to place a full-page ad in national paper? Around P250,000 for one placement in a widely-read publication. Let’s say the paper is called Daily Planeta. The newspaper could probably tell you that they have nationwide coverage, with a circulation of 7 million copies a day, that their readership base is 10 million Filipinos or so, that they are read by adults 27-60 years old, etc. Of course they would give you more detailed data.

But no matter how detailed, they will never be able to show you exact figures, especially for how many actually see your ad, much less how many take action upon seeing your ad. Let’s say you want to advertise to the yuppy market. Daily Planeta certainly fits the bill. But they won’t be able to tell you exactly how many young people will see your ad. Nor will they be able to target your ad specifically towards your preferred market with any reliable degree of certainty.

Newspaper advertising (as well as those in the broadcast media) is like watering your garden: you do get to nourish your plants… as well as the weeds. Ok, not a very sexy analogy, but you get the picture.

What’s wrong with ‘blanket’ advertising? It’s simply this: in the Information Age, people are bombarded with ads to the point of indifference, numbness. I’m sure you’ll agree with me that, when reading newspapers, you will take more notice of ads only if they present you with something that is of interest to you.

That is why targeted and contextual advertising has come of age. Advertising on the Internet — especially in websites (blogs, search engines, web-based email services, etc.) — allows for this form of campaign.

Plus, you get to see exactly how many people actually view, and take action on, your ad. Google is so confident in this that they will charge you only for just that much exposure. Come again? you might ask. Suppose you sign up for an online ad campaign where you pay only the number of times you ad is clicked by users. This is possible and this is being done. And you get to receive on-demand reports too.

Businesses in Davao, whether internationally- or domestically-focused, would do well to explore the world of "new-media" advertising. For more information on Google AdWords, please email robillo[at]gmail[dot]com.