# How to Scale Advertising Beyond Social and Search

> A NachoTuesday interview — the C-Suite Insights series from NachoNacho, the B2B SaaS and AI
> marketplace. In conversation with Maryna Burushkina, Founder, GrowthChannel.

- **Page:** https://nachonacho.com/nachotuesday/video/How-to-Scale-Advertising-Beyond-Social-and-Search
- **Guest:** Maryna Burushkina, Founder, GrowthChannel
- **Guest on LinkedIn:** https://www.linkedin.com/in/mburushkina/
- **Recorded:** 2023-03-21
- **Watch:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIpdYdcNE2c

## Summary

In this NachoTuesday, Andy Karuza interviews Maryna Burushkina, Founder of GrowthChannel. In this interview, they covered tips on how to scale advertising beyond social and search. The discussion also covers advertising trends for 2023, defining your omnichannel ad strategy, advertising tactics for branding, website traffic, and conversion, and how to scale your advertising programs without breaking the bank. Watch this interview today to unlock new growth channels for your business while spending your advertising dollars wisely.

## Full transcript

This is Andy Karuza with NachoNacho, the number one place online to Manage, Discover, and Save on SaaS. Today we have Marina from GrowthChannel joining us, and our discussion is focused on how to scale your advertising beyond search and social. In the current economic conditions, many companies are pouring their money into social and search, but Marina is here to teach us that there are numerous other channels where you can invest your advertising dollars and achieve a better ROI. Today's episode will explore thinking outside the box when it comes to advertising. Thank you, Marina, for being here. Before we dive in, could you give us a quick elevator pitch about your product and what your company does? Thank you, Andy, and hello, everyone. I'm delighted to be on this live show today. Let me tell you a bit about GrowthChannel. We are an AI engine for programmatic advertising. Our platform helps businesses optimize their advertising campaigns by targeting specific audiences across various channels. We recommend affordable channels such as web display, native advertising, video advertising, and even in-game and in-app advertising, depending on your business needs. As you mentioned, Andy, many companies are scaling back on advertising due to the economic conditions. For those hesitant to spend money on advertising, I would advise against broad targeting. Instead, focus on your highest-value customer segments. Dive deep into their preferences, interests, and purchasing habits. By targeting these specific audiences across different channels, you can maximize your advertising efforts. Consider channels beyond social and search, such as Amazon, and identify the channels your audience uses and engages with. Additionally, explore cost-effective channels like programmatic advertising, where you can strategically reach your target audience without requiring a huge budget. Platforms like Growth Channel have no minimum ad spend requirements, allowing you to test the waters with a few hundred bucks and track your conversions effectively. That's a great point, Marina. Many startups are looking for cost-effective advertising channels that might not immediately come to mind. Can you share some channels that startups should explore but often overlook? Certainly, Andy. Besides programmatic advertising, which I mentioned earlier, startups can consider niche channels that align with their target audience. For instance, if your audience reads Business Insider, Forbes, or CNN, why not reach them through these channels? You can target specific audiences without needing a substantial budget. On platforms like Growth Channel, you can start with a small ad spend and closely track each step of the customer journey using pixels. By doing so, you can assess if a particular channel is driving conversions and then invest further. We have a question from our audience specifically about B2B targeting. Apart from LinkedIn, what other recommendations do you have for B2B marketers? B2B targeting can vary greatly depending on the industry. For B2B marketers, utilizing third-party pre-built audiences can be beneficial. These pre-built lists contain specific audience segments, such as investors, angel investors, or funds. By layering additional filters, like company size or relevant keywords, you can refine your targeting. Keyword targeting, in particular, has shown impressive results, with up to 10x ROI when combined with demographic information. For example, if you're selling supply chain software, you can add keywords like "supply chain software," "high-tech software," or "B2B enterprise SaaS" to reach the right audience. Consider advertising on aggregator articles, blogs, and news sites like USA Today or The New York Times, as they attract individuals interested in emerging companies and investments. That's some valuable advice, Marina. B2B marketers can also explore targeting specific blog types or leverage LinkedIn for their niche audience. Cost-effective advertising on relevant blogs and industry sites can be quite effective. Thank you for sharing your insights today, Marina. But it will create an audience profile based on those emails, including company information and names It does a pretty good job of matching them to their LinkedIn profiles. When it comes to advertising, I often prefer to spend money on people who have already shown interest. That's where retargeting and similar campaigns come in, as they can be highly effective. These are people who have already had some experience with your brand. Investing in ad spend for this audience can help push them further down the funnel, rather than spending a lot of money at the top of the funnel on people who have never heard of you. Retargeting is always a good strategy, and we also recommend using it in parallel with reaching new audiences. Whenever they visit your site or engage with your brand, you can capture their attention and bring them back. It's important to consider the overall visibility of your brand, reaching people multiple times and in various places. So, if you're investing in reaching a particular audience, it makes sense to retarget and educate them at different stages of the funnel. For example, you can target them on LinkedIn, on relevant blogs they visit, or through display retargeting ads. Eventually, you may even have a call-to-action (CTA) for them to download a white paper or access more information about your product or service for further education. It's not a one-and-done approach. LinkedIn is a great channel for advertising, but you need to be mindful of the ad costs there. It's not the cheapest option. We also had a question from the audience about the disappearance of third-party cookies and the impact of iOS blocking advertisers, especially Facebook, from retargeting people. This is a significant trend that data companies and advertising platforms have been considering for over a year now. The current approach involves unique user identifiers and cross-device IDs to identify users across different platforms. Many companies can still reach users through these methods. For example, you may have a conversation about having dinner and then start seeing ads about dinner options on Hulu. This targeting is based on context and keywords, utilizing unique user identifiers, which are long strings of digits. Many platforms can identify users across their various devices, allowing ads to be shown on different platforms like TV or Spotify based on conversations near the user's device. It's an interesting approach that considers contextual targeting. Apart from these trends, connected TV, particularly in 2022, experienced significant growth. Due to increased screen time during the pandemic, channels like Holo Rocco, Pluto, Disney Plus, and Prime saw a surge in popularity. While Facebook is still a dominant player, many advertisers are exploring other platforms, such as TikTok, although its future remains uncertain. LinkedIn has always been a reliable platform for advertising, maintaining its stability. On our platform, we've also noticed growth in digital out-of-home advertising. This allows for targeted reach in office elevators, digital billboards, supermarkets, and even during events. For example, if you want to reach people attending the South Pine event, you can geofence the area and target them on their phones while also displaying digital billboards at the event. This approach has gained popularity recently. Can advertising be invasive? Can push notifications be too much? When is advertising considered excessive? Yes, advertising can be invasive, especially when it becomes intrusive or disruptive to the user's experience. Push notifications can also become overwhelming if they are frequent and irrelevant to the user's interests or needs. Determining when advertising becomes excessive is subjective and depends on the individual's tolerance and preferences. However, there are some indicators that can help identify excessive advertising. These include: Frequency: If ads appear too frequently, bombarding users with constant interruptions, it can be considered excessive. Intrusiveness: Ads that interrupt or obstruct the user's activities, such as pop-up ads that cover the entire screen, can be intrusive and annoying. Relevance: Irrelevant ads that have no connection to the user's interests or needs can be seen as excessive and irritating. Intrusive data collection: If advertising involves excessive data collection without proper consent or transparency, it can be invasive and raise privacy concerns. To strike a balance and avoid being excessive, advertisers should aim to deliver targeted, relevant ads in moderation, respecting users' preferences and privacy. Providing users with control over their ad preferences and opt-out options can also help mitigate the feeling of invasiveness. Customers, how do you avoid annoying them with any of your advertising campaigns? Well, there's actually one very simple answer to that: frequency control. It's very hard to achieve on platforms like Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, and others. However, on more advanced programmatic channels like our platform, Gross Channel, you have full control over your frequency cap. This means you can determine how many times each user sees your ad per hour, per day, per week, or per month. You can set it to show your ad to the same person maybe only once a week, once a day at most, or once every second day, for example. Sometimes, I'm watching TV and I feel like I see the same ad one after another, and I think, "Couldn't they just put a frequency cap in place?" So, definitely utilize frequency control as much as you can. If you have access to it, set it up to ensure it's not too invasive. Many platforms offer this feature, but surprisingly, many marketers don't take advantage of it. Regarding targeting the EU, there are a few things to keep in mind. Firstly, ensure that your website's privacy policy and other related aspects comply with the regulations of the targeted countries. Secondly, there are certain limitations in advertising when it comes to stricter countries in the EU. For example, custom audience targeting, which involves identifying people who attended past events, is not allowed due to GDPR. However, you can still target people at specific events in European countries and continue marketing to them for a certain period, typically 30 to 60 days after the event. As for our company's founding story, we initially planned to target multi-brand enterprises like Philips or Alliance. However, with the COVID-19 pandemic, it became challenging to pursue that direction. We participated in YC startup school and discovered that many startups and small businesses were facing marketing problems. As a marketer myself, it was something I hadn't realized before. So, we decided to pivot and focus on helping small businesses and startups grow, especially during the difficult times of the pandemic. If you're interested in entrepreneurship, I highly recommend "Shoe Dog" by the founder of Nike. It's an inspiring story. Another great book is "Traction" by Gabriel Weinberg, which delves into various traction channels for marketing and attracting customers. It offers 19 different channels and goes into detail about each one. You can find it on platforms like Audible. When choosing our product over competitors, there are a few key points to consider. First, we don't have a minimum ad spend requirement in our programmatic advertising platform. Additionally, we provide access to over 150+ ad networks and offer advanced functionalities. Moreover, we go beyond being just an advertising platform, providing features to help with marketing planning, competitor research, identifying personas, customer decision journeys, channel strategies, and more. We aim to offer a comprehensive solution for your marketing needs. Thank you once again for having me on the webinar, and if anyone is interested in our product, you can find it on our B2B SaaS Marketplace with a 30% discount. We have a wide range of advertising channels for you to explore, especially in these economic conditions. Feel free to check it out, and don't forget to read "Traction" if you're interested. See you soon for the next NachoTuesday!

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