Getting Your Business or Charity Better Known With Brand Awareness Ads
Fifty2M
March 4, 2025
Brand awareness ads can help get more people into the top of your marketing funnel, growing your audience and creating more opportunities over time.
What Are Brand Awareness Ads?
If people don't known about your business, they can't buy from it. Similarly, they can't donate to your charity if they've never come across it.
A lack of brand awareness is a major cause of low growth in businesses and charities.
Awareness ads are designed to fix this by putting brands in front of more people, some of whom could then go on to become customers or donors in time.
What Brand Awareness Ads Should Focus On
When using ads to raise awareness, it's important to focus on:
grabbing attention, so that more people are likely to actually see them wherever they're placed
making sure your ads feature your logo and colours because you want people to recognise you later
associating your brand with whatever it is you sell or do, so there's a greater chance of people coming to you down the line
being memorable, so that it's easier for people to recall your brand and your product, service, or cause after exposure
Some channels and platforms have specific formats that work well when it comes to brand awareness ads. For example, on paid social platforms, video works well, especially Facebook and Instagram Reels. For website banner ads, animated GIFs can work well because the movement draws the eye.
Remember, brand awareness ads are not about making immediate sales or securing donations, they're about setting the scene for them later.
The Best Placements For Brand Awareness Ads
As well as the content of the ads themselves, there are two key factors that influence success with brand awareness ads:
Reach: brand awareness ads need to get in front of as many people as possible
Frequency: people need to be exposed to brand awareness ads multiple times
It's important to take these into account when planning a brand awareness ads campaign and choosing the best placements.
Prioritise ad placements where:
Lots of people who might be interested in your business or charity could see them. Broad targeting works best at this stage so that you don't accidentally exclude people that you might otherwise appeal to, although you can improve efficiency with demographic and interest-based targeting in some placements
People will have the opportunity to see your ads several times, even if that's only subconsciously. That's because familiarity breeds affinity thanks to a psychological phenomenon known as The Mere Exposure Effect
Ad placements with large reach and exposure frequencies include:
Television
Out-Of-Home (billboards)
Social media
Newspapers and magazines can reach large audiences, as can cinema ads, but unless you're prepared to pay a lot of money, it's likely your ads will not be seen often enough by the same people to make a difference.
Unaddressed mail, including letters and leaflets, can reach large numbers of people in specific locations, and can also be affordable enough to repeat at a frequency that can start to have an effect on brand recall.
For the best overall results, it's a good idea to use multiple channels at the same time. This way, each reinforces the others to create a sort of multiplier effect.
Brand Awareness Ads: How Much Should You Budget?
If you're reading this and asking "how much should I budget for brand awareness ads" it's a good sign that you're thinking carefully about the idea.
There are two components to think about:
Ad creation and campaign implementation: will you design the ads yourself, or pay someone else to do it? Who will be responsible for the execution, media buying and so on?
Ad spend: how much are you prepared to pay to the owners of the spaces and platforms you want your brand awareness ads to appear on?
When it comes to producing ads and ad campaigns with impact, it's best to get expert help. This could come in the form of a creative agency that designs the ads, a separate media buying agency, and, for social media ads, a paid social agency. Or you could work with a full service agency like Fifty2M that can take care of it all.
Ad spend directly impacts the success of brand awareness campaigns because it can influence both reach and frequency; the more you spend, the more people you can get in front of more often - for instance, billboard ads in one town for a week will not put your brand in front of as many people as billboard ads in 10 towns for two weeks each, but the the extra locations and campaign duration come with an increased cost.
When constructing your budget for brand awareness ads, start by thinking about what you want to achieve and then tailor your spend based on affordability.
Measuring Success With Brand Awareness Ads
Success with brand awareness ads will differ from one campaign to the next, and what matters to you may not be the same for another business or charity.
For these reasons, pinning down a universal definition of success isn't easy.
Not only that, it can be hard to measure given that you're not asking people to take an action that's easy to track - you're just trying to get them to see and remember you.
However, there are some metrics that you can use to help determine how well your brand awareness campaigns are working:
Website visits
As more people begin to come into contact with your brand, those whose interest is piqued may start to visit your website to learn more and you'll see this in your website analytics
Follower growth on social media
It's common to see your follower count on social media begin to grow during a brand awareness ads campaign as your aware audiences look for ways to stay in touch with what you're all about
Social media mentions
You might begin to see people mentioning your brand by name on social media as they share details of what you do with friends and family they think could be interested in you
Branded search terms
Google Search Console will be able to tell if you if more people are finding your website by typing your brand name into its search engine, and it's often the case that you'll see a rise in this type of search activity
Leads, sales, enquiries and donations
Although brand awareness campaigns are about simply getting in front of more people more often, it can trigger a small corresponding increase in purchases etc among your newly aware audiences
Ad platform reports
If you're using digital marketing platforms to carry your brand awareness ads, such as banner ads delivered through Google's Display Network and the Bing equivalent, or you're running paid social ads on Meta's Facebook and Instagram platforms, you'll be able to track how many people your ads have reached, how often, and how many ad impressions have been served.
Brand Awareness Ads: Key Takeaways
Brand awareness ads are crucial for building a strong foundation for your business or charity. They introduce your brand to a wider audience, increasing the potential for future customers or donors.
Focus on grabbing attention, featuring your logo and colours, associating your brand with your offerings, and creating memorable ads. The goal is to make a lasting impression, not to drive immediate sales.
Reach and frequency are key to successful brand awareness campaigns. Choose ad placements that maximise the number of people who see your ads, and ensure they see them multiple times.
Budgeting for brand awareness ads involves considering both ad creation/implementation costs and ad spend. Strategic investment is essential for achieving desired reach and frequency.
Measuring success in brand awareness campaigns can be done through various metrics, including website visits, social media growth, mentions, branded search terms, and even a slight uptick in leads or sales. Track these metrics to gauge the effectiveness of your efforts.
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