What is digital advertising?
Digital advertising is any paid message delivered through a screen connected to the internet. That covers search ads, paid social, display banners, online video, audio streaming, connected TV, retail media and the ads inside apps and games. What sets it apart from traditional media is not the screen but the plumbing: placements are bought in auctions or through platforms, audiences are targeted by data rather than by the content around them, and results come back while the campaign is still running.
Within it there are two broad jobs. Some digital advertising builds a brand, with films and visuals designed to be remembered. Some drives a response, with ads designed to get a click, an install or a sale today. Most healthy budgets do both.
Why it matters
Why digital advertising matters
It is where the attention is. For most audiences, most media time is now spent on phones, laptops and streaming television, and digital is the only way to reach them there at scale. It is also the most accountable media ever sold: an advertiser can see what each dollar bought, adjust in hours and stop what is not working. That flexibility lets a small brand compete with a big one, because a sharp idea aimed at the right audience can outperform a large budget spent badly.
The catch is volume. Feeds refresh constantly, ads fatigue in weeks, and every platform wants a different shape, length and tone. Digital rewards brands that can make a lot of good creative, not just one great spot.
In practice
How digital advertising works in practice
- 01
A campaign starts with an objective (awareness, consideration, conversion) and an audience, then a channel mix built to reach that audience where it spends time: search for intent, social and online video for discovery, connected TV for the living room, display and retargeting to follow up. Budgets are set by channel, and the platforms' buying tools handle bidding within them.
- 02
Then the creative is built for each placement: vertical cuts for stories and short-form video, square and landscape versions for feeds, six-second bumpers, fifteen and thirty second spots for streaming, static and motion variants for display. Once the campaign is live, the team watches performance, retires what fatigues, and feeds the winners with new variations.
At RIOT
Digital advertising at RIOT
Most of the films we make now live on digital channels, and we plan for that from the first frame. For Bogg Bags we made the CTV spot "Real Life, Worry Free" for the streaming living room. For Gantri we made two months of social product films. For Homebase we ran a Meta ad engine from February to April 2025, producing creative in rounds so the results could steer the next batch.
Watch out
What people get wrong about digital advertising
Treating targeting as a substitute for creative. Precise targeting puts an ad in front of the right person; it does not make them care. Most of the difference between a campaign that works and one that does not is still the ad itself. The other mistake is resizing one asset for every platform. A television spot cropped to vertical with captions added is an ad that tells the viewer it was made for somewhere else.
