Online advertising is a form of advertising that uses the Internet and World Wide Web in order to deliver marketing messages and attract customers to your products and services.

Examples of online advertising include contextual ads on search engine results pages, banner ads, Rich Media Ads, Social network advertising, online classified advertising, advertising networks and e-mail marketing.

A major benefit of online advertising is information and content that is not limited by geography or time. The emerging area of interactive advertising presents fresh challenges and opportunities for advertisers who have, up until now, been restricted by conventional media.

Advertising campaigns and promotions can be trialled and the results analysed far quicker, and at substantially less cost, than the more traditional approach of paper or media advertising.

Online advertising is generally results based and so the start up costs are relatively low. For example with Pay per Click promotions you only pay when someone clicks on your advert. Many thousands may see it, but you are only paying for the people that are genuinely interested in your product or service.

Compare this to a newspaper advert where you are paying the same amount for the space, regardless of how many people follow it up.