The Smart Guide to Be0er Banner Ads By Aaron Kupferberg Crea;ve Director Didit

Transcription

1 The Smart Guide to Be0er Banner Ads By Aaron Kupferberg Crea;ve Director Didit

2 Introduc&on Design banner ads that get clicks Banner ads are the most prolific form of marke&ng on the web. Since the earliest days of Geoci&es and AOL, banners have adver&sed everything from Apple Ipads to Viagra. Since the majority of banner ads are produced to be displayed on someone else's site specifically, a site the designer doesn t have design control over adhering to the industry consensus on a number of factors is a must. When running a banner campaign that stretches beyond a single loca&on, this becomes even more important.

3 Strategic Recommenda&ons Follow IAB Guidelines and correct file formats The Interac&ve Adver&sing Bureau, or IAB, maintains a specifica&on of the standards most banner ads adhere to and this is a good star&ng point when planning your ad. The IAB Display Adver&sing Guidelines detail a variety of common ad unit sizes (i.e. 300x250px). The IAB publishes guidelines on specifica&ons such as maximum video frame rate, the limit of the Z- Index of the unit, and file size. File size is especially important. If your file size is too big, you'll either lose out on poten&al impressions (especially of users with slower Internet connec&ons) or create performance problems for the page as a whole.

4 .JPG,.PNG,.GIF, or Adobe Flash files are the standard formats publishers accept. Keep in mind that Flash banner ads are not supported on all devices, so always provide your banner in.gif form so you won t miss any poten&al clicks. Note recent studies have found that square- shaped banners have the highest click through rate (CTR). Clear, a[en&on- grabbing copy and images When a user comes into contact with your ad, the chances are he or she didn't come looking for it. Instead, he or she is there to see some other piece of content and your ad is just there. Since users aren't looking for what's in your ad, grabbing their a[en&on with a combina&on of images and clear copy is key.

5 This means it s vital that your ad not be too crowded with informa&on. There is no cookie- cu[er solu&on here. Build the ad in a clear, unobstruc&ve manner by focusing on the key element of your product that will make people want to read more. Peoples eyes are naturally drawn to a subject inside a frame. So make sure that your banner ad s have a clearly- defined frame by extending the graphics right to all the edges of the box. If your ad is white, it s a common prac&ce to put a 1 pixel gray border around the ad.

6 Strong call to ac&on Your ad needs to tell a user what to do, or they won't do anything. Your ad must instruct them to "find out more" or "buy it now" in order to have any chance of successfully naviga&ng them through the conversion process. Therefore, you need to design a Call to Ac&on that is hierarchically significant to the visual design of your ad and very clearly lays out what to do. Your Call to Ac&on can come in a number of forms, including a tradi&onal bu[on, text link, or even a QR code.

7 Banner- to- landing page consistency Your ad should be visually relevant to the site it takes you to. Clicking through to reveal a website with li[le to no visual rela&onship with the original ad seriously degrades the user's experience and will likely throw most users off the process. Your ad should use similar color, image style and typography so the user's par&ally accustomed to your site before he or she s even visited. And if your banner promises 10% off, your landing page should reinforce that offer. Otherwise users will sense a disconnect, or bait and switch tac&c and likely not convert.

8 Animated ads vs. sta&c ads Animated ads can greatly increase user engagement if they are done with finesse. Use just a li[le too much anima&on and you risk obstruc&ng any engagement with your ad. Transi&on- style anima&ons work well, but you ll need to pay a[en&on to technical issues and file size. Most studies that address the performance difference between Flash and sta&c ads have found that Flash ads outperform sta&c ads, but the metric used is almost always CTR. I have yet to see any compelling evidence that a Flash banner drives more sales than a sta&c banner, so bear this in mind when deciding on ad types. Animated and dynamic: when you add dynamic anima&on and interac&vity you get very effec&ve user engagement. Click to see example.

9 Figh&ng Banner Blindness. Banner Blindness is real. Because banners are everywhere, most banner ads are ignored. The reasons include lack of relevance to the viewer, fear of spam, a virus, slower page loading &me, or some other unexpected reac&on. In one AdKeeper survey, 43% of respondents said online banner ads don t seem interes&ng or engaging; and 31% of respondents said they only wanted to click ads when they were in the mood or interested in looking at them. There is no doubt that banner ads are a difficult medium for adver&sers to execute successfully, but they can be very effec&ve if best prac&ces and crea&ve principles are followed.

10 Banner myths 1. Photos of people always boost performance. This all depends on what photo you have and how you use it. The wrong photo is likely to do more harm than good, but the key is relatability. If your photo helps your customers see themselves wearing, using, enjoying, or benefi&ng from your product, then go for it. 2. Green bu0ons increase clicks, red encourages ac;on, etc. You ll some&mes hear that green bu[ons increase clicks or that red text encourages ac&on, but when you look at actual test results, it s rare that any two stories align. Some&mes a green bu[on beats a red bu[on and some&mes it s vice versa. There s no one magic color that always does the trick. It s more important to s&ck to your brand guidelines than to follow someone else s idea of what the perfect banner background looks like. Test, test, and test again to determine what works best for your campaign. 3. Click Through Rate is your key performance metric. CTR can be a valuable measurement tool for the strength of your ads, but there is significant evidence that clicks don t always translate into conversions. If the goal of your campaign is branding, then clicks aren t necessarily worth recording (impressions are). If you are running a re- targe&ng campaign, then conversions are more important. Use a group of metrics to determine your banner campaigns performance.

11 LOOKING FOR CREATIVE BANNERS? Didit has a full crea&ve staff to build banner ads for you. If your internal crea&ve department is overwhelmed or just needs a helping hand, give us a quick call at We ll be glad to help. CONTACT US