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Banner Advertising

Written by: Jorge Cruz

Article Overview: It has become one of the most popular forms of promotion on the Internet today, but in my humble opinion, few people out there actually know how to make the best use of banner advertising. With blinding colours and seizure-inducing animations, most banner ads do more harm for the products they are promoting than good. But, there is a way to make use of the medium that doesn’t completely kill your viewer. Read on to find out how to make online banners work best for you.

Banner Advertising

It has become one of the most popular forms of promotion on the Internet today, but in my humble opinion, few people out there actually know how to make the best use of banner advertising. With blinding colours and seizure-inducing animations, most banner ads do more harm for the products they are promoting than good. But, there is a way to make use of the medium that doesn’t completely kill your viewer. Read on to find out how to make online banners work best for you.

Banners are meant to make an instant impact on viewers’ minds, so much so that people are encouraged to click on them and visit the company’s page. That doesn’t mean, however, they have to be ghastly. Surf the web for a few minutes and take note of some of the ads that appeal to you most. What was it that caught your attention? Did they convince you to click on them?

Banner ads should first and foremost be clear, both in graphics, colours, and text. The more that is going on in an ad, the less people will be able to understand what its message is. In less than a few seconds, people should be able to recognize what it is exactly that you’re selling and what the benefits of that product or service are.

The use of the word ‘free’ is always one of the best ways to attract hits. Even if you’re just giving away a free e-book, people will forever be lured in by the fact that they don’t have to pay for it. Action words such as “Click Here” and “Visit Now” are also big draws with banner advertising. Tell people what you want them to do and the chances of them doing it are much higher.

Another key element in keeping with their simple nature is to keep the file size of your ads small. The larger the file size, the longer it will take to download. And, chances are that if a visitor has to wait more a few seconds for a page to load because of an ad, they will be long gone from that page before they even find out what the page was about. To that end, you should also try and keep the amount of text on the ad to a minimum. The less you say, the bigger the font you can use and the faster people can understand what your message is. Also, don’t overdo it with fancy flash and animation.

Once you’ve got your ad designed, don’t be afraid to test it out and change what’s not working. See if you’re generating the amount of hits that you want, and if not, play with the ad. Change some colours, change some text, or change the contrasting nature of the ad.

The great thing about banner advertising is that you don’t have to be a master coder to do it. Even the most amateur Internet user can usually create their own ad, and at little cost. It’s also never final – play around with it until you find something that works for you.

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Article Tags: banner ads, banner advertising, banner advertising, colours



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