Banners, online advertising and branding

Banner advertising can be controversial. We have long been told that banners are a thing of the past. Well luckily there is a lot to see wherever you go on the net. It would be a boring place without them.

What are they doing to the banners?

From time to time we have been told that traditional pictorial banners are gone, that no one clicks on them anymore, that people regard them as blatant “hype” and to steal money. We’re told that by far the best banner ads are wolves in sheep’s clothing, ads that are cleverly disguised to look like text or a drop-down box, and not like an ad at all. The story is that everyone who is someone is producing these for the pitch and making an absolute fortune using them in their advertising.

Well surprise, it doesn’t take long to recognize these posters for what they are. This is not to say that they are not very effective if used in the right place, but that is not everywhere.

I recently read an article about using banners as in-text advertising and the excellent click-through rates they generated. These were “banners” only in the sense of being gifs or jpegs. They were not pictorial in any way. They were designed to fit neatly into a page of text, with a couple of lines of text and a link on them. It was advertising trying not to look like advertising. With respect, calling these “banners” is just playing around. Because they look exactly like text, they get the click-through rate of any piece of text on a page. Comparing your results to pictorial banners is like comparing oranges to apples.

Why are illustrated posters at the top of the list?

There are two factors that the anti-traditional banner argument fails to take into account:

First of all, the pictorial banner is great for promoting the advertiser’s own brand. No word banner can come close to evoking any vibe the advertiser wants, let alone make a unique statement about who the advertiser is. If you doubt me, take a quick look at some of the beautiful artwork created for casinos: atmosphere per gallon. Would a two line text ad do the job too?

Secondly, there are people on the net, and not a few, who are really looking for things, dare I say it, even looking to spend money. For these people, the right chart can be nothing short of a godsend. Would a text banner draw attention and jog your memory as well as a graphic? Would it evoke that “Oh, that’s the people I’m looking for!” response? I bet not!

Here’s another thing: does the text banner give you any concept of the quality of the business behind it? Hardly!

The fact is that, in principle, online advertising is not that different from advertising in the rest of the world, as some of the truly successful internet marketing gurus have pointed out. Therefore, it is logical that the same precepts of good publicity continue to apply. It all comes down to branding: creating a presence that the customer can instantly recognize. When all is said and done, the first step in that process is often visual.

Make the most of banners

With Internet advertising, we have in our hands the most brilliant means of promotion that exists, both in terms of quantity and quality: something very special happens with images and colors when they are shown on the screen with the light behind them. . We need to make the most of that.

For those who persist in sneering about “eye candy,” let them eat dry crackers. I say that they are missing a whole wide arena of appeal to the buyer through the senses. Most of us instantly respond in real life to “the way things look.” There may be a few wounded mortals for whom the printed page is everything, but don’t count on them making up the bulk of the hordes you hope to have on the way to your website.

Fortunately, as Internet technology advances, we can take full advantage of images and, within reason, we should do just that. This is a world as competitive as the “real” world, maybe more so. The need is for very high quality graphic and conceptual design in all areas of Internet advertising and marketing.

A business can capitalize on this opportunity, primarily on its own website and emails, and secondarily on the billboards of cyberspace, with the quality of its banner advertising. People may not click on banners every time they see them, just as they may not follow every ad that catches their eye in a magazine or on TV. But if the ad is visual and memorable, if it creates the right “feel,” and if the exposure is repeated and reinforced, when it comes time to buy, they’ll know exactly what and who they’re looking for.

Will a two-line text ad or a dropdown box do it for you?

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