We mentioned something about how important are the banner metrics in banner advertising. And the most significant metric regarding banners is the banner size, measured Width x Height in pixels (px).

The idea is that a banner can be made in virtually any size you wish. That’s pretty cool. And yet, if every advertiser would create its banners using its own size preferences, there would be chaos. Websites would look like sloppy collages, publishers would create in-house standards for the banners they accept, media agencies would work hard creating custom banners for every website they want to advertise on and so on.

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We found an excellent article on banner advertising written by Mitch Joel on his blog, Six Pixels Of Separation – The Twist Image Blog. The article is a bit old (actually dated on September 10, 2008) but what’s said in it is nevertheless true today:

Do you know anyone who clicks on banner ads?

Somebody must be. Media companies are still praying that banner ads will save their print business. Online ad networks keep popping up offering advertisers a multitude of Websites willing to run whatever they throw at them for a very competitive CPM (cost per mille-thousand) price. Some will even take banner ads on a CPA (cost per action) basis – meaning, if someone doesn’t click on the banner and get the action they desired (buy, give information, etc…) the advertiser does not pay.

Read the entire article

This is the third and last “lesson” regarding the differences between the flash, static and gif banners. You can read the previous articles here and here. Today we’ll talk about gif banners.

GIF banners

GIF banners are animated or static images that contain images and text and carry the .gif extension. Animated GIFs comprise a number of images (frames) that are displayed one after another and thus creating the sense of motion. A GIF file that contains only a frame is static.

Example:

Advantages:

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Google search goes web 2.0!

Yes, I am as surprised as you are. Google is changing. The way we search is changing.

Google, through is SearchWiki introduces a way for the users to customize their search results by ranking, removing, and adding notes to them. In order to do that, users need to have a Google Account. But I guess that’s not a problem, isn’t it?

Now, the interesting part is that a user can see how other users have altered any given search results page with their own notes and changes. Click here to find out more.

Now, of course, you can affect only the search results associated with your account. You can’t “modify” the way Google generates the search results nor its algorithms.

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Static banners

A static banner takes the shape of an image that might contain graphics and text. Most of these static banners are .jpg files, but you can also find them in .png, and .gif. GIF banners can be static and animated, but we’ll talk more about GIFs in the next “lesson”.

Example:

Advantages:

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We’ll going to start a 3-post series about the three main banner types: flash, gif and static. We’ll give you a short definition for each of them and we’ll tell you what advantages and disadvantages each of them carry (promise it won’t be as boring as it sounds). Today we’ll begin with flash banners.

Flash banners

A flash banner is an animated web banner created using Adobe Flash technology. These banners employ complex animations (like movies) and sound and are often interactive (they “react” based on what the user is doing). Physically, flash banners are .swf objects embedded into web pages.

Example:

Advantages:

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This is quite something. A friendly banner, in a sea of annoying and aggressive display ads…

Now, I know you’ve already watched the banner. And just began reading these lines about… now. Well, that’s quite understandable: it grabs attention …from the content. That means the banner blindness doesn’t work here.

But why is that? Why is this banner working so well?

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Some say banner ads don’t work so well. And that, at least to some extent, is true. There are many reasons why they don’t work, and almost always is your fault, dear marketers.

Since we don’t wish to bore you, we selected only the top 10 greatest mistakes EVER in banner advertising. Now let’s shoot them:

10. Make that banner look much prettier than our old, corny website.They’ll understand we’re in a hurry.
Well, we’ll tell you one thing: your prospects don’t care about you. That being said, neglecting your landing page is a very expensive mistake. The landing page is the first thing your prospects will see after clicking your ad, so it’s very important to make sure they won’t leave your website in the next second. Otherwise, your advertising campaign is no more than wasted money.

9. Size, length, weight? What are we talking about? Shoes?
No, banners. Not knowing the basic metrics of banner ads can put you in some serious trouble. And that’s because publishers require some clear specifications regarding the banner’s size (for example 120 x 600 px), length (for example maximum 15 seconds of animation) and weight (for example 40Kb). Follow the IAB standards and it will be less likely for you to be in the wrong.

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To make sure we’re speaking the same language, we need to put some things straight about banner advertising right from the start.  Let’s begin with the basics:

What is banner advertising?
Of course, it’s a form of online advertising through banners. Banner advertising is also called display advertising (as opposed to text-only advertising) because of the visual nature of banner ads.

What is a banner ad?
A banner ad, or a web banner, is an advertisement displayed into a web page. The advertisement consists of an image (.jpg, .png, .gif) or of a multimedia object (usually created using Flash). Thus, banner ads can be static or animated, depending on the technology used to make them.

Example of a static banner ad:

How do banner ads work?
Banner ads are intended to generate traffic to a website by linking to it. Also, web banners can function as regular, print advertisements: inform, notify about a new product, increase brand awareness and so on. However, most of banners are clickable and their main function is to get clicked on. But we’ll talk about banner effectiveness in a few moments.

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