Banners have been around for years and many people have written the CPM model’s obituary
Due to the increase in “banner blindness” amongst internet users the era of using them as a direct marketing tool is considered over, however they are still an effective method of branding.
With this in mind some networks have started to offer Cost Per Click or Cost Per Action options to encourage advertisers to move back from search engines with the promise of more granular and accountable tracking.
The most popular choice amongst small to medium sized websites starting out advertising using banners with relatively small budgets (a lot of networks ask for a commitment of £10,000 or more per month) is Google’s content network.
Using a very similar bid model method as their search network, advertisers bid on either keywords or to be shown on specific sites. Unlike the search network, you can choose between CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and a CPC (cost per click) and you can run either text adverts or banners adverts.
To get started simply set up a new campaign in your AdWords account and choose either ‘placement targeting’ or ‘Image’ ads’ as you go through the campaign set up process.
Writing a banner brief
If you choose to use some display advertising chances are you will need to use a designer to create one or more banners for you. To avoid along drawn out chain of emails going back and forth asking for changes follow these tips when writing a design brief:
- Be specific and don’t presume any knowledge on the designer’s part
- Be clear on the purpose of the banners (e.g. sales, branding, leads...)
- Inform them who the target audience is
- Specify which components are most important (e.g. headline, price, logo...)
- If you have seen a banner you like send them a screen grab for inspiration
- Be clear what you DON’T want
Online Marketing - Advertising Networks