Display Advertising: 3 basic questions every marketer should ask themselves about banner ads
Considering low costs and the potential return of driving significant volumes of traffic to your homepages or landing pages, banner ads would seem a safe bet to count as one of the most important elements of a successful marketing strategy. Yet in reality, most banner ads become lost in the afterthoughts of marketing campaign planning.
How does this happen?
One thing I have discovered in working with our Research Partners is the problem begins with an all too common approach to banner ads in which a focus is placed on “creating a few banner ads” instead of “creating highly effective” banner ads that appeal to visitors.
In today’s MarketingSherpa blog post, I wanted to offer three questions every marketer should ask themselves when crafting banner ads that you can use to aid your display marketing efforts.
Question #1. Do we know where the traffic is coming from?
Assuming you already have banner ads in place, a good place to start is by diving into your metrics to better understand the amounts of traffic your banner ads are currently generating.
If you are new to banner ads or have limited historical performance data, then consider some of the obstacles you must overcome to create an effective banner ad ranging from:
- Gaining a visitor’s attention
- Capturing visitor interests
- Driving visitor engagement to click on your banner ad
You should also consider the types of traffic coming to the website or page in which your banner ads are displayed because this information will play an important role in later design, messaging and CTA planning.
Question #2. Do we know where the traffic is going?
While it is important to know where your visitors are coming from, knowing where visitors are going throughout the overall experience can help you craft messaging and CTAs that deliver on the expectations set by the banner ads.
For example, if a banner ad redirects a visitor to a lead capture form, then using a call-to-action like “Learn More” would not be an optimal CTA versus using “Apply Now” or “Apply Now.” Analyzing where your traffic goes is also a great way to help you detect and fix any simple leaks in your funnel.
