Marketing

How to Create Banner Ads That Demand Attention

create banner ads

All marketers know that display advertising is absolutely crucial to the success of an integrated marketing campaign, and that you have to create banner ads. Whether you’re doing it using re-marketing, or via contextual audiences, or maybe you are doing something with programmatic, display advertising is important.

So what makes your prospects want to click a banner ad when they browse the web? What makes them all want to click? Well in this article, I’m going to share with you some key tips on creating a fantastic banner ad that demands attention.

So, how can you get people and potential customers to click your banner ads? I’m going to show you exactly how, so let’s jump right into it.

Action stations!

The first and most important element when you create banner ads, is having a good call to action. You need to make sure that ad has a call-to-action in place and usually this should be in the form of a button. Having a button on your banner ads helps them stand out against the backgrounds of any websites.

Always make sure that call to action button stands out, because that’s really going to drive clicks to your banner ad and it’s really going to make people want to complete the action that you’re suggesting within your call to action.

Avoid too much text

Back in press ad days, clients would often demand that you jam as many words in that small press advertisement. Some clients do the same with banner ads. No! Avoid using too much text, it is super distracting and easily confusing to the users.

You want to stand out by having a strong but succinct message in your banner ads, with a strong image and strong colouring, Too much text means tiny text, and users can’t be bothered to squint to read something that’s just a banner.

Don’t be too zen

Now I know I said don’t jam too much in, however just as equally, avoid using large white space like a blank page in a magazine. These don’t really work in terms of sticking out at all, given you have little control over where the ads may show. They may appear on popular Australian websites, or they may be on super busy media site with 100 other banners.

Too much white means that your banner ads could just end up falling into the background of the websites, and will not be noticed.

Use curiosity

Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it never hurts a banner ad. Clever copywriting when you create banner ads means that you can leave the user wondering the ‘What if?’.

If you can get them intrigued, then they can’t help but follow the link to find out more.

Get animated!

Many websites seem to be super busy nowadays, and it can be tricky to stand out at all. However, you would agree that if something animates, it always catches your eye. Make sure you animate your banner ads in subtle but clear ways.

This will really help them get noticed, clicked on and improve that click-through rate of yours.

Get bold and bright

My very final tip for you to create banner ads, is be bold and bright by using solid, vivid colours.

Yes, I know you have regular brand colours, however I’m sure one of those colours will work as a  strong background. This bright colour can help make the ad interesting and more vibrant.

So when you create banner ads, work on being different and overly vibrant, in fact I would say be colourful and make those ads really stand out!

About author

Lauren Clarke is an Australian freelance blogger, who writes on small business marketing, human resources and business for a number of blogs. Outside of writing, she enjoys sampling Australian red wines, and live theatre. Follow Lauren on Twitter.