Nov 23, 2020
Life in the digital media age has made us all a little bit savvier online. We know exactly when we’re getting targeted by ads, and we know what steps to take to avoid those situations.
But if you work for an advertiser, targeting smarter customers means you have to keep evolving how you do business. And that’s where banner ads come into play.
You’re probably familiar with banner ads. They’re the web advertisements that get embedded into a page but link to the advertiser’s page. More importantly, they give you the creativity and flexibility to try new things, appeal to your customers, and ultimately stand out from the endless sea of similar-looking ads that follow people around the web.
The most popular ones use static images or gifs (usually paired with a short CTA), but the ones you probably end up clicking are the active Flash ads. They catch your eye and pull you in, just like a good thumbnail on YouTube.
Actually, we’re all familiar with banner ads in one way or another. If you spend any time on Wordpress sites, social media, YouTube, or anywhere else on the internet, you’ve seen thousands of banner ads in 2020 alone.
And if we’re honest, we’ve all probably clicked on our fair share of them too.
Banner ads are versatile, which gives you the opportunity to get creative. They are small on the screen and can be sized differently, which means they are flexible and work well in mobile apps or on web pages.
According to Google Adsense, the best sizes for ad banners are:
— 728x90 (a leaderboard, usually along the top or bottom of the page)
— 300x600 (a half-page vertical ad)
— 300x250 (sort of like a square)
— 336x280 (which is a slightly bigger almost-square)
— 320x100 (a mobile banner)
Getting the sizing right matters. In the ancient internet days of the early 2000s, everyone thought that big banner ads would obviously be more successful. But the truth is if ads are too big, they actually deter people from clicking.
This is especially true for video banners. On the one hand, adding video can turn banner ads into a heavy-duty tool to revamp your entire marketing strategy. Analysts predict the video advertising industry could double in the next few years, and it’s hard to ignore the success of video as a marketing tool.
However, you have to be careful with how you build and place banner ads (especially in the case of videos). Ads that are perceived as obnoxious give off the vibe that you don’t care about the user’s experience, that you’re distracting them from the content they wanted from the page.
So banner ad placement matters just as much as the sizing. And incorporating a clear frame around your ad helps the (potential) customer see your ad, but also visualize the separation between the banner and the content on the page.
After all, you want to be a welcome guest during their online experience, not an aggressive intruder.
Banner ads — if done correctly — can be a great way to complement the page they’re on. That’s how you stay visible (and clickable!) but also start to win the customer’s trust.
A banner ad should be a one-stop-shop selling point for your company, not just your product. If brand marketing has taught us anything, it’s that people want to try new products from brands they trust — banner ad design can be a big step in helping you develop that relationship.
A good video banner has three key elements: a clear logo, a straightforward call to action, and a compelling value proposition.
Yes, you want customers to know who your company is. And yes, you want them to see what the next step or desired action will be. But if you don’t give them a reason to click on the ad (a chance to save time, a special deal, etc.) then they just won’t.
Another thing to keep in mind is the sound element of a video banner. Obviously, sound quality matters quite a bit. Choosing the right music can make all the difference — dropping in some royalty free epic music during an ad for your luxury candle sale would ruin all the hard work you put into the ad.
In fact, the sound and visual design can have just as much — if not even greater — impact as the messaging or call to action that you’re targeting.
When it comes to making a banner ad, you have three types of video banner ads to choose from: in-banner videos, out-stream videos, or in-stream videos. And no matter which one you choose, it’s important to put in the time and research so you’re creating the ad that lines up with your brand and your strategy.
Of course, I can’t talk about banner ads without covering the topic of design. A lot of the concepts might seem obvious, like choosing a legible font or incorporating short-but-interesting animations.
There are a few golden rules to remember. The first (and probably the most important) thing is to follow each platform’s technical specifications, which we covered earlier. You’ll also want to maintain brand consistency across any and all banner ads, which includes colors and fonts.
You’ll also want to use some sort of animation. Think about the ads that catch your eye, either when scrolling through a blog post or swiping through Instagram. Anything that attracts attention will stand out, and sometimes that can be all you need to multiply your ad’s success rate.
Hopefully it's clear how banner ads work and why advertisers should be excited about them. Between the creativity involved, the flexibility they offer, and the success rate of combining banner ads with video content, it should be difficult not to feel a little fired up.
And if you aren’t a designer but still work for an advertiser, you’re in luck — you can find platforms that handle the design stuff for you, but still give you the control to create the sort of ad you want.
Bannersnack has an easy-to-use tool that helps you create video banners or social media ads. Their system juggles all the platform specs for you. And with thousands of templates to choose from, you can focus on creating a professional video ad that meets your vision.
And the best part? It doesn’t require any particular technical knowhow. That makes it a valuable resource for ad agencies, marketers, and freelancers who are looking to turn video footage or marketing strategies into banner ads that actually work.
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