Anatomy of an Awesome Banner Ad
Introduction
When it comes to creating great banner ads, there are a lot of subtleties you need to take into consideration. One major consideration is the message that you wish to portray to the viewer of the ad about your particular product or service. Let’s say you have product(s) which have a great focus on quality (like Apple), you would want to sculpt your ad in a certain way to reflect that image of quality. There are many ways to achieve this, and I’ve listed a few below that we used when developing our own client’s ads.
Imagery. Appropriate use of high quality imagery to emenate the feeling of quality behind the product and brand. Close shots are used to magnify detail and intricacies in the product.
Branding. Well placed, beautiful logo placed to expose company brand. Elegant Georgia font used in slogun to continue brand message of quality.
Call-to-Action. Button placed to prompt user to action (i.e. click on the ad). Use of colors from company website to further reinforce the brand. Dashed effect used to represent the “tailored” aspect of the product.
Background. Subtle “zig-zag” pattern used to represent stitching and the “tailored” nature of the product.
Branding or Traffic Generation?
There are ultimately two types of ads that can be created: those that focus on brand-building, and those that focus on brute clicks and traffic generation. The ad above is an example of one that is developed specifically to highlight a brand of quality rather than for pure clicks.
When it comes to creating ads for pure traffic generation and CTR, you tend to skew towards different design ethics and strategies. For example, big, bold, eye-catching text usually becomes a typical focal point. Obviously, this doesn’t mean that you can’t create an ad that is both brand-focused and does well in terms of CTR, but finding that perfect balance is a very difficult thing to do.
Below we’ve demonstrated an ad created for one of our clients whose pure focus was to generate traffic to a specific landing page and convert the traffic into leads.
Strong Text. By isolating the word “FREE” from the rest of the ad, you help catch the viewer’s attention. Offering resources related to your product/service for free is potentially one of the best ways of marketing your end product/service.
Highlighting. By making key points in ad copy bold and darker in comparison to the rest of the text, you force viewers to read the bold print when skimming the content of the ad.
Call-to-Action. Larger, more prominent button is used (in comparison to the last ad) to entice the viewer to click.
Final Thoughts...
Remember, when creating banner ads for whatever reason, keep your target audience and purpose of the ad in mind. Always use a color palette that suits the feel you’re going for and represents the brand well. As an example, the dark brown tones used in the Tailorwork ad really reinforce the notion that Tailorworks is all about the quality of their products (through association with wood, craftsmanship, etc.)
Don’t be afraid to step out of the box and be a little more creative either. Creative ads get noticed way more than traditional ones.
Anyway, thanks for reading this guide to the “Anatomy of an Awesome Banner Ad”, and we hope you put the knowledge to good use!
If you have any questions/comments about what we’ve mentioned here, or you want to hire us to create an awesome set of banner ads for you, don’t hesitate to get in touch, or visit our website.
Specialists in banner design