5 Telltale Signs of a Good Banner Ad

Banner ads make the world of online advertising go around, and if you’re a small business looking to amp up your advertising campaigns, banner ads are the way to go. With a small design effort and the right networks you can communicate your product and services to a huge, targeted audience for exceptional results. But first you need a good design. That’s where this article can help. The best banner ads around the web all have the same telltale signs. You should take note and make sure that your banner ads use these tools too – before you know it you’ll be seeing the results you desire.

Subtle animation. Here’s the deal with animation – it’s a great way to get viewers attention, but it can easily be overdone. The best banner ads have just the perfect amount of animation to draw viewers in without irritating them. We’ve all seen those banners where the animation is overdone by flashing a million times per minute or jumping across the screen, this is not what you want, it only contributes to banner blindness. What you do want is tasteful animation that loops at a relaxed (medium) speed and cuts off after a certain amount of time – like 10 loops, and freezing on the most important shot.

 

Fast download time. Good banner ads download fast – usually before the rest of the webpage is done loading. This way viewers eyes are automatically drawn to the ad first before seeing the rest of the page. If your banner ad takes a long time to load or heaven forbid, actually holds up the download time of the whole page you will lose that click. A fast download time may mean cutting down on some animation or other design aspects, but so be it. You won’t get any views or click throughs if you don’t have a speedy download time.

Simple and sweet. Less is more and another major telltale sign of a good banner ad design is when the ad is simple, informative and to the point. It’s easy to want to over-pack the small banner ad design space you have, but resist that urge, doing this will only work against you. It is much better to get to the point and entice the user to click through without over-indulging information. Plus your point will be much clearer without the clutter.

 

Readable fonts and colors. Sort of in line with simple and sweet, the best banner ads don’t overdo fonts and colors. If you let yourself, you can really go crazy with these design aspects, but again, resist that urge. Large, legible font is best. An 18 point font or larger is good and something simple like Arial is always a safe bet. Color wise you have a lot to work with, just keep it simple and tasteful. Don’t try to jam pack a million colors in. Three contrasting colors will take you a long way.

 

A call to action. Without a doubt the best banner ads always have a call to action and yours should too. No banner ad is complete or will experience success without a call to action. Make it clear and obvious. Say things like “Click Here”, or “Go”, or “Enter”.

Now that you have some ideas, look around at other banner ads and take note of what they have and don’t have that seem necessary or unnecessary. Before you know it you’ll have a banner ad that’s getting your products and services noticed.