|
Are Banners Dead?
by James D. Brausch
http://www.targetblaster.com
We've all heard the rumor that banners are dead.
We've heard that the click-thru rate averages
somewhere between 0.1% and 0.5% or so. We've
also heard that conversion ratios after clicking
a banner are much lower than via a text link.
Is this all true? Should we just give up on
banners completely in favor of text links?
I thought so for a while. I kept pledging to
stop creating banners for my sites. After all,
I knew (with some exceptions to the numbers)
that the above rumor is generally true. It has
been this way for more than two years now.
While I was creating banners for a new site
last week, I had to ask myself why I was doing
it.
Here is the answer: I had to. Although I
agree that text links are much better than
banners, I still create banners because I would
simply miss too many opportunities without
having them. Let~s take a few examples of where
I use banners to this day (even though I agree
that text links are better):
1) I include them on a page on my site giving
examples for how to exchange links with my
site. Yes; text links are listed first, but
lots of people want banner exchanges. I would
lose out on those links if I didn't have
banners. So; We create a 468X60, 125X125, 120X60
and 88X31 banner for every single site I own.
It's part of our standard procedure.
2) Paid banner advertising. There are some
select places where I really want to get my
message out. I'm willing to pay for a link in
those places. The problem is that the owners of
those sites only spin banners. They have no
provision for a text link.
3) Affiliate programs/networks. Just like #1
and #2, not having banners available is going
to make you lose out on tons of potential
affiliates who want banners.
I'm pretty sure those are the only places I
still use banners, but you can see that I really
do need them even though they don't perform as
well as text links... or do they?
Although I generally use conventional banners
for the link exchange page, I have starting
using rather unconventional banners for my paid
advertising and affiliate programs. What's
unconventional about them? They look just like
text links. That means, they end up performing
just like text links.
Here's how I do it:
1) I open up Front Page Express.
2) I insert a table the size of the banner I
want to create (468 X 60 or 125 X 125, etc).
3) I type my message into the table. I mark
some text and turn it into a hyper-link...
Just like I would if I was creating a real
text link.
4) When it~s a perfect text link, I hit the
preview button. This shows me the web page with
the text link I just created.
5) I click the Print Screen button to save a
copy of the screen on the clip board.
6) I open up my favorite graphics program
(Corel Photo Paint) and paste the screen image
from the clipboard.
7) Now it's just a matter of trimming around
the text link to the right sized banner and
saving it.
There... Now you have a banner that performs
just as well as a text link.
The author, James D. Brausch, is the Vice
President of Marketing for Target Blaster, Inc.,
an Internet Marketing firm specializing
in targeted traffic.
http://www.TargetBlaster.com
This article courtesy of ...
You may freely reprint this article on your website or in
your newsletter provided this courtesy notice and the author
name and URL remain intact.
|