Advertising includes any informative or persuasive message carried by a non-personal medium and paid for by a sponsor whose product is in some way identified in the message. Mass media such as televisions, radio programs, magazines, newspapers, and the like are the most commonly used for advertising. However, more modern ways of advertising like the direct mailing of catalogues, electronic media advertisements featuring computerized ordering, and other direct-response vehicles have almost completely taken over the traditional mass media forms. One of these new-fangled forms of advertising is banner ads.
What are banner ads?
Banner ads are a form of online advertisement that makes use of a top, side, or bottom rectangular area in any virtual space found on the internet. They can be horizontally (leaderboard) or vertically (skyscraper) oriented, both of which are according to the ad space given to them by a company. Banner ads can be made to be static or animated, but the focus is still retained towards a more image-centric approach. They function the same way as traditional banner advertisements we see on our roadways: to draw eyes and convince budding consumers to buy a product/service.
One of the major differences is that there is no static rate that hosts are paid by the advertisers. Hosts can be paid through the following: (1) cost per action, payment occurs when a website visitor clicks on an ad and proceeds to do an action in the advertisers’ website; (2) cost per click, payment per visitor click on the advertisers’ ad; and (3) cost per impression, the host is paid per banner ad view. The appearance of these ads and their content type are tailored per the preference of the visitor based on his/her activity on the internet, which are monitored through cookies. This makes sure that every ad commissioned by a company has a higher chance to be noticed by its target market.
In the year 2019, an estimated 31% of the total money spent on online advertisements went to the creation and presentation of banner ads. Facebook records the highest yield in which banner ads are advertised and viewed, clocking in at 42.2% usage in the United States. Most of the users on the internet are interacting with Facebook in some way or form, which explains the high percentage. Especially during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the most effective way of advertising nowadays has been proven to be banner ads. With the increase of apps such as banner generator and graphic designers tailored specifically for online advertising, companies are now having an easier time creating their own banner ads for more and more consumers to see.
As marketers thriving in today’s market climate, here are 10 reasons why you should use banner ads as a digital marketing strategy.
1. It’s fairly Inexpensive
The advancement of today’s technology has granted everyone the opportunity to showcase their ideas in a daily inexpensive way. May it be free Facebook posts, and/or elaborate digital advertisements, anyone with any budget range has a chance to cook up their own advertising strategies that are fitted for their financial capacities. Traditional advertising such as billboards, flyers, tarpaulins, etc. cost more to execute. Designing, sourcing of materials, printing, and distribution are all factors that add up to the cost of utilizing traditional advertising methods, all of which are relatively expensive as time goes on. All of these factors are almost non-existent in producing banner ads, as they are almost exclusively made and displayed on digital fronts such as websites and applications. Marketers can also put forth a flexible budget plan according to their company’s allocation towards advertising and marketing, which further proves the inexpensiveness of using banner ads.
2. It’s simple to make and to manage.
With the emergence of tools such as banner generators, graphic design applications such as Photoshop, search engines such as Google, putting forth banner ads has been simple and efficient to use nowadays. These tools are easy to access and offer a user experience that is manageable by anybody, even those who have the faintest understanding. There have also been increasing numbers of graphic artists nowadays that are ready to lend their experience and service to companies. They offer eye-popping designs and layouts that are ready to publish from the get-go while having the proper understanding of the values and branding that the company is striving to reach for in its advertisements. Even if there are adjustments and revisions to be made, they are easily dealt with and edited unlike traditional advertisements, which require wide-scale physical operations.
3. It is always up-to-date with the times.
Trends and ideologies nowadays are fast-moving and decay very quickly, resulting in companies adopting faster strategies that can keep up with the tides of the times. This results in advertisements that are always adapting to what is hip and trendy to ensure the capture of consumer interest. Embracing a static strategy only does harm for a company that is not an established entity in the market, as they can be easily forgotten and left behind by their peers. Banner ads can be a medium in which a company can distinguish itself as appropriate for the times, as it is easily controllable and updated. Due to their highly flexible nature, they can be always streamlined with minimal to no effort through digital means.
4. It is always affixed towards the target market.
Today, hundreds of billions of dollars are spent each year on the marketing business. Every business existing in the whole world, may it large and small-scale, global and local, innovative and traditional, public and private, everybody must have the courage and wits to capture the hearts of their intended market to establish brand loyalty. Through the development of technology throughout time, people have attained the power of marketing and all its aspects to achieve their desired results. Banner ads utilize the power of internet tracking so that they are always displayed to those who are most interested and/or have interacted with the product before, thus gaining the interest and eventual trust of its target market. Even those with the slightest interest can be encouraged by the presence of banner ads that pop up in their daily digital routine.
5. Exposure is always ensured.
Banner ads are prevalent around the internet, mostly appearing in sites that garner the most activity from internet users. They can most likely be a consumer’s first experience of the company. After exposing a consumer to the advertisement, their next job is to grab their attention and make sure they would not easily go. Banner ads are created to control how long a consumer will grab onto the information offered in the advertisement. The convenience of creating banner ads takes away the inconvenience of lesser exposure; a company can refocus itself on making its advertisements and marketing efforts stand out in the daily lives and distractions of its target audience.
6. It is self-sustaining and reusable.
Once a company puts forth its banner ads throughout the internet, it widely strengthens the image and branding that a company is trying to reach for. It is not affected by any unintentional forces that can result in it backfiring upon the company, as it is not editable in any way by its audiences. Strategic placing of these banner ads in websites and/or applications that are known to garner high-traffic movement is a sure-fire way of continuously influencing consumers about the product without any direct contact from the company itself. Banner ads also have the convenience of not being physically tangible, thus having the capability of being reusable through placing them in different digital forefronts without any material and resource wastage.
7. It can imprint itself to consumers effectively.
The psychology of advertising, simply put, is a culmination of the many interests and preferences multitudes of research have put forth on the tendencies of consumers to act upon the world’s market. The main subject under focus when it comes to the psychology of advertising is the fact that all human beings, either when we buy or consume, will always try to distinguish themselves from all other people. Banner ads make use of this natural instinct to be unique and different through the perception that they are personalized and tailor-made for every individual consumer. When these values have been laid on the ground, other lingering human psychological aspects such as motivation, preferences, personal judgments, etc. contribute in conjunction with each other. A company that creates effective banner ads have a general idea of one’s target market and their sensibilities, thus having a greater persuasive influence over potential consumers.
8. Results can be seen in real-time and in an organized fashion.
Internet companies have made it easier for companies to advertise their products in an efficient way, usually developing specific applications for the sole purpose of data statistics in advertisements that are siphoned through them. Advertising platforms such as Google Ads, Microsoft Advertising, Facebook Ads, and the like are often complemented by banner generators that work towards providing marketers an easy way of monitoring the progress of the banner ads that they have created. This allows them to quickly analyse its performance and make the necessary adjustments to improve and/or strengthen their presence in the digital front that they have chosen to endorse their product in. Real-time feedback and data presentation is prevalent concept in the growth of the internet nowadays; advertisements are no stranger to this and are currently reaping from the benefits it brings for those who choose to utilize it.
9. Guarantees consumer loyalty.
In this competitive environment, a product without communication is a dead product. Communication infuses life in it and triggers sales. This is where banner ads come to play. They are an effective bridge between a company and its consumers with the digital front acting as a medium of connection. Banner ads can be the main form of communication that companies utilize to their advantage: they can describe the function of the service/product they are availing and can also work to make people want to buy the product or service through addressing their wants and needs. Promos and product updates can also be directed towards the consumer through strategic and effective placement of banner ads where their loyal consumers are usually in, that of which can further reinforce their familiarity and love for the product.
10. It eventually warrants company revenue.
With the number of competitions that are almost everywhere, an excellent communication strategy is what makes a particular brand stand out from the rest. With the development of modern mass media like the internet, almost every person in the world has access to a gadget that can connect to it, thus opening an infinite number of doors for new and more targeted communication strategies which eventually lead to more customers for a company. More customers simply mean more revenue for the company to manufacture and develop their products while earning profits. Banner ads are one of the essential forms of communication strategy nowadays that can kickstart a company’s vision towards expanding into new horizons, helping holistic growth towards success.
Advertising is a major aspect of society that makes it go round nowadays. Its power is mostly underrated: people mostly brush over the presence of advertisements as they are literally present in the five senses of the human being every day. We may not think of them as directly affecting our lives, but the way that banner ads can affect the market is an astounding power of their own. Discover what your company can truly reach by creating banner ads to effectively capture the vision that it had always aspired for from the start.