Placing
Banner Ads Online: Look Before You Leap!
By Chris Ayers
You've decided on an idea. You've picked out some bright colors. Your
banner ad uses animation and includes the magic word, "Free."
Only one decision left to make ... where to place the ad? Look before
you leap... where you place the ad can make
all the difference!
Let me tell you a story that clearly illustrates the point. I recently
designed a series of banner ads for a small company that provides employee
benefit services. They have a great concept but need more exposure on
the web.
After completing my design work and posting the ads online for the owner's
review, curiosity got the best of me and I asked him where he was placing
the ads. He responded that he had heard from some friends that if I want
to generate real traffic, he needed to be on Yahoo or one of the other
big search engines.
Again, my curiosity got the best of me and I had to ask the next logical
question ... namely, "Do you know how much they charge for banner
ads?"
He replied that he had done some checking into it and thought that he
could place an ad with one of them for about $2000 a month. "That
pretty much shoots my advertising budget for the year, but I'm banking
on the results," he reluctantly added.
Well I really liked this guy and do think that he has a really great idea.
So I couldn't let him put all his advertising "eggs in one basket."
I asked if he had checked into placing ads with other websites where his
potential customers might visit. He shook his head no, and I told him
to give me a week and I'd get back with him.
Before I go any further, don't get me wrong. I think Yahoo and other big
websites are great places to advertise if you have the funds to support
your efforts. I just think that for many small companies, these are not
the best alternatives.
So back to my story. While traveling on business, I spent a couple of
hours online searching for websites dealing with human resources, retirement
planning, group health insurance and other employee benefits.
After sorting through the results, I narrowed my list down to 10 sites
that offered online advertising. I sent emails to each site, explaining
that I represented a client who was interested in advertising on their
site.
HOT TIP: I refrained from sending the business owner the list directly
because I knew that I could negotiate agency discounts with many of the
websites. In fact, I was able to negotiate a lower rate with all but one
of them :-)
I then called my client and arranged a meeting. I gave him the list of
websites with their advertising rates and told him that I thought advertising
with some of them would be a much wiser use of the limited funds at his
disposal.
Noticing that he looked unsure, I explained that most of the people visiting
these sites would be interested in what he had to offer. In other words,
his ads would be targeted much more closely to his potential customers.
The more we talked, the more he smiled. By the end of our conversation,
he was grinning from ear to ear.
Now for the $50,000 question: How did it all turn out?
I got a call from the young man a couple of weeks later thanking me over
and over for the help. He couldn't believe his results (nor could I).
He had placed banner ads with three of the websites that I had located
for a total of $400. And his traffic had already tripled ... in just two
weeks time!
How can you use all this when promoting your website? I've outlined each
of the steps in the list below. Now I can't promise you the same results,
but I think you'll be very pleased.
1. Start with a great
banner ad. If you don't have the tools or talent yourself, have someone
design one for you. You can get some great tips on what makes a banner
ad effective from a website called Four Corners Effective Banners. Check
out their tips at <http://www.whiteplam.com/fourcorners/digiwaretips.shtml.>
2. Think about your
potential customers? What other products and services do they purchase?
Look in the trade magazines that your customers read. What other kinds
of information do they seek? Brainstorm a list of ideas.
3. Search the web
using your favorite search engine to locate websites that attract your
potential customers. My favorite for this purpose is <http://www.dogpile.com.>
Dogpile searches using
multiple search engines and then gives you top ten results for
each.
4. Browse through
the websites to see which might fit with your product or service. Contact
a couple of them and ask for their rates and the number of visitors they
attract each month.
5. Don't forget to
tell them you've designed the ads yourself and want the 15% agency discount.
It might actually be less, but you won't know until you ask.
6. Select one or two
and try them for a month. If the website offering the advertising doesn't
provide you with the information, be sure and check your access logs to
see how much traffic is coming from their websites.
7. Repeat the process
as often as you'd like. Contact the next two websites on your list and
repeat steps 4,5 and 6. Or go back to step one and use some other words
from your list.
Chris Ayers is a promotional consultant and publisher of the weekly newsletter,
"Unlimited Traffic." To subscribe to his free newsletter: send
any email message to traffic-on@mail-list.com.
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