Increasing your reach with online advertising

We are in a period when banner advertising seems to be on the wane — with click-through rates dipping to 0.39% average. But while banner ads aren't as effective as they once were, the truth is that a great many companies, large and small, can still use banner ads effectively as part of their advertising mix.

At Creative-Ops, we can help you with any and all aspects of banner advertising. Based on your input, we can create polished, persuasive campaigns with professional banner ads in Flash or as simple animation gifs. We'll also help you seek out suitable publisher sites, negotiate the price of banner ad space, and help you make the best use of your advertising budget.

How do you measure online success?

Click Through Rate (CTR). This ratio of page views to clicks is expressed as the percentage of total visitors to a particular page who clicked on the banner ad. This is a basic measure of how effective a banner ad is. At Creative-Ops, our clients achieve CTRs that range from the industry average of about 0.39% to as high as 10%. As a general rule, the more targeted the site, the higher the CTR. Directories and search engines also sell banners ads that pop up when a particular keyword is entered. Thus your banner could show only when someone entered a relevant search word.

Cost Per Sale. Creative-Ops believes that a much more important metric is the actual cost of making a sale. By comparing conversion rates with CTRs, you can begin to measure the effectiveness of a given campaign. Analytical software from such systems as DoubleClick combined with HTML tracking code on website conversion pages help us determine which sites and which banner ads had the best results.

Branding. While CTR and Cost Per Sale relate to direct marketing objectives, another way of looking at banner ads is as "branding" tools. They create brand awareness, and a brand image in the viewer's mind, whether or not the viewer eventually clicks on the ad. Although this don't account for the effectiveness of a branding campaign, it does measure how many visitors were exposed to your message.

Top Trends for 2006

1. Open rates are falling
2. Clickthrough rates are stable
3. Conversion rates are up
4. Spam is less of a deterrent
5. False positives remain a problem
6. Frequency should be tested
7. Creative design matters

Call 866-781-8195 (toll-free) for a free consultation.