Four Things to Consider When Evaluating Banner Ad Creative

During a conference call earlier this week, the client brought up a great question:

How does your team evaluate banner ad creative? I mean, do you have certain guidelines to judge effectiveness prior to launching the banner advertising campaign? The short answer: YES! In fact, there are four considerations we take into account when evaluating banner ad creative:

1. Clear Value Proposition
2. Clear Imagery
3. Character Limit
4. Actionable Call to Action (CTA)

To bring these considerations to life, let's examine a few banner campaigns we have run in the past.

Box 'Words' Customer Acquisition Campaign

In one of the first case studies we developed following the creation of MKG Marketing, we worked with Box to create & execute a customer acquisition advertising campaign.

Looking at a sample of the banner ad creative used below, let's walk you through our evaluation process.

1. Value Proposition: Easy and quick! "Simple, Secure Sharing From Anywhere"
2. Clear Imagery: Cloud services product emphasized with white clouds & brand name
3. Character Limit: Uncluttered design drives user direct to call to action
4. Actionable CTA: Strong click here to begin a 'Free Trial' call to action

So, how'd we do?

Well, the campaign improved their cost-per-customer-acquisition metric by 51% and we won a 2012 OMMA award for advertising creativity!

YouEye Customer Acquisition Campaign

When YouEye approached our team to help bring their user testing SaaS product to market, we jumped at the opportunity.

Looking at a sample of the banner ad creative used below, let's walk you through our evaluation process.

1. Value Proposition: Three simple words: 'Insights for Websites'
2. Clear Imagery: Logo speaks directly to their value proposition. Green CTA button jumps off the page
3. Character Limit: Short sentence offers secondary CTA ('see for yourself') and then validation provided by Microsoft & Zappos client roster
4. Actionable CTA: 'Try It Today' pushes users to not only click through but to test drive the SaaS product

So next time you are evaluating banner creative, make sure to ask yourself ...

1. Is the value proposition stated in this ad clear? Do I immediately 'get it'?
2. Does my imagery align with the text-based value proposition? Is there a clear connection established between the two?
3. How many characters are in this ad? A good way to ensure the banner creative avoids clutter is to read through it: if it takes more than 2 - 3 seconds,  you've got too many words & images!
4. Lastly, is there a clear action that users are being instructed to take? Hint: 'Learn More' is not a clear action ...