500,000 Clicks Worth Of
Twin Lakes Area Experience
From January 1, 2010 through July 31, 2010 the banners and classifieds on 2Cooleys
main pages had 29,165 clicks. Now image another 15 years worth of clicks! I'm
sharing here what I learned from a half-million clicks on area tourism banners over 15
years. Each of those clicks carries technical and user data used for increasing
click rates. As can be expected, some banners get many more clicks than others. So What Makes an Ozark Recreation Banner Produce Lots of
Bookings? First and foremost, it takes thought, work, and time. It is rare
that a banner produces a good return on the first try. It does not take a great deal of
effort to watch results and adjust accordingly, but you must do just that. Though it
sounds complex and time-consuming, our top-producing banner campaigns each take about 3 to
5 hours of time over a year.
It Takes Multiple Banners. You can't run
just one banner design all year and expect year-around results. If you use just a summer
theme banner, you can expect results only three months out of the year. If you have
two or three banners with different season themes rotating in your spot, you'll double or
triple your results.
The List
The list below summarizes, but obviously does not detail, what you need to know. It is
meant as a guideline only.
| 1. A banner's purpose is getting visitors to
your Web site. Your site, not the banner, is what sells. |
| 2. Banners have a fraction of a second to
attract attention, then 2 or 3 more seconds to earn a click. |
| 3. People don't like ads. The more banners
look like advertisements, the fewer clicks they get. |
| 4. People read banner text, but click only if
text is short, informative, and hype-free. |
| 5. Banners must be season relevant. Few click
summer banners in the fall. Rotate multiple banners in your spots. It is not expense to do
so. It just takes more effort on your part. |
| 6. Banners must match site content. The
closer the match, the more clicks you get. |
| 7. Due to cognitive shifting, a banner's page
position is EXTREMELY IMPORTANT! |
| 8. Logos do not generate clicks. Use logos
only if branding is your primary objective. |
| 9. 1 or 2 month banner runs are too short
unless the spot gets 15,000 views or more a month. |
| 10. To increase clicks you need more metrics
than just clicks and views. Ad metrics should be free. |
| 11. Banners should be on static display, or
static rotation, but never on auto rotation. |
| 12. Having a text link under the banner image
is important for several reasons. |
| 13. For metrics gathering, images and links
in the same banner need different tracking codes. |
| 14. Use advanced ad serving options for higher click
rates only after you first test all basic steps. |
| 15. Tourism banners work best when they show a price
or price range. |
| 16. Clever or cute does not work. Specific offers do.
Information, not entertainment, generates clicks. |
| 17. Testing and fine-tuning banner design over a
period of time is the most productive effort you can make. Testing and adjusting pays off
many times over. You can't just "stick one up there and see what
happens". If at first your banner does not produce, don't give up. If it was that
easy, everyone would be doing it. The race is won by the Tortoise, not the Hare! |
|
FAQs
Time & Complexity
Sound like a lot of work? Sound complex? I have helped many customers run effective,
sophisticated banner campaigns. In most cases it takes about 10 hours a year of the
customer's time. There is very little to learn. What you do need to learn takes about an
hour, and that time is spread out over three or four 15 minute sessions.
Costs
All of the above can be accomplished for less than $500 per spot per year. You can get a
good banner program for $350 to $750 a year. You can get a producing banner for much less.
You can get a sophisticated multi-banner program for about a $900 a year.
How Much Money Will A Banner Make Me?
People click a banner because they anticipate landing in a site offering something they
want. If they land on your site and don't see what they thought they would see, or if they
see it, but don't want to pay the price, they will not convert into a booking. This is why
your banner must match what your site offers.
However, even with the best match between banner and site,
and even if you have the best prices, best facilities, and the best of what ever else is
needed, you will get 2 to 3 bookings for every one hundred people who click your banner. I
have seen higher conversion rates. I've seen them as high as 12 bookings for every 100
clicks. But that is not the way to bet. Instead plan on 2 to 3 bookings for every 100
clicks. If you do better, great! Figure out what your average booking rate is, and from
there you can calculate what your banner will produce in minimum gross sales based on your
click guarantee.
How Many Clicks Will I Get?
Click counts vary considerably. If the ad is fully optimized, plan on about 1,000 clicks a
year. I see ads getting 1,000 or more clicks in six months. I see some ads get less
than 100 clicks per month. Most ads on 2Cooleys sites will get between 800 and 1,200
clicks per year.
The Best Money-Making Banner Strategies
1. Start out on a simple level, learn the basics. Then go for more advanced
efforts.
2. Test and fine tune banners. Forget hitting a home run on the first swing. It will not
happen. The difference between the pros and the amateurs is found in the testing process.
3. Once you buy a banner spot, run at least three different banners in that spot.
4. Based on what you learn during your tests (test results show up in your ad metrics
control panel for free) develop additional banners, and serve those banners using advanced
serving options.
What Are Advanced Serving Options?
By applying specific programming to each banner you can have it display, or not
display, or display different banners, based on city, state, time of day, day of week,
search engine terms, popularity of the banner based on all of the former, and just about
any other factor you can think of. For example, if someone enters a site displaying your
banner for fishing, but the person used lodging as a keyword, your lodging banner displays
instead of your fishing banner. Further, if that person was from Memphis, you could have a
lodging special for people from Memphis display. But let's say that Memphis special should
display on Monday and Tuesday only because it is for the weekend, then the display for
that Memphis Lodging Specials will display only on Monday and Tuesday. It goes from there.
What Is An Ad Metrics Control Panel?
If you have ever purchased a banner ad and the seller gave you one of those little
password protected sites where you can see how many views and clicks your banner has had,
that is a very basic panel. A true ad metrics control panel offers far more than just
views and clicks. |
