Creating Simple Text Banners Tutorial

[Teli]

I'd strongly caution people against creating an animated banner advert.

If done improperly, they can become more of a distraction than a marketing tool, in some egregious cases, it can cost both the website displaying the banner and the site being marketed a visitor because it can cause the visitor to click the back or close button, and many webmasters are moving away from allowing animated banners on their websites.

Those are just a few things to keep in mind. Also, while GIFs can be easy to create, the web seems to be moving towards Flash to get a lot more interactivity involved with the banners -- so that may also be a good thing to look into.

~ Teli

[Teli]

Bobbie brings up a super awesome point. When in doubt (or lacking design skillz), ask the merchant or affiliate manager to hook you up.

As she said, many are only too happy to help because it means they'll also have some new creative for other affiliates as well.

If they can't or are unwilling to help, maybe you should reconsider actually promoting their affiliate program (assuming that your request is reasonable, of course).

~ Teli

[its_me_shaners]

Great Idea. I guess my concern about this, and I doubt even if affiliate that provide there own creatives do this , is the testing of the creative, the headling and all that. But yeah its great IDea and sweet Tute !!

[Teli]

You bring up a great point, shaners -- testing. I'm guilty of not testing all my creative, so I know there must be others out there.

For the most part, and if the affiliate program shows promise, then testing the creative should be moved up the priority list.

I should probably add that the purpose of a banner advert is to get the click through -- not to sell the product, that's the landing page/merchant's job.

So, testing it should be likened to testing a PPC advert. Which tweaks increase the click through rates and such.

~ Teli