Banner advertising is one of the oldest traffic generation methods that is still highly effective for many website businesses. Banner advertising is similar to online classified advertising or paid text link advertising.

Place these colorful ads onto relevant high traffic websites to increase brand recognition and bring more traffic to your website. Interested visitors will click on your banner and be taken to your website.

You can purchase banner advertising in three ways:

1. Flat monthly rate: Pay a fixed monthly rate for based on size and location on a particular page.
2. Pay per impression: Pay a rate per thousand impressions that the page your ad is on is presented to visitors. This is different than pay per click.
3. Exchange banners: You can negotiate an exchange where you place their banner on your website and they will place your banner on theirs.

Banner advertising tips

1. High traffic: Select popular, high traffic websites to advertise on. These sites do cost more, but they will yield much better results. Get them to show you their traffic statistics and how long their visitors are staying on their site.
2. Targeting: Place your banner ads on relevant websites in your niche. A banner for children’s clothing won’t get many clicks if it is featured on a retirement planning website.
3. Simple: Keep your design simple and focused. One big mistake that people make is to put too much information in a small banner ad. Define a clear call to action.
4. Attention: The colors and fonts need to stand out and quickly grab the attention of the visitor. You don’t want your banner to blend in with your competition.
5. Avoid auto-play: Banner ads that involve sounds or video that play automatically are a bad idea. They are annoying and cause visitors to click away from a website.

Will banner advertising work for your business? There are many different traffic generation techniques being used today. You will want to test various traffic strategies and measure the results before you commit a large portion of your marketing budget to any one strategy.