| The main purpose for creating online banners is to increase the viewership of your website. Based on researches, I think there are some points that we can consider when making our banners so they will look more "click-able". Do share with us if you have other interesting and useful ideas as well! Let us update the list together. |
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Use Contrasting Colors
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| Do not use colors or a design style that blend into background of the website that you are putting your banner at. It will make your banner look much less visible than others who use total different color themes. |
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| left: less contrast colors VS right: more contrast colors |
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Keep the File Size Small
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| People will not wait for a large banner to load finish before scrolling down to read further on the content. Make sure your banner is small in file size and be one of the first few images to complete loading when visiting the website. |
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| left: slow loading image VS right: fast loading image |
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Include a Call to Action
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| A short phrase like "Find out more" or "Sign up now" will better capture people’s attention. It also allow them to roughly get an idea of your banner nature, whether are you selling a product, sharing an article or signing up for an application. |
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| left: without call to action VS right: with call to action |
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Subtle Animation is Useful
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| Animated objects or short movie clip make great banners. Some designers also integrate a small flash game which is enticing people to play and click on them. But of course, make sure your file size is kept small, or do your preloading progressively. |
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| left: without animation VS right: with animation |
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Straight to the Point Heading
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| Keep your message short and straight to the point. Make sure people can understand the purpose of your banner and the benefits that they will get if they were to click on it. |
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| left: general heading VS right: specific heading |
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Create an Obvious Button
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| Include a good button design within your banner so it will look clickable instead of a plain picture on display. Try to make it obvious that people can click on your banner. |
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| left: without button image VS right: with button image |
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Track the Statistics for Banner Clicks
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| This is very useful in understanding your own performance after every banner design. You will be able to identify which are the more effective approaches towards your audience and apply them throughout your future works. |
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I am Johnson Koh, a graphic and web designer in Singapore. Founded 10Steps.SG with the purpose to share my experiments and interesting design news. Follow me on Twitter here. 
8 Comments | Write a Comment
Ive been following your blog posts for several weeks now and find them a riveting read.
Thanks for sharing. Great concept.
“Straight to the Point Heading” i agree to this completely.
this is a great tips mate, thanks for this one, but for now, I dont have yet the budget for buying adspot hehehe
Same for me bro. I hope to update this list further so please share if you have any ideas ya
thanks for sharing
i learned – the call to action and subtitle animation is important. and i do this for my blog.