Advertising is everywhere. There’s a reason for that. Advertising works. Adverting gives your product reach, repetition and remembrance. As surfers, we may not like advertising but as adult webmasters we are advertisers.
"With advertising, you want your banner to convey your message almost instantaneously." |
Cyber pornographers use a lot of web-centric methods to advertise. We use pop-ups and FPA. We send out email. We build and submit thumbnail galleries in order to advertise adult sponsors. The most common and virtually oldest form of Internet advertising is the banner ad.
It would be nice to be a design genius. It would be equally nice to be able to pay a design genius to create a banner ad for you. More than likely, if you’re reading this you are neither a design genius nor can you afford to pay one. You want to learn how to make your own banners. You want banner-making tips. And here they are:
Any digital image has two kinds of size. One size is the dimensional size. The actual dimensions of the image on the monitor/window. For example, the average ad banner is 460 x 60 pixels. A pixel is a graphical unit of measurement for sizing digital images. When you see an ad banner on a webpage, it’s usually 460 pixels wide and 60 pixels high.
Internet ad banners come in various pixel sizes but these are the three most common: 468 x 60, 120 x 60 and 88 x 30. 468 X 60 is referred to as a banner ad because it resembles a hanging pennant. A 120 x 60 ad is called a button. An 88 x 30 ad is named a chicklet.
You want to know about pixel size because different webpage venues have different requirements concerning pixel size. TGP sites tend to favor buttons for reciprocal links. A banner ad will cost you more if you’re buying space for it on another site. And because they’re smaller, chicklets cost less.
The second type of size is file size. An image is a file. A file takes up a certain amount of space on a hard drive or a web server. That space is the file size of the image. The larger the image is in file size, the longer it will take to download to a surfer’s browser.
When you create a banner you need to make sure it’s small in file size. A 468 x 60 banner should typically be sized at 20 kilobytes or less, even when it’s animated. As well, a button or a chicklet should just a small if not smaller.
Color, design and copy. All of these elements should be as simple as possible when creating an ad banner.
There are three primary colors in the spectrum: red, blue and yellow. All other colors are merely combinations of the original three. With a banner graphic, you don’t want to use too many colors because a) more colors equal bigger file size and b) intricate coloration is lost on the tiny surface of a banner.
Your design should be simple. Try not to include too many decorations/images on a banner. A 468 x 60 banner is physically about the size of a skinny bookmark. Don’t confuse your surfer with too much on too little a space.
A banner without text might look cool but it won’t relay your message. Surfers need to see text on a banner ad. They need to be told what they’re looking at and what they should do about it. However, it’s a mistake to insert too much ad copy on a banner. With advertising, you want your banner to convey your message almost instantaneously. If your banner is too wordy, you’ll lose the surfer’s interest.
In modern society, we’ve become somewhat desensitized to advertising. When watching television, we go pee when the ads come on the screen. When we listen to the radio, we switch stations when the commercials air. On the net, we try to disregard the ad banners on a web page. Researchers call it “banner blindness”.
The research that coined the term “banner blindness” was from a study of behavior by web surfers. The study went on to say that surfers are more likely to notice animated banners than static ones. In other words, site visitors are more apt to pay attention to your ad banner if it’s moving.
The problem with animated graphics is that they tend to be larger in file size than static images. An animated graphic is comprised of several image cells looped together. The more individual images and cells, the bigger the file size.
There are a couple of ways to keep the file size small on an animated graphic. The first way is to use as few individual images as possible to create the animation. It’s quite possible to make a good animation from just two images. You also want to make sure that there aren’t too many cells in the animation as they too take up space.
Another way to refine animated graphics is with optimization software. In fact, image optimization software will help you with all your graphic creations. This software will decrease file size by either reducing the colors in an image or compressing the image or both. There are programs that are designed to specifically optimize images. There are also graphic editing suites that come bundled with optimizing software.
You are an adult webmaster but secretly, you’re really an advertiser. You want to use all the tools available to you as an Internet advertiser. The most common tool is the ad banner. If you keep your banners small, simple and animated you’ll be able to send your message across cyberspace. Even on the net, advertising works. Make it work for you.
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