The simple answer is, all businesses with an online presence can use banner advertising.
Banner advertising can be effective for any business that wants to increase brand awareness, drive targeted traffic to their website and generate sales.
Which types of businesses can benefit the most?
For small businesses and niche businesses, banner advertising can be especially effective as it’s easy to target specific groups of customers. For example, if you offer a party catering service in Wiltshire, you could advertise on websites offering wedding venues and rental houses in the Cotswolds area.
This highly targeted approach makes it more likely you’ll attract customers who’ll be interested in what you’re offering – so you can keep your costs down by only spending on your advertising where it’s likely to succeed.
For businesses of any size with an e-commerce function on their website, banner advertising can help bring potential customers directly to the right area of your website, where they can easily convert to a sale – a definite advantage over more traditional forms of advertising such as print ads.
Who’s less likely to succeed with banner advertising?
Larger businesses can benefit from increased brand awareness using banner ads. They can also use quality banner adverts as part of a wider web marketing strategy – for example, alongside pay per click (PPC) advertising, search engine optimisation (SEO) and engaging with social networking tools such as Facebook and LinkedIn.
However, the type of business that’s least likely to benefit from banner advertising is one offering a very wide range of products and services. A very general banner ad that tries to cover everything your business offers is less likely to catch attention.
In this case, the best strategy is to target one particular product or service and promote this in an eye-catching way. A good tactic might be to include a special offer or limited-time discount.
For example, if your business offers a range of printing and artwork services available nationally through stores and your website, you could promote a special offer just on business stationery ordered online. This is more likely to drive targeted traffic to your website that might result in a sale.
