Advertising Your Web Site Online

The basic online advertising unit since the World Wide Web opened up to commercial use has been the top-of-the-page banner ad. This is still the most popular form of Web site advertising, but there are now many alternatives to this old standard, and more are coming.

One of the best recent online advertising values to appear is Google's keyword-linked text ads. They are obviously not part of the search results, as shown in Figure 7-1, so Google users are not being flummoxed, but they are in character with the rest of the site's content; that is, they are not a blinking or jumping graphic stuck in an out-of-the-way location on the page that readers can easily ignore, but are right next to the search results, where a Google user is most likely to glance at them.

Figure 7-1. A Google search for "life insurance" brings up many keyword-triggered text ads on the right side of the page.

Other Web sites are running large graphical ads in the middle of their pages, and these ads were generating response rates four to five times higher than top-of-the-page banners in the early months of 2002.

The best place to keep up with the latest trends in online advertising is the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Web site at www.iab.net. IAB members all have a vested interest in the success of online advertising, and their content tends to be slanted toward large businesses, but it is good to look at their ever-changing content before making any advertising decisions of your own.

Don't be afraid to experiment. Try a few text ads, try different banner ad sizes, try running ads on different sites, and track all your results carefully. Then and this is so basic that it shouldn't need to be said, but it is a rule that is often ignored by companies of all sizes spend more on what works, and less on what doesn't. Your advertising program should constantly evolve as you come up with new ideas, and some of them work and others fail. The statistical homework needed to track ad results is boring in the extreme, but it is absolutely necessary to keep costs low and results high.

Take the traditional PR route. If you are selling products or services online, find news Web sites that cover your business area. Send press releases to them. Make sure you send releases only to those that either cover your industry or geographic region; others are not going to be interested, and will consider inappropriate press releases spam. On the other hand, online news editors who do cover your area will generally be enthusiastic about your information. Gathering news is expensive and tedious, and competition among news Web sites is fierce. Well-written, relevant press releases sent to online media have an excellent chance of being turned into stories.