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Banners have been used for quite some time to assist in promoting products and services, to let customers know about the launch of a new product line, and to notify people who are walking nearby about a specific promotion that a store is running. The use of banners is effective. It helps get people to notice your business, draws their attention, and once they become interested – you simply have to close a deal.
If banners are so effective, then why is it that your business fails to get a good return on the investment made through this marketing strategy? This is actually a common question that businesses ask, especially if they have not yet experimented with different designs.
Whether looking at setting up a few vinyl window decals or printing out a large banner that will be hung in a location where drivers can easily see it, following specific proven strategies can produce far greater results than simply continuing with the same campaign that is not bringing in the results you’re aiming for.
3 Effective Banner Design Tips To Consider
Before looking at some effective ways to improve your brand’s banner advertising efforts, here’s an interesting fact. Recent studies have suggested that more than half of all consumers still seem to trust a printed type of marketing material more than they would trust another kind of material, such as an advertisement that they see on the internet.
With many consumers still relying on physically printed media that they see in the real world, it’s crucial that businesses don’t overlook the importance of focusing on a great design for banners that they’ll set up.
Below is a closer look at three particular strategies that you definitely have to consider while you’re having banners printed for your business.
1. Consider Your Message Carefully
Before you start designing banners and prior to sending off any type of artwork to your printers, start by taking a closer look at what message you want to communicate with these marketing materials. A banner should be short and to the point but still, send a message. You ultimately want to communicate quickly with the person who sees it. They shouldn’t have to stop and spend five minutes reading the banner, but rather be able to scan it quickly and immediately understand what it’s about.
Start by considering the purpose of the banner. A banner can be used to promote quite a large number of things. Ask yourself these questions:
- Are you going to promote the launch of a new product or service offered by your brand?
- Would you like to promote a promotion that you’re going to offer your customers?
- Do you want to advertise new business hours? Perhaps you decided to extend your business hours during the Christmas holidays?
- Do you want to promote a specific product or service?
These are, of course, only a handful of scenarios where you might consider making use of banners as an advertising platform for your business.
In some cases, you might simply want to provide a general overview of your business. If this is the scenario, you need to sit down and carefully think about what you want to place on the banner. The banner should not be overcrowded. In most cases, simply having a great design that shows off your corporate branding with your logo, along with a few words that give an overview of the products or services your business offers, is enough to attract new consumers.
Regardless of the purpose that the banner will play, always have a thorough plan on what you want to have displayed on the banner before you move on to the design part of the project.
2. Use Color to Your Advantage
Once you have a good overview of the message that the banner is going to relay to the public, you can start with the design. This design will ultimately be sent to your printers, but before this step is taken, you should ensure the banner design is effective and not overwhelming.
Color is one of your most important elements when it comes to designing a banner that is attractive to consumers.
It has actually been proven through research that color has a significant impact on how customers respond to an advertisement. For example, a study that was conducted by HubSpot, one of the internet’s biggest marketing platforms, found that there is a big difference in click-through-rates when comparing buttons that use different colors. When the call to action (CTA) button was colored red, there was a 21% improvement in clicks compared to a green button.
Let’s consider a couple of the colors that were analyzed in the study:
- Red: Red triggers emotions that are powerful, but the emotions can be either negative or positive. In sales, red is considered a very powerful color as it brings about feelings of urgency when used in the right way. For 7% of men and 9% of women, red was voted as their favorite color. Among a study group, 2% of men did vote red as their least favorite color.
- Orange: Orange is associated with courage, warmth, and energy. It can, however, also represent immaturity, frustration, and deprivation. In the study, only 5% voted orange as their most preferred color, with up to 33% of participants responding with orange as their least favorite color.
- Yellow: Yellow seems to have a great reaction. The color is associated with happiness, intellect, and creativity. The color was voted as the most favorite by up to 57%.
- Green: Green is most commonly associated with nature and growth as well as freshness. The study showed that about 14% prefer green in advertisements, but up to 16% of people don’t like the color.
- Blue: Blue is yet another popular color with up to 57% of respondents explaining that they prefer this particular color.
3. Emphasize On Shapes
Apart from color, shapes also seem to play an important part in attracting people’s attention to a banner advertisement. Shapes should help to draw the attention of consumers to specific areas of the banner. This, in turn, can help to ensure the customer knows exactly what they’re reading, knows what information is the most important, and knows where to go if they want to use whatever was promoted on the banner.
When it comes to shapes, it’s crucial to effectively combine them with the previous tip discussed above – to experiment with colors. Each shape will, of course, have a specific color assigned to it. Assigning the right colors to your shapes and ensuring the different colors used on a banner are good matches becomes crucial when you’re looking to attract more people to your business.
Consider highlighting some of the more important words and messages that you include on the banner. Highlighting refers to ensuring that a shape encloses specific words and that you choose the right combination of colors to represent the text as well as the shape.
With this in mind, you might be wondering what exactly should be highlighted. In the majority of cases, highlighting your business name and placing everything else at less visible spots is not going to bring you great results.
While you can add your business logo to your banner, consider adding it to a smaller location. Instead, customers want to know things like what you’re promoting.
Let’s say you’re advertising a discounted promotion that you’re running for the weekend. The emphasis should be on words like:
- “This weekend only”
- “Weekend sale”
- “Savings”
- “Up to 50% off”
These are just a few examples. If you’re not using the banner within your store, then be sure to add an address or your shop’s name. This way, people know where they need to go if they want to take advantage of the promotion.
Conclusion
Banner advertising still remains an effective way of promoting a brand, promotion, or event in the offline world. Unfortunately, many businesses fail to use the right techniques to attract more eyes to their banners. Use the three effective banner advertising tips discussed in this article to make this marketing effort more successful for your business.
