Lesson #21 Banner Advertising Basics
Written By Titmowse

The term "Banner Blindness" comes from a study by the Center for Media Research. Surfers use websites in different ways and one must consider these ways when determining where to place their graphical advertising. Graphical banners are (statistically) less clicked upon than text ads are but that doesn’t mean graphic ads are less important.

In the TGP realm, everything is about the images. There’s a ring of truth to the supposition that horny viewers aren’t really concerned with words. In TGP, they want the pics. Your graphic banner is a pic and your job is to make them want to click it.

Yes, image banners add more to your bandwidth bill. Yes, image banners cause your gallery page to load slower. But banner ads work and they work very well on galleries. TGP surfers look at a page differently than they do a free site or paysite. TGP surfers already know before entering your gallery that they are going to find thumbnails. They enter with confidence because of the description in your link on the TGP.

The first thing they are going to do as your page loads is look for the pictures/thumbnails. That’s why the best place for a banner ad is at the top. The top of the page is still the pinnacle of HTML real estate and you want an ad to be the first picture a surfer sees on a gallery. Text at the top of the gallery will most likely be ignored by the average TGP porn patron. Clickable thumbs at the top give away too much too fast and feed the freebie mindset. Graphic banners make the very best use of top space.

That being understood, one should also become familiar with the many banner sizes and types available to them. Very few adult sponsors allow you to create and link your own graphic ads. Some do but even they recommend you use the ones they have created and tested for success. Sponsors provide banner graphics for advertising and all you have to do is pick one.

There are full-sized banners, button banners, vertical banners, static banners, animated banners, flash banners, hot-linked banners and banners you host on your own server.

Naturally, a vertical banner will only reside at the top corner of a page at best. A button banner will be smaller (usually 120x60 pixels) than a full size (480x25) will. Animated banners have been proven more clickable than static ones but animated banners take longer to load. Flash banners are very intriguing and sometimes interactive but they can be large in file size and might not work in older browser software.

Take into account your sponsor’s TOS when using banners on your galleries. Some stipulate that you have to save the file to your disk and then upload it to your ftp server. Some will tell you that you must use their hot-link code or you won’t receive credits for your sales.

If you have a gallery on a free-hosted page then your banners will have to compete with the header advertising embedded into the page by your host. This matters a lot because not only does it mess with the effectiveness of the top spot, that free host header can also be added into the ad count by a TGP reviewer. Most TGPs only list galleries with two-three clickable ads. If you have to use a free host, definitely make sure your graphic banner is as close to the top as possible.

Some gallery makers use a mix of text and banner ads. They put the graphic ad at the top and the text at the bottom or somewhere in the middle. Try different layouts and see what works best for you and your content. However you choose to use graphic banners, use them. A graphic ad is a picture that should stand out on a page of pictures and a picture can be worth a lot of money!