"Incentive" is also important

As mentioned in the previous articles, a creative design and appropriate placement of an online advertisement are the important factors to make an ad be more effective, if you are going to place an ad on the Internet, there is one more thing that you should consider, that is “incentive”.

Appropriate incentives are used to achieve click-through. Banner advertisements with offers such as prizes or reductions can achieve higher click-through rate.

Click-through a banner ad leads through to a destination site which gives audience more detailed information on an offer. Let’s see the following example – B&Q.

↑ Although the advertising message is clear and easy to understand, it is just a banner ad which cannot be linked to its official website. In my opinion, if it could be click-through to the B&Q website to see the product information, it may induce target customer to visit the shop.

Let’s see one more example. The following is IPSA’s banner ad which is placed on Windows Live Messenger.

↑ A “Call for Action” button is also important and it could draw the audiences’ attention to click-through a banner.


Besides, the incentives “learn more about the make up and get a sample for free” could solicit audience’s response to visit the shop. By the way, a button for registration in the website is also an effective way to capture customer data. Therefore, the mix between online and offline spend could maximize the reach, brand awareness, and purchase intent etc.



Post by Isabel Li
Student No. 08849106S