7 Ways to Improve Ad Design

I recently gave a lecture with a colleague Eric Stucki, on Direct and Interactive, The Creative Process. The topic discussed the impact of Direct Response Marketing. The success often lies in the ad design.

A few aspects of direct marketing that most business owners overlook include the ad design, message, theoffer, and testing the results and consumer impact. There are several parts of an advertisement. Each one can have a dramatic impact to a marketing campaign’s success.

• Copy
• Art
• Ad Design
• Price Point
• Button format
• Link font color
• Long vs short
• Trail term
• Billing term
• Payment options
• Benefit order

One trick is to offer something big, with something very small, i.e. In the lecture we talked about offering 50% discount, with a $10 freebie. Once you have an idea that the following tips for ‘ad design’ are not magic formulas, then they can be used to generate a good marketing campaign.

1. Ugly works best
2. Long copy is better than short
3. One word or color can make a dramatic difference
4. Use paragraphs vs. bulleted copy
5. People click links, not pictures
6. Tell people what to do
7. Stay away from multiple page flows.

When marketing online, a 2% response rate is good. This does not reflect sales, just the response to the advertisement. This may seem low, but it is statistically on par, or much higher, than other marketing medium.

The first step is to determine who you are marketing to. This is not as difficult as you may think. Just look for people who have bought, or buy, your product. Look for how the competition is already selling to them.

Create a few samples. Do not expect your first campaign to work perfectly. It takes time to create and perfect a campaign. A 2% response will require about 10000 page views per test. However, finding that one ad creates a 2% response rate is not enough. It is important to experiment with different ads to see what works best.  One ad may result in 10% response, but the people who respond may not be ready to buy. A group of ads may result in a 2% response rate for each, but the actual ‘conversion to buy’ ratios may vary greatly.

This is a brief look at creating an online marketing campaign. Trial and error, and perseverance, will help most business owners create their own direct marketing campaign.