The effectiveness of banner ads should be measured through search behaviour as much as by click-through rates, a survey from iProspect has found.
iProspect, a search-engine marketing agency under Isobar, studied the behaviour of visitors to ad-supported sites. It found that nearly as many netizens who click on banner ads will conduct searches for brands associated with the ad, and nearly half of all audiences on an ad-supported site will eventually perform a search that is relevant to the ad they saw.
According to the agency, the study aims to highlight the connection between display ads and search engine marketing, based on a pool of 1,575 American internet users.
“This new iProspect study goes beyond previous studies about the importance of integrating the offline and online marketing mix,” said Antony Yiu, search director, wwwins Consulting Hong Kong and iProspect Hong Kong. “Marketers should shed the old dotcom era mentality of using only display ads for their online campaigns and instead utilise a more synergistic approach of integrating both search and display ads to earn exponential returns on their advertising investment.”
The survey further found that 31 per cent of netizens respond to display ads by clicking on them, compared to the 27 per cent who respond by conducting a search for the brand, product or company.
Twenty-one per cent instead choose to type the company’s URL into their browser and nine per cent find relevant information from social media sites.
According to iProspect, a total of 52 per cent of internet users actively respond to display ads.
Additionally, the survey found that 33 per cent of respondents to an online display ad go on to purchase from a company with which they are familiar, compared to the 14 per cent who learn about a company for the first time from a digital display ad.
