7 Secrets to Create Affiliate Banners That Drive Conversions

Affiliate marketing is all about placing your brand in front of the right audience to drive more conversions. This can only be done with up-to-date promotional methods and affiliate program strategy ideas. Some common techniques, like newsletters and email marketing, usually don't come out helpful in attracting the audience's attention. So, if you are tired of spending money and time on ineffective campaigns, here is what you have been missing out on - the affiliate banner ads!

Banner ads, or display ads, introduce your brand to the audience with an aesthetic visual aspect. Most people usually don't like to read long texts, but they sure pay attention to catchy visuals and graphics.

This article will discuss why you should create affiliate banner ads, along with some affiliate banner tips to drive more conversions. So let's get started!

Why Are Affiliate Banners Important?

Banner ads are usually placed at the top, bottom, sides, and sometimes in the middle of your website's content. The thing that gives banner ads an edge is their ability to contain precise information, interesting images, a clear call to action (CTA), and an overall attractive copy - all in one. Just like this banner ad on the NBA's website:

A well-designed banner ad persuades a visitor to click on it, leave the current website, and visit that brand's product page. The main purpose of these ads is to present the brand in front of the audience and turn them into a customer.

Let's face the fact — human minds process visuals more easily than long strings of text. This makes banner ads an effective affiliate marketing medium.

Moreover, you can also use banner ads on multiple platforms, such as your website, social media pages, blogs, and email marketing. This eliminates the need to spend money and time on creating different ads for each platform. And they are a great investment as well!

7 Tips to Create Affiliate Banners That Drive Conversions

If you don't know how to create affiliate banner ads correctly, you can't make much difference in your affiliate marketing performance. So, here are seven effective affiliate banner tips to help you get started with your campaign:

1. Convey a Clear Message

Companies often want to include every bit of information in the banner ads they intend to use offsite.

Of course, it makes sense, but you should not do that at any cost. The two things that make any banner ad attractive enough to capture the audience's attention in split seconds are its simplicity and clear message.

An effective banner ad doesn't contain unwanted texts or images. Instead, it includes only key elements, such as:

• Background image or color
• Attractive title
• Minimal text
• The call to action (CTA) button
• Logo

Here is an example of a perfect banner ad:

2. Include a Prominent CTA

A clear call to action button gives your audience an easy option to view your website or buy your product. All they need to do is click the CTA, and everything will come right to their plate. A CTA button takes a visitor to that brand's official website so they can view the product in more detail and, hopefully, then buy it.

This is why a well-designed banner ad must have a clear CTA and the right information.

An effective CTA also needs to be prominent enough for the visitors to be able to see it.

3. Know Your Target Audience

Targeting your ads correctly is one of the effective tips to make your banner ad drive more conversions. For that, you need to segment your audience according to their interests or likes.

You can use a heatmap, like Aurora Heatmap for WordPress, to track visitors' behavior on your website, including clicks.

Once you know your target audience completely, you can then aim your banner ads to only users interested in your product. This way, you can drive more conversions with less effort.

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4. Use Strong, High-Quality Images

You must keep all the elements of your affiliate banner ad consistent and brand-focused. This includes the images as well. High-quality images are the essence of a banner ad, as they attract the audience's eyes and represent your brand.

So use images that suit your website's style — colors, tones, fonts, and image types — and elevate the overall look of your banner, just like this one that ran on the Forbes website:

5. Place Your Banner Ads Correctly

The placement of a banner ad plays an important role in driving conversions.

Once you create affiliate banner ads for your brand, the next step is to determine where they will be more prominent. If you place your ad at the wrong place, it will get overshadowed by other content on the website and will not generate as many clicks as you hoped.

So, what's the prime location for a banner ad? Usually, it's either at the top of the page or in between a blog. The ads placed above the fold or at the top generally attract the audience's attention as soon as the page loads.

For example, both Lumosity and Pizza Hut's ads are well placed on the NHL.com website:

6. Create a Tracking Campaign for Your Banner Ads

How will you evaluate your shortcomings and strong points if you don't monitor your progress? That's why creating a tracking campaign for each banner ad is important.

You can make necessary changes in your ads and improve your conversion rate through a tracking campaign.

That's where a good tracking campaign software, like LeadDyno, comes in handy.

The software provides you with detailed clicks, leads, and conversion reports for each banner ad within minutes.

The LeadDyno Tracking Campaign lets you create a unique link per site. This helps you measure the quality of traffic you are receiving from each website. You can also link your affiliate banner ads to LeadDyno's tracking links and measure their clicks, leads, and conversion rates.

7. Use Authentic Free Tools

The best part about creating affiliate banners is that you can customize them as per your preferences. Moreover, with the help of free tools available on the internet, you can design your brand's banner ad without investing a single dollar.

Here are our top three picks to create affiliate banner ads for free:

Google Web Designer

No need to worry about the coding part with Google Web Designer. The tool allows you to create affiliate banner ads with HTML and CSS designs, while its visual editor generates code automatically.

From the app's several device-friendly designs and layered animations, you can surely create a banner according to your brand's theme.

Canva

Companies promoting their products through social media marketing simply love Canva! The app is an excellent platform for creating high-quality and attractive social media posts as well as banner ads.

Canva is the most fun app on which to create affiliate banners, as it offers more than 400,000 free stock photos, templates, font combinations, illustrations, and more.

Fotor

Fotor is a free app that can be used online on a desktop. The app offers many banner templates that help beginners design attractive banner ads easily. However, if you want to use more features, the Fotor app also includes a paid premium option.

Conclusion

Affiliate banners are an eye-catching, pleasing way of adding value to your affiliate marketing strategies. Although they are super-fun to design, you also need to watch for some essential things before making them a part of your affiliate marketing campaign.

Remember to keep the message of your banner ad short and clear, use high-quality images, include a prominent CTA, and place the ad in the right spot.

Also, don't forget to keep track of your banners' performance!