The other day, I was having lunch with internet marketing consultant Jason Baer and as we were talking about possible banner advertising solutions for different clients, he sketched the following diagram on a napkin:

Well, we’ve re-created it in pretty colors, but this is essentially what he sketched for us. Over the last several weeks, I have referred to it again and again. It has become a handy tool for me to simply remember the banner advertising options and how each has a role in any brand’s overall strategy.

First of all, it’s shaped this way to represent 2 things: the size of the potential audience associated with each and how far along that audience lies in the sales process.

1.  First, let’s talk about categories. Placing banner ads in a category, or ‘vertical,’ is serving your banners to a predetermined package of particular types of websites. For example, you’re selling perfume so you serve ads on major women’s websites that have a focus on beauty and shopping, such as a group including Elle.com, Vogue.com, makeupalley.com and Amazon.com. In this case you have a LOT of websites that fit into your category and the universe of possible impressions is huge. You pay less for these impressions because there are a lot of them and the people you reach may or may not have heard of your brand. However, you can be assured they are topically interested in what you have to offer. I recommend this type of banner advertising for brand awareness and for casting a really wide net to attract new audiences.
2. Contextual banner ads are served on pages where the context or the page matches the product you are selling. For example, an article on your local news site talks about about the growing mountain biking community and displays a banner ad for protective gear for bikers. I recommend this type of advertising as a complement to category advertising since the audiences are equally relevant and you’re still speaking to a broad audience.
3. Imagine you’re in the market for a new car, so you visit autotrader.com to compare pricing, you post your old hunk of junk on craigslist and then visit your car insurance website to see if you need to upgrade your coverage. Then, when you’re reading your yahoo email, you’re served an ad that reads ‘10% off a new car at Car Depot.’ This is behavioral targeting. Your web history shows that you’re in the market for a new car and you’re served a relevant ad. In this case, there are fewer people to target, but they are worth paying more for because they are further along in the sales process and more likely to buy your product. I recommend using behavioral advertising to remain in front of a highly targeted audience throughout their decision making process.
4. Retargeting banner ads are served to people who have already visited your website as they are going about their business somewhere else on the web. Below is a retargeting example from one of Brookfield Homes’ banner campaigns. This is the most important banner advertising to take advantage of because the audience is the most relevant. They are familiar with you and have already expressed interest by spending time on your website. This audience is the smallest and most expensive to reach. But completely worth it. I recommend retargeting for everyone who has something to sell.

All of these options are viable ways of reaching your audience, so be sure to consider each when trying to achieve the optimal program for your brand.