Megan Sullivan-Jenks, Director of Marketing & Communications, Choozle: From your point of view, how important are display ad creative assets to the success of a digital advertising campaign?
Jim Wagner, Designer, Creativity Multimedia: Creative assets can be critical to a campaign’s ROI. Some relevant examples are:
• Peta’s print and broadcast ads
Peta creates the most outrageous ads possible then sends out press releases featuring their ad. Because the creative is so outrageous and sometimes offensive they get huge amounts of press coverage (which is free). They spend nothing on a media buy yet get their message out to millions of people. The creative does all the work.
• Wendy’s twitter account
Twitter accounts are free. Wendy’s real-time bitter, very funny tweets amuse millions directly and through retweets. Clever writing does all the work.
• Panda Cheese
Google it.
MSJ: How do you push to create display ads that cut through the noise?
JW: The best way for a display ad to cut through the noise is to avoid the noise. The relevant target audience density of a media buy is a key ingredient for a campaign with a good conversion rate/cost per click.
MSJ: What are some core elements that should be in a display ad creative? (i.e. a call to action, attention grabber, etc)
JW: With digital advertising, the offer is everything. Screen positioning, size, animation, color, headline, and content relevance all have an effect on click through.
MSJ: How much do you take into account your target audience and other data points when creating display ads?
JW: This varies. Usually, the Branding is designed around the intended consumer so I try to stick to the brand look
MSJ: Does color have an impact on click-through rates and overall performance for display ad creative?
JW: Yes. A/B splits have proven this. Why one color works better than another, who knows.
MSJ: What is the value that marketers gain from A/B testing creative assets?
JW: A/B splitting is a powerful way to optimize the ROI for your media budget. Cost per click and total conversion ratio benefit when the media planner knows what creative performs best. I’ve worked on digital campaigns the have had as many as 10 separate creatives running simultaneously being tracked real time.
MSJ: What are some common missteps that you see advertisers making with their ads?
JW: There are two that come to mind right off the bat:
• Improper targeting. Ads that target via cookies/browser history and abandoned cart cookies that display one-off items that you purchased a month ago. Serving up a lawnmower ad after I’ve just bought one is media waste.
• Bogged down ad servers. Advertisers should make sure their ads don’t reside on an overloaded server. Roughly 20 percent of the ads served to me I never see because I’ve read past the content where their ad was positioned.
MSJ: Can you explain what Creativity Multimedia offers?
JW: Creativity Multimedia is a full-service advertising design & production studio.
After graduating from the University of Florida, Jim moved to NYC to start his career in advertising. He worked for George Lois as his senior designer, then took a position at Mccann Erickson as Senior Art Director working on the Columbia Pictures and TriStar account. Jim then formed my own Digital advertising agency, Zowie Digital. His clients included Absolut Vodka, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, Gentiva Health Services, Alitalia Airlines, and Olympus America. Zowie also executed sub-contracted specialty projects for top-shelf advertising agencies such as TBWA/Chiat Day, McCann Erickson, The Ad Store, Poppe DotCom and Modem Media.
