Making money or wasting money – your motorcycle ad banners can have a significant positive or negative impact on your bottom line. Next, the following information and tips for creating banner ads will be very helpful. You will find that your ads will help you get the most from your investment (ROI).
What type of ad banners work best? This is a common question in marketing. The answer depends on several variables. Here’s an article if you are learning or need to brush up on your marketing principles. Below is some web banner information to help design effective, revenue-generating ads.
- Defining Your Biker Ad’s Goals
- Identifying Your Target Audience
- Customizing the Ad's Message
- Motorcycle Banner Ad Sizes
- Creating Banners in Groups
- Ad Design & Landing Pages
- Make Your Ads Stand Out
- The Simplicity of Biker Ads
- Choosing Colors for Ads Tip
- Choosing Banner Fonts Tips
- Choosing Visual Elements
- Adding Your Motorcycle Logo
- Framing Your Motorcycle Ad
- Location of Ad Buttons
- Value-Proposition
- CTA Banner Ads
- Animated Biker Ads
- Small Ad File Sizes
- Mobile-Friendly Motorcycle Ads
- Best Biker Ad Placement
- Testing Motorcycle Banner Ads
Defining Your Biker Ad’s Goals
You must define clear goals before creating your motorcycle company’s ad banners. For instance, is your goal for branding, educating about a product or service, immediate sales, lead generation, re-marketing, or what? Notably, a clear plan helps improve the look and success of your ads.
Identifying Your Target Audience
Next, your ads must focus on what will attract your rider’s audience. More specifically, your ads should focus on what will convert into sales. But too often, biker companies’ ads don’t do this. Not doing this will reduce the number of people who interact with your ads.
Also, there are ways to find your best target audience before creating ads. Your expert banner designer will know this. One way is to look at the demographics of your company’s Facebook or Instagram page. Another is to use web tools like Google Analytics.
After your ads have been live for a while, there will be data to evaluate. Once the data is gathered and analyzed, new strategies can be created. And your new ads can be made for your company using this data, and this cycle repeats. This process is called the MVP development approach. It is where you build or create something, measure its results, and learn to modify your strategy.
A/B testing is a great way to see what is and is not working. It provides data and facts on which banners are performing.
Customizing the Ad’s Message
In addition, your banner ads must focus on what drives the best results. When should your motorcycle company’s ads’ colors, words, and imagery change? Notably, it is when your target audience is further defined, and data supports the changes.
For instance, I’ll use my hypothetical company, Kickstart Motorcycle Jackets (Kickstart). They sell a sports bike jacket and an old-school biker jacket. The banner ads for sports bike riders and old-school bikers will differ. Ads for sports bike riders won’t work for old-school Harley riders, and vice versa. The banners are different because the target audience is different.
Another example of targeting is geographic location. For instance, if Kickstart wants to sell more cold-weather jackets, these motorcycle jackets will sell better in Detroit than in San Diego.
Motorcycle Banner Ad Sizes
Another essential item when your marketing agency creates advertising banners is using the correct size and shape.
1. Here are some popular Google Ad sizes (formerly called AdSense):
((Ratio – Dimensions (where used))
- 300×250px (Medium Rectangle)
- 336×280px (Large Rectangle)
- 300×600px (Half Page)
- 728×90px (Leaderboard)
2. Here are the most popular Facebook ad sizes:
((Ratio – Dimensions (where used))
- 1.91:1 – 1200×630px – (Feed)
- .525:1 – 630×1200px (Portrait)
- 1:1 – 1200×1200px (Square for Feed, Right Column, Instream Video, Market Place, Instant Articles, Story, Collection, and Ads)
- 1180×1920px (Stories)
3. Here are the most popular Instagram ad sizes:
((Ratio – Dimensions (where used))
- 1:1 – 1080x1080px (Photo Posts & Ads)
- 1.91:1 – 1080×608px (Photo Posts & Ads)
- 4:5 – 1080×1350px (Photo Posts & Ads)
As you can see, your company has many ad options. Which format works best depends on the motorcycle ad’s location on a page.
Creating Banners in Groups
Note that some ad platforms use the same ad ratios. For instance, a 1200×1200px banner and a 1080×1080px banner have a 1:1 ratio. An important banner ad creation tip is to use the most significant dimensions of a particular banner shape. You do this because ad platforms will often automatically resize your ads.
Here’s an example of how to use this tip to create high-quality motorcycle ads. Let’s say you have a 1080x1080px red and black banner on your website, but on another website, you have a green and yellow-themed 300×600px banner ad. This can create brief, unnecessary confusion, so providing your visitors with a smooth, easy buyer’s journey is essential. Consistency is also crucial for branding.
Ad Design & Landing Pages
Also, the ads and landing pages should look similar. For instance, the colors, font, logo, and imagery should be related. Importantly, this makes for a smoother transition from the ad’s location to your site. Again, even some slight awkwardness will hurt your engagement metrics and sales.
Make Your Ads Stand Out
Loud ads or those with excessive variation should be avoided. Too much can be too much.
The Simplicity of Biker Ads
An additional banner ad creation tip is that less is more. It is similar to a motorcycle paint job with too much going on. Often, this happens with pinstriping. But it turns people off; it’s mentally awkward to look at; everything blends; your focal point changes, etc.
People need to quickly and easily recognize your site’s offerings. Most viewers will only glance at your ads. With a lot of content in the ad, the letters and graphics will be smaller, making it harder to read. People are impatient on the internet, so simple banners get you the most value.
Next, this leads to one common error when designing motorcycle advertisements. The banners for your site aren’t intended to generate sales. Advertisements are to get bikers interested in your offering and to get them to your site. Then, your website closes the deal. In an ad, provide essential information and save the details for your website.
Choosing Colors for Ads Tip
Let’s start with what not to do. First, some color combinations in the motorcycle world should not be prominent. Just ask if you don’t know why.
Significantly, you must change your ads if you use poor color combinations. As you know, changing banners and your site takes time and money. But this is easy to avoid if you know which color schemes work and which don’t in the biker world. Plus, the primary colors of your ad banner should be like those on your site. And this gives your visitors a visually smooth transition to your site.
The answer is that it depends. Your colors should be whatever gets your visitors to buy. Your larger competitors’ sites can give you an idea of what colors work in your niche.
Choosing Banner Fonts Tips
Any font used in your ads or on your motorcycle site design must be easy to read. Again, people on the Internet are impatient and only glance at banners.
Many people won’t click on your banner if they can’t quickly and easily read your ads. If a font is hard to read on your site’s banner, it can be a turnoff. Choosing a font that fits your niche and is also readable is crucial.
This also helps make the buyer’s journey smooth. Following this recommendation will improve your engagement, sales, and branding.
Choosing Visual Elements
Also, please do not use some images on your motorcycle ad banners. And please do not use them on your website. Contact us if you’re unsure which images to use. If incorrect images are used on banners or your website, please have them redone. Of course, this can be costly. Subsequently, getting the graphics right the first time is a must.
Adding Your Motorcycle Logo
Adding your motorcycle top-shelf logo to your advertising banners is necessary. It builds brand awareness and differentiates your company from other companies.
How large should the logo be on the motorcycle advertisement? How large should the other imagery, text, call-to-action, and value proposition be? It depends.
There are some standards, but they go beyond the scope of this article on ad creation. The bottom line is that your logo can drastically affect an ad’s engagement when the proportions are wrong. The color and imagery you use on your banners must follow what you can and can’t use in the biker world.
Framing Your Motorcycle Ad
Framing an ad (adding a border) is a best practice. One reason is that it prevents your ads from being mistaken for the rest of the page’s content. Plus, it helps the advertisement banner stand out.
Location of Ad Buttons
Additionally, call-to-action (CTA) buttons on motorcycle ads can increase click-through rates. Next, they should be placed at the bottom-right of the banner. Plus, buttons on sets of ads should be used on all or none.
Value-Proposition
First, your motorcycle site’s ads should include a value proposition that clearly states the top reason(s) to buy your product or service. Again, for the reasons listed above, your ads should be brief, to the point, clear, and convincing. Next, a vital ad design guideline is to focus on your value proposition, which must motivate the customer.
CTA Banner Ads
The above examples are compelling and brief. The phrases don’t need to be bland since the ads will be on motorcycle sites. Here are some more unique, longer, and stronger CTAs:
Animated Biker Ads
Animated ad banners get more interaction than static ads. Here are some ad banner suggestions for you when creating ads:
- Focus on the ad’s message.
- Brevity (under 5 to 10 seconds is ideal)
- Have a value proposition.
- Have a CTA.
- Include the name and logo at the beginning and end of these animated banners.
Small Ad File Sizes
Biker sites that load quickly give your visitors a better experience and encourage them to spend more time on your site. Page load speed is a Google ranking factor and part of quality motorcycle SEO, specifically in your technical SEO.
I would have guessed that almost all developers of motorcycle sites and designers knew this, but I was wrong. I frequently visit sites where the graphics, or their advertisers’, are huge. If your site seems slow, check the size of your graphics and the file sizes of your ads.
Another reason to resize your ads is when you advertise on a website. Websites often resize advertising banners to the wrong dimensions or file sizes, which can make them look bad.
Mobile-Friendly Motorcycle Ads
There are different estimates of the percentage of mobile users on the web. But a good range is that 50-60% of people access the internet on their mobile devices. Subsequently, having mobile-friendly motorcycle advertisements is critical. Also, your biker ad banner designer must see their mobile presence. Note that it is always important to check how your ads and website appear on mobile devices.
Best Biker Ad Placement
Next, where your ads are placed can impact your return on ad spend (ROAS). Before your ad goes on a motorcycle site you pay for, you need to do some research on that site.
The number of ad impressions is good, but a site that shows data that drives traffic to current advertisers is better. The conversion rate of visitors to sales is even more important. Lastly, your total net profit is the most critical metric.
Also important to your company’s ads’ performance is their location on a site. For instance, being on the home page, main pages, and all the other pages is good. But having these banner ads in prominent places is better.
Another word of advice: don’t buy ads on pages that are already packed with them. They aren’t of much value. Also, biker ads below the “fold” don’t get enough traffic. Note that the “fold” is visible at the bottom of the webpage when the page loads (so before you start scrolling).
Ads above the fold get more viewership and clicks. Of course, this is because more people see the top of web pages. Also, people spend more time on the top of motorcycle websites.
Testing Motorcycle Banner Ads
Your company can see what is or isn’t working by testing your banner ad variations. Then the best advertisement for your company can be selected.
Testing your banner ad variations can help your company determine which are working and which aren’t. Then, the best advertisement for your business can be selected.
Finally, if you’re having trouble designing ads, Revolution’s website professionals are experienced in creating banner ads. We’ve exclusively worked with clients in the motorcycle industry for the past 20+ years. Subsequently, we are familiar with the target audiences for various product and service niches.