Subverting the Designer with Google Display Ads? Not Really…

October 27th, 2008 · · New, Web Marketing 2 comments

I was interested to see that Google has recently released a Display Ad creation tool (see video tutorial below). The tool allows people to create display ads (almost) just as easily as the text-based ones. There are quite a few templates, and some samples I have seen floating around the web have been looked very nice. It looks like Google has done it again, since they saw a barrier to people doing business with them (that not everyone can create a nice looking ad) and they found a way to overcome it.

The pros to this tool are the following:

  • It is much easier and faster to create ads.
  • More inexperienced users are less intimidated by the process.
  • Users don’t have to go out of their way (the biggest secret in Marketing is to appeal to laziness ;) ).
  • Self-serve model is an advantage over other ad networks.
  • The tool is impressive (even if the video walk-through has mistakes on it ;) ).

The cons to this tool are the following:

  • You still need a designer for the image and the logo.
  • Designers do more than just place shapes on a set template. They treat images, they create effects. They have an eye for what works and what doesn’t.
  • A lot of AdWords managers are not necessarily Marketers, so they may not know how to appropriately target the market.
  • Display ads still get only a 0.1%-0.3% CTR, 0.5% on targeted sites.

Overall, I think this will be an interesting tool. The best part is what it enables. After many years spent negotiating for ad space both big and small, I think that the biggest advantage is that it is self-serve, and you can book space for as long or as little time as you want. But – I think you can’t get away with subverting the designer ;) .