Statistics have shown that following top display ads best practices can help you reach over 90% of people who browse the internet every day. In other words, by running effective display ads for your business, you can quickly get in the face of your target audience and even convert them to paying customers.

However, the most successful and productive display ads campaigns do not just happen. Instead, they result from time and energy invested in planning and executing such campaigns.

Thankfully, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel.

In the following paragraphs, we share insights into display ads best practices that have proven to work. But, first, let us explore what display ads are and their advantages over other forms of advertising.

What are Display Ads?

First off, display ads are the short form for display advertising. That said, display ads are a way of showcasing your business to internet users (both on web pages and social media) to get them to take action. Of course, by employing the best display ad practices, you can even improve the results you get!

Display Ads are often in images and texts, while videos are also a popular option for many businesses.

Essentially, these media (images, videos, or texts) come up on the screens of targeted internet users and advertises your products and services to them. Then, depending on how much of an appeal your ads have, they may decide to take action and visit your website.

Display ads have a wide range of sizes and can be anywhere on the web page or social media page.

Why You Should Use Display Ads for your eCommerce Business

Before we dive into the best practices for display ads, let us explore how this form of advertisement can benefit your business. Here are some of the advantages of display ads for your eCommerce company: 

• It can be an excellent way to show off your brand's visual identity
• Display Ads build brand awareness
• It targets your specific audience
• It is a more cost-friendly advertising option
• It allows for creativity using images, texts, graphics, and video
• You can keep track and monitor your ad performance, engagement, and progress
• It combines well with other marketing strategies.

Top Display Ads Best Practices for eCommerce 

While digital display ads may not be the most popular advertising option today, they can effectively drive potential customers down the sales funnel. But, you have to execute your campaign with perfection to get top-notch results. That said, here are 6 best practices to follow when planning your display ads campaign:

Keep it simple and clear

With display ads, less is often more. This means you don’t want to clutter your ad by cramming too much information into one image or video. Instead, keep it simple and straight to the point. The same applies to your design — keep it simple.

Here’s why — your target audience will likely have only a few seconds to examine your ads before something else on the internet calls for their attention. Therefore, you want to make sure they see the central theme of your ad immediately, without having to fight through unnecessary information.

Making your display ads simple yet informative is a sure-fire way to increase the chances of your audience taking action.

Utilize high-quality in-banner video

In eCommerce, in-banner videos provide a retargeting opportunity. In other words, a unique video will offer your business an outstanding opportunity to advertise your products or services. However, the quality of the video can significantly impact its conversion ability.

Therefore, a good rule of thumb is to use high-quality videos when creating your ads. This way, your ads become more appealing to your target audience, and they can quickly pick out the information in such videos.

The same thing applies to other ads assets — from images to animations. Always ensure that the quality of your content is as high as possible. That said, you also want to strike a balance between quality and size, as your ads need to have fast loading times.

Create and use HTML5 Ads 

Another one of the display ads best practices that work is to use HTML5 rich media. With the competitiveness of eCommerce advertisement and the numerous distractions on the internet, attracting and keeping your audience's attention with your ads is even more challenging.

You see, statistics show that using HTML5 rich media can boost your display ads results by at least 260%. Therefore, employing this practice can give you an advantage over the competition!

But, what is rich media?

Rich media describes an ad that contains advanced elements such as videos, audios, or similar high-interaction features that can push views to engage the content and take action.

Create dynamic content to showcase your offerings

Dynamic content means that the content of your ads changes based on specific parameters. In other words, you engage a live data feed to update your display ads and show specific products or services at different times.

For instance, you can use geolocation data in your live data feed, displaying different ads based on a user’s location. This means that your ad will be even more relevant to each person that views it.

Creating dynamic content allows you to showcase your business offerings (products or services) to your customers with even more specific targeting.

Stand out but be relevant 

Due to the increasingly competitive eCommerce space, the best way to stand out is to have a clear brand narrative and stick to it. Therefore, an excellent approach is not to design for aesthetics but rather to make sure your design conveys a perfect message to the audience. 

That said, while your designs can help you stand out, you also want to make sure the information in your ads is relevant to the people viewing them.

Spell check your Ads

Spell check is one of the best practices for display ads that seems to be underrated. But, it is crucial for businesses that want to get the best from their display ads.

Why? 

Errors such as typos can:

• Make you seem less professional
• Make you lose potential customers
• Reduce customer's trust in your brand.

Therefore, always take your time to check your ads for errors, no matter how tight your campaign schedule is.

Wrapping it up

Display ads remain an advertising solution that can effectively help you bring prospects into your sales funnel. However, your manner of execution goes a long way in impacting the results you get from your display ad campaign.

Thankfully, the best practices for display ads in this article can help you along the way to attracting those customers and improving your results!