Google’s Display Network can be a great place to generate some additional traffic, leads, and branded exposure. While text ads go a long way in garnering attention, sometimes an image ad can grab searchers’ attention more quickly, especially considering the fact that you can tailor your image ads specifically to match a page’s content. Think about your own experience as a Web surfer. Sure you read text ads, but sometimes an image will catch the corner of your eye much more quickly and effectively.
Image ads, however, may seem out of your reach if you don’t have a dedicated graphic designer, or the means to contract one, but this doesn’t need to be the case. Google has made it easy for you to build your own image ads very simply in AdWords’ Display Ad builder feature. I wanted to draw your attention to it today because I feel like this tool hasn’t gotten enough attention here on PPC Hero, and it could be a very valuable resource to you in expanding your accounts.
Last year, Jen wrote a great post on the basics of creating image ads with the Display Ad builder, so if you’ve never used the Display Ad builder be sure to check out her post, complete with detailed instructions. Basically, AdWords provides many customizable templates for you to quickly create image ads. You can add your logo and text, and some of the templates even include preloaded graphical elements. Background and text colors are completely customizable, as it font face and size.
But, Google has made this process even easier. I’d also like to share a feature I stumbled on recently that makes image ad creation even faster in AdWords. You can create an image ad from any of your existing text ads in AdWords. How? In the Ads tab in the AdWords user interface, click on the ad you want to use to create your image ad and go to “More actions…” then “Generate display ad…” as shown below:
Once you click to generate a display ad, Google will create suggested ad layouts using the text from your text ad:
Simply click the “Show More” button to get more generated suggestions.
In using your existing ads to create image ads you not only save yourself time, but you can also base your image ads off text ads that have proven to be successful. Plus, you can customize any of Google’s suggested ads to refine their look/layout. All in all, I think this is a really handy feature that could very quickly and easily expand your presence on Google’s Display network without the need for additional human resources.
For additional reading on creating image ads on Google’s Display network, check out the following from Google:
Display Ad Builder (Google Help)
Display Ad Formatting (Google AdSense Help)
