Heat Maps are Cool

A research in the US studied the browsing habits and surfing patterns of a sizeable audience. The Heat Maps so generated by studying the eye movements revealed the following observations which are valuable for online advertisers.

• People tune out certain ad types, going so far as to avoid them. Heat maps indicate the 468 x 60 is all but ignored.



• Borders around ads appear to keep attention out of the ad unit. Although some publishers require ad borders, these may need to disappear to make ads more effective.



• Ads that blend into content work. Text ads work especially well. If it looks like content, people look at it.



• Size matters. In general, larger ads perform well. That doesn't mean the largest ads performed best. Skyscrapers performed well, with 44 percent of the audience seeing them. Thirty-eight percent saw half-page ads.



• In-content 300 x 250 ads performed even better than skyscrapers and half-page ads, with 56 percent seeing them.



• Page placement plays a clear role in an ad's effectiveness. Following the typical user navigation pattern, ads that appear in the upper left corner were seen more often.



• Pop-ups are seen by 70 percent of those exposed to them. Yet they were generally closed very quickly (within three seconds) or ignored.

Before you plan to spend your precious advertisement $'s, consult the professionals.

Sharad Agarwal
CEO, Cyber Gear LLC
Email: sharad@cyber-gear.com