banner vs leaderboard

September 18, 2005

one of my pages had a 768×90 leaderboard, i decided to replace it with something smaller so i changed it to a 468 banner. next day my cpm is 60% lower.

just a coincidence? it’s only been a day but i never seen my cpm drop by that much from one day to the other and the drop is quite visible for that particular channel.

i would of thought the banner would probably yeild a higher cpm (less ad units).

i’ll give it another day before switching back to the leaderboard..

didn’t think bigger ads were always better..

* Standard banners (468×60) have indeed a lower CTR, probably due to the banner blindness for this particular format which has been around much longer than other formats, e.g. the leaderboard (728×90).

If possible in your layout, I recommed to go for leaderboard or other formats (like the 160×600). Another reason may be the fact that the standard banner carries less ads and thus less options for visitors (2 vs. 4). I think that choice is also quite important for visitors.

* actually, i was referring to cpm not ctr