Banner Exchange Dictionary

Banner Advertisement
Banner advertisement is a popular form of Internet advertising. Generally, graphics and text are used in banner advertisement, and hyperlinked to the URL of the advertiser's website. Banners are generally animated GIF images. Although nowadays, the advertisers prefer Macromedia Flash banners to GIF banners.

The size of a full banner is 468 x 60 pixels. Majority of the web sites limits the file size of image between 12-16K. The size of the banner should comply with the norms specified by the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB).

Hits
It is the number of times a web server is requested for a web page or an image. But there is a misconception regarding "hits". Generally people consider the number of times a web page has been visited as "hits". The number of "hits" does not always represent the true picture as research shows that 5 out 6 "hits" are for graphic images.

For this reason, more appropriate terms like "page views" or "page impressions" have been coined to nullify any misunderstanding.

Page Impressions or Page Views
It denotes the number of times a web page has been requested by the server.

Banner Views
"Banner views" represents the number of times a banner has been viewed. It is almost same as "page views". But some banner server programs are unwilling to award the "banner view" status to a banner unless the visitor stays on the page long enough for the banner to be fully downloaded from the banner server.

CPM
CPM is the abbreviation of "Cost Per Thousand". Roman numeral "M" has been used to denote one thousand. A price of $20 CPM means $20 for every thousand times a banner is displayed.

Click
When a web visitor clicks his mouse on a banner, he is channeled to the advertiser's site. The number of responses to a banner advertisement is sometimes equated to the number of "clicks."

Click Through
It is same as "click". It is commonly in use to measure the number of visitors who click on the banner and are redirected to the advertiser's site.

Click Through Rate (CTR)
It denotes the percentage of click throughs to banner views. A 2% CTR means that 2% of the banner views have succeeded to pursue the viewers to click.

Conversion Rate
It denotes the percentage of website visitors who are actually buying. This generally ranges between 1- 10%, but it can be lower or higher.

Cookie
These are small files written to your computer when visit a web site, you view a banner advertisement, or put a product in a shopping cart. Cookies enables banner server to present banner advertisements in a interesting way instead of showing the same repeatedly.

Cookies often become the center of controversy. But you can't isolate these from banner advertisement. Cookies also allow advertiser to monitor the viability of a banner advertisement to bring visitors to his web site. This helps the advertiser to understand which banner is generating actual sales.

Run of Site (ROS)
Run of Site (ROS) means displaying a banner throughout a web site or a banner network without targeting the traffic by keyword or site category. Run of site advertising is cheaper than targeted advertising.