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The Theory
There are actually two theories
involved in this test. The first theory
states that blending your ads (making them
look less like ads and more like the rest
of your site) increases your CTR because
most people won't click on a link if they
know it's an advertisement.
The other theory is that making your
ads stand out (using bright colors for
example) will raise your CTR because it
draws your visitors' eyes to the
advertisement.
The Test
This was a large-scale test using
multiple web sites over the course of
three weeks.
We decided to test ads that blended
into the content, ads that stand out, and
Google's default ad colors.
The blended ad had a white background,
blue links, and black text (including the
URL).
The ad format that stood out had a
yellow background with red links and black
text (including the URL)
We also decided we would test these
formats on two types of web sites. The
first one was a normal information web
site that got a lot of unique visitors
every day. We'll call this "Web Site A".
The other web site was a forum that got a
lot of traffic from the same people every
day. We'll call this "Web Site B"
We tested each format for 1 week at a
time.
Week one we tested the default Google
ad format.
Week two we tested the "Blended ad"
format.
Week three we tested the ad format with
bright colors.
The Results
These results were rather
surprising!
During Week 1, "Web site A" got 27,912
ad views. The default Google ad got a CTR
of 4.8%. Not too bad.
During Week 2, "Web site A" got 27,495
ad views. The blended ad got a CTR of
19.4%!! This is a HUGE improvement.
During Week 3, "Web site A" got 28,013
ad views. The ad with bright colors got a
CTR of exactly 10%. Still more than twice
as much as the default ad but less than
the blended ad.
During Week 1, "Web site B" got 11,512
ad views. The default ad only got a CTR of
.5%. That's half of 1%.
During Week 2, "Web site B" got 11,886
ad views. The blended ad got a CTR of .9%.
Still better than the default ad.
During Week 3, "Web site C" got 11,390
ad views. The ad with bright colors got a
CTR of 1.7%. This is higher than all the
other ad formats on this web site.
The Lesson
Don't ever use the default ad format.
There is no reason to. The CTR rate will
always be lower.
Use the blended ad on web sites that
have a lot of text… like an article
site for example.
Use ads that stand out on forums.
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