At least I know that someone's reading this blog.
Bob Gibson from TuCows emailed in, after reading our People ignore banner ads – no, really entry from a few days ago.
Bob was very agitated. Okay, not really. If you've met Bob you'll probably find it hard to picture him really agitated. But he did disagree with a number of the issues that I raised, and as someone who works on the other side of the fence (in terms of advertising), I'm always interested to hear what he thinks.
Even if he disagrees with me 
Bob's point/s?
“Banner Blindness on “Smiley Offers, Punch The Monkey and all that garbage exists BUT if the offer and call to action is relevant and compelling the ROI for the advertiser can be VERY strong.”
Fair enough. Perhaps I'm a little guilty of over generalising. Ironic, when statements such as “Google AdWords doesn't work” and “marketing is a waste of time” raise my blood pressure so much. I take his point.
“If the ROI for a banner campaign is what you describe above we would not be sold out every month on all our key Home Page and Windows Download Library inventory. Eye tracking sounds like an interesting measurement but it pales in comparison to measuring the cost per lead and cost per sale that banners generate.”
Good point.
“I think you will find if you ask any of the key players (your clients) in the shareware space who “get it” a properly measured banner campaign is an excellent compliment to a CPC search campaign on Google or Yahoo.”
Okay, okay. You win. I agree.
Bob – I'm sorry. You're right. Banner advertising can work. It's all about location and placement.
By the way, you may want to take him up on the following offer:
“I would be happy to assist any of your clients find positive ROI with a well rounded campaign of search keywords AND banners. 
”
He also linked to an interesting podcast on how to go about advertising shareware
Interview with Bob Gibson and Greg Weir, Tucows Content Division
