As we spend time analyzing sports, each sport has its own set of physical, mental, and skill demands. For years and years, soccer has been the gold standard when comparisons begin to take place when it comes to the general athleticism you need to play, as well as the general physical demand. For this very reason, there are so many young athletes as well as older athletes who are integrating soccer lifting techniques as well as conditioning techniques into sports like baseball.

In the past, when I heard and saw this happening, the growling, yelling, and excessive weight handling, I cringed. But, after taking a deeper look at what is really going on, it turns out that there is a lot of hard work, inner drive, and pushing of personal limits. Exercise selection and form aside, this type of higher intensity training is achieving an often overlooked quality: fitness.

Because baseball is a sport with very low metabolic and physical demands, athletes learn to adapt to their sport. Some athletes even play baseball because it has a very low physical demand. Over time this will lead to athletes becoming very competent and sport-specific skills such as hitting and throwing, but health and fitness levels are often very poor. When these fitness levels begin to be lacking, injuries are often due to the high speeds and twisting that are needed to execute sport-specific skills. Throwing a baseball is one of the most explosive bodily actions in all sports, yet many pitchers are overweight and inherently lazy.

If, as coaches and athletes, we really stop and analyze this situation, can you tell that you and your team are doing enough to stay slim? Over the years, I have heard of coaches executing their athletes with excessive distance runs, and again it made me sick to my stomach. Although distance running is not a specific protocol for baseball, it will certainly work to increase calorie burn, leading to excess body mass loss. I still wouldn’t recommend running excessively every day, but it would require some form of conditioning every day. I would also recommend that these circuits be primarily cardiovascular rather than strictly geared towards weightlifting. These circuits could include medicine balls, body weight training, form runs, jumping rope, plyometrics, band work, core work, etc.

The great advantage of a circuit is that they work very well for teams. Circuit training allows you to create multiple stations, each containing a different exercise, and accommodating multiple athletes, as well as providing a good amount of variety. The circuits can be done by repetitions or by time. Once the athlete achieves the specified repetitions, or the allotted time, they will proceed to the next station. When choosing stations, just like when designing a general program, you must have a goal. If your goal is strength, then your circuit would be primarily geared toward weight training. If your goal is cardiovascular fitness / endurance and strength, you should select a variety of exercises that contain cardiovascular fitness, strength, or both.

I have become a huge advocate of seasonal circuits because they are time efficient, they will work to maintain and hopefully increase the body’s work capacity, and they are fun.

Although the physical demands of baseball are extremely low, athletes who spend time increasing their work capacity have a tremendous advantage in recovery time, as well as reduced time on the disabled list. Increased work capacity will allow pitchers to pitch deeper into games, while keeping position players strong during the rigors of the game every day. The gold standard of training in the major leagues has been Roger Clemens and his legendary SEAL Program. This program is basically a giant circuit. This program is not extremely focused on circuit weight training, but rather on increasing conditioning levels. This program is a combination of distance and sprint work, as well as side work with baseballs.

Learn a lesson from the Rocket, don’t be the typical lazy baseball player who gets by simply because of the low demand of the sport, but learn to overcome the demands of the sport and you will be rewarded with health, efficiency, and most importantly. , higher performance.

A few years ago, when Apple launched its first iPhone, it took the market by storm. People loved this innovation as it gave them a sense of comfort, luxury and style. This is the reason why Apple managed to get millions of loyal customers who are always willing to receive any product released by Apple. Be it a new phone from the iPhone, iPad or iPod series, etc. People have always shown an interest in buying these products. Apple enjoyed this love of its customers for some time until Samsung introduced its Galaxy S series of smartphones.

Samsung is a big name in the electronic world. It has its own market share and has a range of products including televisions, kitchen accessories, laptops and smartphones, etc. However, Samsung has its own identity in the electronics market, but it lagged far behind in the mobile market until the launch of its Galaxy S series which gave it a new identity and place in the market.

It wouldn’t be bad if we said that Samsung is the only company that is giving Apple’s iPhone tough competition. Samsung’s market share is increasing with each passing day. All because it is getting better and better with each new device, which is why people are now turning towards Samsung. In fact, several iPhone users have also shown interest in Samsung’s Galaxy S series phones and they are switching from the iPhone. There may be many other reasons for this change, but one thing is for sure and that is the difference that Samsung is creating in the market with its devices. If we talk about the new Samsung Galaxy S5, we can easily get an answer to this question of why people choose Samsung over others.

Samsung Galaxy S5 is the new phone in the Galaxy S series. It has some wonderful features that ultimately make it a better and more powerful phone this year. Some amazing features of Samsung galaxy S5 are listed below:

• Durable and waterproof design with a polycarbonate back, which provides a firm grip on the phone unlike the slippery metal back of the iPhone.

• 5.1 “HD AMOLED 1080 x 1920 (432ppi), a larger, brighter and sharper screen than many other mobile phones available on the market.

• 16GB and 32GB built-in storage with microSD card slot.

• Qualcomm Snapdragon 801, 2.5 GHz quad-core processor and 2 GB of RAM.

• 16 megapixel camera with LED flash

• Longer lasting 2800 mAh battery with autonomy of up to 390 h, music playback up to 7 h and talk time up to 21 h

• Latest Android 4.4.2 software

• Fingerprint sensors for security lock

With all these features, Samsung Galaxy S5 takes smartphones to another level. However, all these functions were also included in the previous Galaxy series smartphones, but in the S5 they are further improved to provide the best phone experience for users.

Bingo is possibly the most popular game in the world, played in many countries in different languages ​​around the world. However, the move to online bingo is a leap of faith for some. The main obstacle for players is trust in the system. How do we know that the numbers are random and not forged by the computer?

Gala bingo says that the order in which the bingo balls are drawn is determined by her random number generator (RNG for short). The RNG Gala bingo uses have been developed by market leader Sun Microsystems. Sun says its Virtue Fusion software ensures that the outcome of each game is absolutely random.

The Virtue Fusion network is used by several other bingo sites. The advantage of this for players is that each game will have a depth of players and a large enough prize that is worth playing for.

Players can mingle in online chat rooms before playing, but when the game starts, the chat ends and the serious stuff begins. The numbers are dialed by the host and the numbers are automatically struck off your bingo card for you. So you don’t have to be quick with your clicks to tap your numbers. The chat panel constantly sends you updates on who has only two or one number so you can know where you are in the game.

Bingo games vary and some may already be familiar with the variations of traditional 90 ball bingo. Variations like 75-ball bingo and 80-ball bingo are self-describing. The games with the most spin are like The Money Ladder Deal or No Deal, where the winner of the house has to choose to accept an offer from the ‘banker’ or take a prize in a chosen box at the beginning of the game.

There have never been so many online bingo sites to choose from. Most are based overseas and many players would not have heard of them except from some of the big names. Paddypower and William Hill have a presence in online bingo, as well as a few other big brands. However, smaller bingo houses are proving popular, such as 32Red and Gala Bingo. Competition in this industry means that players can get sign-up deals that are so good that they would be enough to tempt anyone. Free money to play being the most desirable. 32Red, for example, gives away £ 10 to each new player, no deposit required.

Welcome offers for new players are like:

– Registration bonuses without deposit

– Welcome bonuses of 100%, 200% or even 300%

– Loyalty bonuses

– Monthly bingo offers

You can even play bingo on your mobile. William Hill Bingo has an app that can be downloaded to any device and you can play on the go, or even at the beach. William Hill will even give you £ 2.50 to play just for trying his new games.

Bingo will never be the same again, but that is progress. The variety of games and easy-to-use systems mean that anyone can play. Automatic card erasure means you don’t need to be quick with the pen to play. Play as many cards as you can and increase your chances of winning.

These car tire buying tips can help you maintain your car with a degree of confidence, especially if you don’t have a lot of knowledge about them.

The most important thing to do when shopping for tires is to make sure you are the correct size. Getting them in a size that is not made for your specific car can cause tire pattern tracks to wear out much faster and cost you money. Also, there are tires made specifically for almost all car models.

Information for tire size is also in the owner’s manual and is located on the side of existing tires. If all else fails, ask the person changing your tires what size they are so you know. Then check it yourself to make sure it matches the car tires.

If you can, always buy five new tires at a time. The reason for this is that as tires are rotated, the spare can be worked on to extend the life of all your tires, help them wear evenly, and save you money in the long run. Many times, tire stores have kits for sale when you buy them all together. These are considerable savings. But shop around because a good sale can save you a good deal of change.

It’s also good to know what type of tires originally came with your car. This way, if you change them, it will be easier to back up if your driving experience is adversely affected.

Most cars come with all-season tires. They are good overall tires because they are designed to withstand all types of weather. Of course. If you live in a hot climate like South Florida, year-round summer tires may be better suited to your needs as they have a higher tolerance for heat. But they won’t do well in the winter if you find yourself taking a road trip to Boston in January.

The same principle applies if you live in Maine, for example. It’s okay to get all-season tires made primarily for driving on snow and ice.

If you drive your vehicle off-road, the off-road may be better for you. If you drive more at high speeds, in a sleek sports car, then all-season high performance tires may be more suitable as they are made for that purpose.

Also, keep in mind that tires wear at different rates. For example, high-performance tires, like the ones you see on a Corvette, tend to have a smoother ride to cope with speed and grip requirements. This also results in much faster wear and tear. It’s not uncommon for all-season tires to last twice as long as high-performance tires.

There are several different tires for different styles and riding conditions. So knowing your driving style before buying tires can help you quickly determine what you need.

First, learn to code. It is very essential to have an understanding of all the basics related to programming. If you don’t know how to program, I would recommend starting with Python. It’s a wonderful language that strips the programmer of low-level details and allows him to focus on concepts. It is also a very fun language, I am sure you will love programming in it. I picked it up in just 3 days (even though I had prior programming experience).

Once you have chosen a language and know how to program, you must decide in which language you want to program the games. That really depends on the kinds of things you want to do: engine development or game development. Engine developers create the core of the game, the engine, the things that turn on the actual game. If you choose this route, you will have to deal with all the low-level programming details. You should use C or C ++ for this, as most engines are coded in these languages. You must also be very disciplined about memory allocation / deallocation and code optimization techniques.

The other route is to encode the games, using a pre-encoded engine. On this path, you will use an engine created by someone else and use it to create your own game. Usually the engines have bindings in some scripting language (such as python, lua, or ruby) and therefore you can code the actual game in a scripting language. You can focus on game design rather than other low-level details.

Obviously, you can choose to do both: code the engine and the actual game.

At first, I think you’d better wait after you’ve created a few games to decide which path you want to take. In your first few games, it is best to code the entire game on your own. You will learn a lot along the way and you will also be able to decide which path you want to take.

To create games, you need certain additional libraries. If you know how to program, you need to know what libraries mean. They are additional code patches that you can link with your own code. To create games, you will need libraries for graphics, event handling, networking, etc. If you are using Python, Pygame is an excellent library for beginners that provides almost all of this. For C or C ++, you have Allegro and SDL. A simple Google search will give you a list of game programming libraries for your language of choice.

Start playing with the library you have chosen. Read their tutorials online. Learn how to do simple things like rectangles, circles, upload images, etc. Try to do some animations. The fundamental concept behind building an animation is to draw the object, then draw another object of the same dimensions on top of the background color, and then draw the previous object, with its coordinates shifted by the required amount. Of course, if you do this too fast, you can cause an illusion of movement.

After that, make a simple game like Pong or a Tetris clone that uses only event handling and some basic physics (collision detection). Google for the game loop structure, it will help you code the game.

Once you have coded it, move on to a slightly complex game, like a game with 2 tanks fighting. You don’t have to get cute with graphics, just use as many royalty-free images as you can. Try cloning more arcade games like Breakout. To do them, you will have to use something called a level editor, something that is used in almost every game.

After that, try your hand at a game that uses some artificial intelligence, like a pacman clone or a top view soccer game. Both can be implemented using an FSM (Finite State Machine), a concept used for AI in 80% of commercial games. Then try your hand at a side scrolling platformer as a Mario clone.

The games mentioned above, combined, include almost all the concepts used in 90% of the games. To create a game with an eye-catching 3D interface, all you need to do is use an engine to help you do it. It’s just that in the beginning, 2D programming allows you to focus on the most important concepts and also makes your code less complicated. Once you are comfortable, you can opt for 3D games.

Cell phone service: choose the one you like best.

You can select the cell phone service of your choice from one of many cell phone companies such as AT&T, Sprint PCS, T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless, Cingular Wireless, and many more. By choosing a cell phone service from one of the companies, you will have access to a variety of cell phone plans. You can choose the best services by evaluating the characteristics of cell phone companies, customer service, voice quality, ease of operation, coverage, cell phones, additional services like instant messaging, and many more.

Cell Phone Service – Coverage

It is very important to consider coverage when selecting a cell phone service. Your cell phone plan may allow you to call nationwide or it may offer regional coverage only. You may not be able to use your cell phone when traveling somewhere if your service plan does not offer excellent coverage. The signal may be weak in some places or inside buildings.

Cell phone service – SMS

SMS (text messaging) is a useful feature that can be offered when you select a cell phone service. Not all companies offer it or you may have to pay a fee to use it. Look for the promotions to find the SMS service included in the registration package.

Cell phone service – International calls

If you are doing business with global companies based in other countries, you may want to consider a cell phone service that offers international calling. This service is expensive, and you may be able to get a better rate with some calling cards. So consider all the pros and cons and make the decision to add international calling to your cell plan. International roaming is another service that you may want to consider.

If you’re traveling to the state of Colorado for the first time and don’t want to spend hours trying to find the most fun things to do, here are five essential things you can focus on that are hard to duplicate in any other state. . Many of these activities don’t involve long lines or crowds, and they don’t have to cost a lot.

Visit a brewery

Move over Milwaukee and St. Louis, we are talking about small breweries located throughout the state of Colorado. You could make brewpubs your reason to visit and scour the state in search of the perfect beer or try attending Denver’s October beer festival, which sells out quickly each year. This is a great, relaxing way to see Colorado. Just don’t spend all your time indoors.

See Dinosaur Footprints or Bones

Many of the dinosaur skeletons you see in museums around the world originated in Colorado. Whether you go to the Museum of Nature and Science in Denver or the Dinosaur National Monument in the northwestern corner of the state or see the 1,300 footprints in Picketwire Canyonlands south of La Junta, you can design your visit based on dinosaurs alone. There are also footprints west of Denver along Dinosaur Ridge. This is an experience that few other states can claim.

Spend time in the mountains

Seek out an outdoor music festival, local art, and chili grill, ride a 4-wheel over Engineer Pass for spectacular views of mountains and wildflowers, hike to waterfalls, take a hot air balloon ride, fish, kayak, or raft, mountain bike down a mountain used for winter skiing, skiing, climbing a Fourteener or a sand dune. There is no better way to soak up the summer sun and appreciate the deep blue skies and puffy white clouds than to spend a day in the mountains. Don’t ruin things by forgetting your sunscreen, sunglasses, a rain cover, and lots of water. Even a drive up to Pikes Peak or Mount Evans is a great way to spend the day and see wildlife without wasting all your oxygen.

Do something western

Visit a ghost town, gold mine, take a ride on the Durango and Silverton steam train, go to a tourist ranch, visit Anasazi villages carved into the cliffs, see bison near Denver, eat some authentic Mexican food, potatoes Fresh fries and spicy salsa, visit Pawnee Buttes in tall shoes for protection from rattlesnakes, go on a rodeo and enjoy lamb hunting, see the Red Rocks Amphitheater or the Red Rocks at Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs. Just don’t try to do all of these things in one day. Colorado is the eighth largest state, and the mountains mean you don’t travel directly in a straight line.

Soak in hot springs

So, you were exhausted and you need a massage. There is nothing better than a soak in hot springs, many of which have accompanying spas. The best experience is an outdoor one with winter snow falling on your face or a summer breeze cooling the night with a sky full of bright stars. You’ve earned a nice hot bath and then you’ll sleep like a baby and be ready to start over tomorrow.

Have you ever been to a fair, festival, company picnic, or other indoor or outdoor gathering of people and seen a huge race track the size of a two-car garage? Did this racecourse have a huge crowd of people around it shouting with enthusiasm? Maybe this race track was under the canopy of a huge inflatable tent with a checkered flag design on top? When you zoomed in to see what the excitement was all about, did you find four to six 1 / 10th scale NASCAR Sprint Cup replica cars driven remotely from full-size steering wheels? If so, then what you’ve witnessed is Micro Reality Racing action. Micro Reality Stock Car Racing is an attraction that has been around for about 15 years and has quickly become one of the most addictive diversions for kids ages 3-83. It was invented in Atlantic, Iowa, by three brothers known as the Namanny brothers. They took a great money-making idea they came up with and decided to mass produce it so other entrepreneurs could have the opportunity to create a large part-time or full-time income, providing career excitement to clients in public and private meetings of many. people.

There are different formats that a Micro Reality event can have. The top three options are pay-per-play, private event rental, and fundraising. A pay-per-play event is one in which the Micro Reality Racing business operates as a supplier, installs the track in a public place, and charges each individual racer for choosing a car and competing for a specified amount of time or a set. . number of turns. A typical race would last 2-3 minutes or 12-15 laps. A typical charge for the race would be between $ 3 and $ 5, depending on the type of event, the region, and the demographics of the crowd. Sometimes providers offer discounts for multiple races, such as two races for $ 5. Typical venues for pay-per-play events are trade shows, festivals, shopping malls, car shows, and carnivals. The main drawback of this type of event is that the income from the races depends on several factors, such as the weather, the location and the participation of the crowd. Although there is the possibility of obtaining a significant amount of income from events lasting between 2 and 14 days, there is also the possibility of losing money, in case the income does not exceed the rent of space, fuel, accommodation, insurance , payments to helpers, food and other expenses that the company will face.

A private rental is when the Micro Reality Stock Car Racing track is hired by a party planner or event coordinator to show up at a specific time and place to offer event sponsors unlimited races for the duration of the event. Instead of event sponsors paying per race, the Micro Reality business is paid by the event organizers or event coordinator to provide unlimited races for an agreed number of hours. This type of arrangement is best for the Micro Reality Racing business owner, as the money is guaranteed and a 50% deposit is usually paid up front, with the balance paid at the end of the event. With a satisfied event coordinator, the Micro Reality track is guaranteed repeat business for years, if the event is annual. The event planner will also schedule a well-managed operation for other functions that you have planned during the year. There is also good potential for referrals to other event coordinators. The types of events that private rentals are used for are birthday parties, corporate hospitality events, company picnics, team building retreats, and church outings.

A fundraiser is similar to a pay-per-play event, but there is usually a revenue share between the Micro Reality Stock Car Racing business and the event coordinators. The revenue share will be anywhere from a 90/10 split to a 50/50 split. In this type of event, sometimes the rink owner and event coordinators will agree to use a ticketing system so that revenue can be tracked.

A Micro Reality racing system consists of 18 modular track sections that are similar to folding tables with only two legs. There are twelve 15 degree curved sections and six straight sections. The track can be configured up to 9 different layouts, from a small 10 ‘x 10’ circle to a 25 ‘by 30’ Indianapolis Brickyard layout. There are also various oval, superspeed oval, and asymmetrical designs that can be configured. The cars are decked out in replica NASCAR paint schemes and typically four to six cars are raced at a time. Drivers operate the vehicles from behind full-size steering consoles that are linked with radio controls inside. The most successful track owners also keep track of laps with a digital lap counter. Some providers use a computer and lap counting software that displays race statistics on an LCD monitor.

There are many different ways that a Micro Reality Stock Car Racing system can entertain the crowd at your next event. Although there are many variations in the events and venues, the only thing that will be constant between them all is the high-level excitement among the crowd and the Micro Reality Racing participants.

Banner ads are the pioneers of internet marketing. The first commercial appeared on http://www.hotwired.com (now http://www.wired.com) on October 27, 1994 in the form of an AT&T advertisement. Since then, banner ads have taken over the internet in a variety of ways.

An advertising banner is a graphic promotion that is used on websites as a form of advertising. Banner ads can be any size you want, however the accepted standard is 468 pixels wide by 60 pixels high. Due to the wide acceptance of this size, the same banner ad can be used on most websites without having to reconfigure the size and layout. Although banner advertisements can be used to advertise your phone number, address, or whatever else you want, the actual purpose of banner advertisements is to get someone to click on them and access your website.

There is a lot of controversy about the effectiveness of banners. Some people swear by them, others swear by them, saying they are not worth working for. Although click-through rates have been steadily declining, the same can be said for ad prices. The average click-through rate is in the 0.5% range for banner ads. But, with a good banner layout and placement, it is still possible to achieve a good return on investment, combining below-average ad rates and above-average response rates.

Banner ads are sold in three ways: cost per 1,000 impressions (CPM), pay-per-click (PPC), or pay-per-action (PPA).

Buying a PPC banner is usually more expensive than the CPM basis, but it can be much more effective because people actually take some action by clicking on your site. One of the drawbacks of PPC banner advertising is that a person can click on an ad more than once and will be charged for each click. However, some ad providers track the IP address and only charge one click per computer per day. However, most places don’t do this for the simple reason that it means less money in your pocket.

The effectiveness of cost-per-impression banners can vary quite a bit, depending on their location on the web page and you usually (not always) pay the same if the banner is prominently displayed at the top of the page or hidden in a Lower corner. Most CPM banner sites rotate banners across the site (Run of Site – ROS) and across the page. Banner ads to reach the general public are typically priced at $ 1 to $ 10 CPM, while targeted sites can fetch CPM rates of $ 30 to $ 50 or more. Although it may not sound like much, banner ads can be quite expensive. Do the math with me:

If you’re paying $ 10 CPM and the click-through rate is an industry average of 0.5%, then it costs you $ 10 to get 5 people to your site, or $ 2 per person. If 2% of your site visitors make a purchase, your Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) is $ 100 ($ 2/2%). That means for every transaction you make, you have to pay $ 100 in advertising fees. Some websites fail to even convert 2% of visitors into customers, especially when they originate from a banner ad.

For banner ads to be effective, you need to combine above-average click-through rates with below-average banner prices and sell a high-priced product, a high-margin product (such as an information product), or have a strong back end in place for you to make money on the second, third, fourth, and even twentieth sale.

Pay-per-action banners are usually the most expensive, as you only pay for a desired action. This can be a product sale, getting someone to sign up for an email list, or any other action you want. PPA banners can be very similar to an affiliate program and use the same type of tracking.

Banner exchanges

Like link exchange, some companies have banner exchange programs. Most banner exchange programs are free, and some may require you to pay a monthly administration fee in order to cover their costs.

Many of the free companies make money by the proportionate proportion of banners displayed on their site, vs. their banners are displayed on other sites. Let’s say you need to place a certain banner on your site for a total of 10,000 impressions, but you only get 8,000 impressions of your banner on someone else’s site in return. This is how these sites are funded. They sell the 2,000 additional impressions you lose, to make a profit.

Some banner exchanges are pure and simple; I will put your banner on my site, if you put mine on yours. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this if both sites are of similar interest and get comparatively the same amount of traffic.

Some sites will keep track of your statistics and others will allow you to load multiple banners so that they can be rotated on the sites where they are placed. This way you can determine what works best if you pay per impression. It is also always a good idea to use your own ad tracker so that you can follow the clicks on your site and see how many actually lead to a sale.

Some banner exchange companies will actually design the banner for you as part of their program. Although I suggest you design, (or have designed) your own banners. If you are going to let the banner exchange company design it for you, make sure you are on target. Some of these companies use software that automatically creates their banner without being touched by human hands and without being seen by human eyes, until it reaches yours. As with any type of advertising, the design, wording, and call-to-action of your banner is very important.

Since the purpose of a banner is to stop, really interrupt the surfer’s train of thought, clicking on a banner is an impulsive decision. People need a reason to make an impulsive decision, so give them one. The following are some tips to help generate the highest possible click-through rate:

– Have a call to action. Always say “click here” on your banner, or some variation of it. I know this sounds too simple, but it is often overlooked and can easily double your click-through rates.

– Add a button. Placing the words “click here” on a real or obvious button on your banner improves response.

– There is no place for subtlety in posters. Your banner should scream your message.

– Try asking questions: “Do you want to save 15% on your car insurance in 15 minutes?” Questions work better than statements, especially when used to provoke the audience. Studies have shown that by changing a statement to a question, you can increase your click-through rate by 16%.

– If appropriate, use humor. Make sure it’s really fun and get other people’s opinions first. Very often, something that may be funny to you, other people may not understand.

– Use bright primary colors. The brightest colors attract the attention of visitors. Blue, green and yellow cause the most clicks. Stay away from transparent colors, either in the foreground or in the background; They tend to get lost in the colors of most websites, so stick with solid colors.

– Use a simple animation. Moving images and flickering animation attract visitors to your banner. The strategic use of movement captures attention more effectively than static posters. Don’t make them too wild or complicated so that the message gets lost, the senses get overloaded, and / or the file size is too large.

– Offer a reward or a gift when someone clicks on your banner. It will help motivate people to click. Contests work well too, especially if you’re giving away money. Money is the biggest motivator.

– Run a series of banners. It may take more than one message to tell your story or to go after a particular market. Run a series of banners and vary your message. Keep your message consistent and catchy so your visitors will want to read more. After the fourth printing of the same banner, most people tend to unconsciously block it in their mind.

– Keep the copy short. Think of billboard advertising: the average person spends six seconds looking at a billboard, and you have less than a third of that time on the web. Write a compelling copy. Use action words that motivate.

– Use italics if you can. Although they don’t have a huge impact, they can increase click-through rates by a few percentage points compared to standard typefaces.

– Create curiosity. A large part of those who click on ads do so out of curiosity. Studies show that curious clickers are based on many demographic and other characteristics, so targeting based on curiosity can be very effective when you have a general interest product or service.

– Use wide banners or tall skyscraper banners. They are clicked on significantly more than smaller, thinner, or square banners.

– Make your banner file size small, so it loads quickly; 10-30kb is typical for a 468 by 60 pixel banner.

Some tips for implementing banner ad campaigns

First, determine if you think a banner ad campaign would be worth participating in. Consider banner costs, compared to a half-percent average click-through rate, your sites’ conversion rate, profit margins, and customer LOV (Lifetime Value).

Determine where and on which sites you want to consider placing your banner ads, taking into account cost, banner placement, payment types (PPC, CPM, PPA), and whether or not it is a targeted site. Find some websites that complement yours.

Contact the site where you want to place your ad and ask if they have a rate sheet and learn about their payment options. You can also see if they offer special offers or discounts if you buy in bulk, or even just ask for a better deal. Many times they will give you one simply because you asked for it.

Read the submission guidelines. This generally covers things like:

– Maximum file size

– Accepted file types (commonly .gif, .jpg and flash – .swf)

– Accepted banner sizes

– Deadlines for submission and review

– How many banners can you send for rotating campaigns? How often do the banners rotate?

– How do you determine where your banner is placed on each page?

– Do you pay for placement or is it random?

Keep track of all your banner statistics. Although the company you are advertising with can do this for you, it is also a good idea to follow up yourself. This way, you can track and determine results like your conversion rate, ROI, CPC (cost per click), and click-through rate for each banner.

All in all, banner advertising can be a key part of your online marketing campaign. Depending on all the key factors mentioned above, it may or may not be an economically viable part of your marketing campaign, if it can bring you profit. If you can’t, don’t worry, there are plenty of other ways to profitably market your business online.