What are Display Ads?
Display ads, also known as display advertising, are ad formats that appear in various formats across websites, apps, or social media platforms. Beyond basic banners, display ads can be static images, animated visuals, text, video clips, or rich media (featuring interactive elements such as mini-games or motion effects).
Example: When you visit a news site, you can easily spot a large banner at the top, an auto-play video inserted within the article, or a product image displayed at the bottom of the page. All of these are types of display ads.
Display ads focus on building brand awareness, creating touchpoints with target customers, and driving them toward action (purchase, sign-up, app download…). While search ads reach users based on intent-driven keywords, display ads often appear to spark interest, maintain presence, and improve conversion rates.
How Display Ads Work
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Visual creatives: Display ads use images, videos, or interactive elements to capture user attention across publishers such as blog owners, websites, and third-party apps.
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Ad placements: Ads can appear in multiple positions on a web page, such as top banners, sidebar placements, within content, or in other formats like native ads.
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Targeting: Advertisers (brands) can leverage features such as contextual targeting, keyword targeting, behavioral targeting, audience segmentation, or remarketing to serve ads to the right audience at different stages of the customer journey.
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Call to Action (CTA): A clear and compelling CTA added to the banner or ad layout encourages users to click, directing them to a landing page, attracting attention to the brand, and increasing engagement and conversion opportunities.
How Display Ads Differ from Other Ad Types
Display ads stand out with extensive reach, diverse formats (image, video, rich media…), detailed audience targeting, and real-time measurement. While they don’t target based on search intent like search ads, display ads are highly effective when the goal is brand building or remarketing. Strategically balancing resources between these two formats helps businesses maximize multi-channel performance.
Popular Types of Display Ads
Understanding the formats helps marketers choose the most effective solution for campaign goals.
#1. Banner ads
Banners, also known as standard banners, are the earliest and most popular format, with standard sizes such as leaderboard (728x90px), skyscraper (160x600px), square (250x250px), or rectangle (300x250px). As of 2024 in Vietnam, banner ads still account for over 40% of total display ad budgets, proving their long-lasting impact and strong reach.
#2. Interstitial ads
This is a full-screen ad format that usually appears when navigating between pages or before accessing main content, especially common in mobile apps. It delivers high visibility as impressions are almost always viewable — positioned in highly visible areas — resulting in one of the highest CTRs. However, it can be skipped easily if it appears too frequently. Additionally, due to its full-screen nature, it may attract spam clicks or accidental interactions that do not provide meaningful data. Marketers must therefore control frequency to avoid user annoyance.
#3. Native ads
Native ads blend seamlessly with page content to the point that they are nearly indistinguishable from editorial content, creating a smooth user experience. Common placements include sponsored articles, in-feed ads, promoted listings, breakpage ads, etc.
Thanks to their natural look and non-intrusive design, native ads help users receive brand messages more comfortably, which increases interaction. When placed in the right context, this ad type not only attracts attention but also strengthens trust in the brand.
#4. Video ads
As users increasingly prefer video content, display video ads like pre-roll, mid-roll, and out-stream formats often take a dominant position. By combining visuals, audio, and motion, video ads deliver messages quickly and emotionally compared to static formats. When the content is engaging within the first few seconds, users are more likely to stay until the end, improving brand recall.
Additionally, video ads allow for coherent storytelling, guiding users through the product experience journey. If optimized for duration, visual quality, and targeted distribution, video ads can deliver exceptional conversion rates.
#5. Rich media ads
Rich media refers to advanced interactive ads such as 360-degree rotations, animation effects, mini-games… which enhance user experience and engagement time, but come with higher production costs compared to standard banners.
Thanks to interactive elements, rich media enables brands to tell their story more vividly and engagingly, leaving a lasting impression on viewers. This ad type is especially suitable for product launches or campaigns requiring feature demonstration. However, for maximum effectiveness, load times and compatibility across devices must be ensured to avoid disrupting user experience.
#6. Sticky footer ads
Sticky footer ads are ads fixed at the bottom of the screen as the user scrolls, ensuring the message remains visible without interrupting the reading experience. This placement helps brands maintain continuous visibility, especially effective for CTAs like “Buy now,” “Sign up,” or “Claim offer.” Always staying within view creates a high chance of interaction without requiring users to scroll back up. When designed cleanly, with harmonious colors and concise content, this format can significantly increase click-through rate (CTR).
Moreover, sticky footer ads are suitable for both desktop and mobile, ensuring consistent visibility across multiple devices. However, if not optimized in size or frequency, this ad type can feel like it’s “covering” content, affecting user experience. Therefore, striking a balance between prominence and subtlety is key to making sticky footer ads effective.
>>> What advantages do SmartAds Display Ads offer compared to other platforms?
Benefits and Key Advantages of Display Ads
Display ads not only evoke emotions but also serve as a tool to drive strategic goals:
Boost brand awareness
Display ads can span across multiple platforms, from web to mobile apps and social media, attracting attention and creating conversion opportunities.
In the digital era, display ads are rapidly growing thanks to their large reach, personalization capabilities, and detailed performance tracking using UTM parameters directly on websites to monitor user interaction behavior.
Reach target customers & apply targeting
Major platforms like Google Display Network, Facebook Audience Network, or SmartAds optimize distribution using AI, allowing targeting by age, location, interests, behavior, remarketing… ensuring ad budgets reach the right people at the right time.
Optimize budget & easily measure performance
With flexible pricing models (CPC, CPM, CPA), businesses can optimize based on campaign objectives. Metrics such as CTR, impressions, conversion rate... are also updated in real time on campaign dashboards.
Increase engagement and conversion
Ads create lively touchpoints, personalize content, and feature strong CTAs to increase click and actual conversion rates.
Key Notes for Running Display Ads Campaigns to Maximize Performance
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Choose the right placement: Identify clearly which websites or apps align closely with your target audience to avoid budget waste.
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Create attractive, professional ad designs: Includes high-resolution images, concise messaging, and standout CTAs.
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Select suitable formats: Depending on goals and budget, combine multiple formats (native, banner, video, rich media) to amplify results.
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Continuously monitor, measure, and optimize: Use real-time reporting tools like SmartAds dashboard for A/B testing, targeting adjustments, and daily budget optimization.
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Comply with ad policies & protect brand safety: Avoid misleading content, violating imagery, and ensure privacy and data protection.
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Attach UTM for precise traffic tracking: Use UTM parameters in all ad links to clearly identify which channel, format, or campaign users are coming from.
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Analyze user behavior after click: Monitor metrics like time on page, number of page views, bounce rate, and conversion actions to evaluate traffic quality.
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Compare performance across ad formats: Assess CTR, CPC, CPA of each format (banner, native, video, sticky footer…) to identify the highest-performing one.
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Evaluate format suitability based on goals: For example, if the objective is awareness, prioritize video or interstitial; for conversion-focused campaigns, choose sticky footer or native ads with strong CTAs.
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Adjust distribution strategies: Based on collected data, refine frequency, timing, and audience settings to optimize upcoming campaigns.
Overall, display advertising is a crucial tool in Digital Marketing strategies, but leveraging it effectively is not easy. Businesses need to build the right campaign approach, combined with continuous measurement and optimization, to unlock more opportunities to accelerate their online customer acquisition journey.
About SmartAds, formerly known as eClick, developed by FPT Online – one of the leading pioneers in digital technology and media in Vietnam. Through continuous innovation and development, with an extensive network of premium publishers, SmartAds affirms its pioneering position in applying brandformance solutions in the Vietnamese market, aspiring to become a trusted partner accompanying brands in their online customer acquisition journey. If you're looking for an advertising solution that optimizes both awareness and performance, don’t hesitate to create an account and experience campaign setup on SmartAds here.
