Shared ad space in the realm of outdoor advertising – from rotating billboards to stadium signs – has made business sense for decades. Shared ad space on the Internet makes even more business sense. And now – thanks to the Tristitial – Internet marketers can enjoy the powerful benefits of shared advertising.
The financial advantages of sharing a Tristitial with other Internet marketers are compelling.
In a simple example, suppose that an advertiser ordinarily pays a publisher a CPM of $30 to display a banner on the ad space of a web site. By sharing with two other advertisers a Tristitial deployed to that same (but shared) ad space, the advertiser can now share the cost of that ad space, potentially reducing the CPM by up to 70%. For example, if the publisher offers a 50% discount and charges each of the three advertisers a CPM of only $15 instead of the normal $30, the publisher would still generate total ad revenue of $45 from all three advertisers (instead of $30 from just one advertiser) from the same ad space. In such a case, each advertiser effectively spends only half of its original CPM budget for the same 1,000 impressions of banner exposure, effectively doubling the purchasing power of its original advertising budget.
The extent of the discount that results from a shared ad space will depend on the publisher's shared advertising price strategy. If the publisher wants to maximize profit margin, the discount for a shared ad space will likely be closer to 40%. On the other hand, if the publisher wants to maximize sales volume, the shared ad space discount will likely be closer to 70%.
Publishers and ad networks might also prefer to price each banner in a Tristitial differently, if they believe that the first, second, and third banner positions in a Tristitial each have a different display value to Internet marketers.
Advertisers may wonder where in a Tristitial it is best to have a banner displayed.
The chart below analyzes the advantages and disadvantages associated with each of the three banner positions in a Tristitial. The analysis is based on cognitive psychological studies of memory1 and perception2, and on the fact that Tristitials use the following, eye-catching form of animation to indicate the transition from one banner to the next: the division of a banner into horizontal or vertical tiles that smoothly and gradually flip into the next banner. Internet users can be expected to react in certain ways to such animated transitions, and these reactions may become even more likely as the Tristitial becomes more commonly deployed and recognized.
| Position |
Advantages |
Disadvantages |
| First Banner |
The Internet user is least likely to leave the web page before a Tristitial displays the first banner.
The proven effects of primacy and recency in memory and recall mean that the first banner occupies a more "memorable position" in the Tristitial and is thus more likely to be remembered, if the first banner is viewed first.
If the Internet user catches only a momentary glimpse of the first banner right before it transitions into the second banner, he or she will likely realize that the Tristitial animation cycle has finished only after the transition from the third banner to the first banner has commenced. In such a case, the Internet user is almost certain to see the first banner at least once and probably twice.
Even if the Internet user notices the Tristitial only after the second or third banner has been displayed, such user is likely to continue watching the Tristitial until the first banner appears because only then will it become clear that the animation cycle has finished and all of the banners in the Tristitial have been displayed.
|
The animated effects of the Tristitial begin only with the second banner, so the second banner may be the first one to capture the Internet user's attention if such user was not looking at the Tristitial when it was first served to the web page.
|
| Second Banner |
The animated effects of the Tristitial begin with the second banner, so the second banner may be the first one to capture the Internet user's attention if such user was not looking at the Tristitial when it was first served to the web page.
If the second banner is viewed first, the proven effects of primacy and recency in memory and recall mean that the second banner occupies a more "memorable position" in the Tristitial and is thus more likely to be remembered.
Even if the Internet user was looking at the Tristitial when the first banner was first served to the web page, if such user recognizes the ad unit as a Tristitial, he or she will probably be curious to see the second banner revealed before exploring other content on that web page, or leaving the web page altogether.
|
The proven effects of primacy and recency in memory and recall mean that the second banner is the least likely to be remembered, if it is the second out of the three banners to be viewed. However, the fact that second banner is actually the first to be animated may in some way offset the disadvantage of being displayed in the "more forgettable" second position.
|
| Third Banner |
If the third banner is viewed last, the proven effects of primacy and recency in memory and recall mean that the third banner occupies a more "memorable position" in the Tristitial and is thus more likely to be remembered.
|
The Internet user is most likely to leave the web page before a Tristitial displays the third banner.
However, if the Internet user views the web page long enough to notice the Tristitial animation, such user is likely to watch the Tristitial long enough for the animation cycle to be completed and the third banner to be displayed.
|
If, for example, a publisher believes that there is some marketing advantage to being displayed earlier rather than later in a Tristitial, the publisher may prefer to offer bigger CPM discounts to advertisers whose banners are displayed later in the Tristitial. The following is an illustration of a pricing scheme based on the assumption that an earlier banner placement in a Tristitial is better:
Instead of selling an online ad space for the normal $30 CPM to one advertiser, a publisher uses a Tristitial to sell the ad space to three advertisers, as follows:
- The advertiser displayed in the first Tristitial banner ad pays a CPM of $20, saving 33% on the regular CPM.
- The advertiser displayed in the second Tristitial banner pays a CPM of $15, saving 50% on the regular CPM.
- The advertiser displayed in the third Tristitial banner ad pays a CPM of $10, saving 66% on the regular CPM.
With the shared ad space pricing of this example, an advertiser could use the same $30 that would have been spent on non-shared CPM to purchase the first banner position (for $20) in one shared Tristitial, and the third banner position in another shared Tristitial (for $10), effectively doubling the exposure of the advertiser's banner to 2,000 impressions.
Advertising in a Tristitial is clearly more cost-effective than paying a higher CPM for a static JPG or GIF banner of the same size, but there are other important benefits as well. An Internet ad campaign that exploits a Tristitial is also a much more powerful way to catch an Internet user's attention. While motionless images just sit "dead" and unnoticed on the web page, a Tristitial is animated, and thus effectively transforms each of its static banners into eye-catching rich media ads. And because Tristitials contain visually diverse ad content from three different campaigns, they produce an inherently distinctive overall effect that is even more likely to get noticed.
The Tristitial is compatible with Macromedia® Flash® Player version 6r65 or higher. However, an estimated 3% of Internet-connected computers either lack Macromedia Flash Player or have an outdated version. Thus, publishers and ad networks must designate a static image (also known as the "alternate image") that will be served to this small minority of Internet-connected computers. A Tristitial advertiser who wants to supply the alternate image banner should notify the publisher or ad network; otherwise, the alternate image may be allocated to one of the other two advertisers appearing in the same Tristitial.
An advertiser supplying the banner for a Tristitial can use a banner whose file size is generally up to 12KB for the leaderboard ad unit (468x60 IMU), and – for other ad units – up to 20KB. For the exact file size allowed in any particular case, consult with the publisher or ad network offering the Tristitial.
_________________________________