Since I started at Premier Guitar almost 10 years ago, I’ve implemented and analyzed over 10k campaigns with creative sets ranging from static banner ads to multi-platform, rich media. Over the years, I’ve been able to develop a data-driven understanding of what makes a good piece of creative and I’ve helped hundreds of clients with the most common question I get: “What should I put in my banner ad?”
Good creative tells YOUR story and highlights your products, so the “best” way is unique to each brand and product. Instead, I like to focus on highlighting what you shouldn’t do. So, I present my Top 5 mistakes in creative design:
1. Now what?: There’s no call-to-action.
Every piece of creative needs a call-to-action. Traditionally this is a button like “Click Here”, “Learn More”, etc., but it could also be a simple offer for readers to engage with your products by visiting your website, watching your videos, or shopping in your online store. Whatever it is, it HAS to be there.
2. ZzZzZz...It’s too wordy.
Brevity is essential in display advertising. If you don’t hook the reader immediately, they will move on, so time is of the essence. For standard banner ads, keep your message simple and memorable. That means there isn’t room for every specification or detail of your product. Find the most desirable/unique aspect (or 2) of your gear and build your creative around that.
3. My eyes!: It’s too busy (or boring)
Digital display advertising is a visual medium. It’s important to keep your potential customer’s perspective in mind when designing your creative. So, if you’re going to animate your creative, don’t rotate 6 panels in 2 seconds. Conversely, don’t rotate 2 panels in 20 seconds. Don’t flash the brightest white after the deepest black. You get it. If your ad isn’t pleasing to look at, it’s not pleasing to engage with.
4. Call in reinforcements: It looks amateur.
The best representation of your brand and product is your imagery. The most valuable investment you can make in the success of your online advertisement is your photography and creative design. It’s ok it you aren’t able to do this yourself, but I advise you to beg, borrow, or barter with a professional who can help feature your product in the best way possible. If you strike out with a pro, check out products like Canva and Bannersnack which can give you a great foundation to do it yourself.
5. Cast a lure: It doesn’t inspire an emotion.
Once you have dialed in your concept and photography, the last step is to hone your message. Successful banner ads convey a fact, intrigue the reader, and entice them to click to learn more. Without venturing into hyperbole, your message should inspire an emotion in the viewer - surprise, shock, intrigue, humor, etc. The best way to do this is to convey a simple, clear, message that sets you apart and piques the interest of the reader along the way.
__
Still have questions about the do’s and don’ts of creative design? There are plenty of resources out there that can offer additional tips and tricks. Remember: there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Use trial and error to find out what works best for you and your company's goals. If you need a more personal touch, PG’s Marketing Lab is here to help with any and all of your marketing questions. We’d love to help you develop a strategy for your display advertising online. You can sign up for a free, no-pressure consultation with PG’s Digital Strategist, Luke Viertel, using the calendar below.
The $499 Indonesia-built PRS SE CE 24 Standard Satin does not have the advantage of a flame-maple top to give an upscale aura, like its bolt-on cousin the SE CE 24, but doesn’t need it. Because it takes about a minute of playing the SE CE 24 Standard Satin to feel and hear that it’s guided by the same playability-first design philosophies that make top-shelf PRS instruments coveted. There’s a lot of classic PRS essence in the SE CE 24 Standard Satin, and at 500 bucks in the year 2024, that is no mean feat.
The Best Deal Yet? PRS SE CE 24 Demo
Stirring Up Trouble
One really cool thing about a satin finish PRS is that, rather than compelling you to don kid gloves, it invites you play it hard, like a battered old Les Paul Jr. or Telecaster might. Like those guitars, the SE CE 24 Standard Satin is an elemental instrument. There is little in the way of bells and whistles to distract you from picking. Instead, the straight-ahead nature of the design tends to reinforce the sense of how well-made the SE CE 24 Standard Satin is.
Even with the $499 price in mind, I will surprise exactly no one by mentioning that this PRS is, more or less, flawlessly put together. Look all you want—you won’t find anything misaligned, sloppily cut, or improperly glued anywhere. The bolt-on maple neck sits snugly in its pocket and the fretwork is every bit as nice as what you see on guitars much further up the food chain. There’s no fret buzz, and yet the action is low and slinky. The guitar rings like it’s a living thing, too. Strum a first-position E chord and you’ll feel the resonance in your ribs.
When you examine the SE CE 24 Standard Satin at even closer range, you find details that charm and impress. Where an expensive U.S.-built PRS wouldn’t leave the factory with anything other than a perfectly bookmatched mahogany body, the SE CE 24 Standard Satin’s all-mahogany body is made up of at least three sections which look fairly asymmetric in size. The grain looks pretty different at the joins, too. But that does nothing to detract from the pervading sense of craft. In fact, it heightens the SE CE 24 Standard Satin’s all-business, proletarian essence—a nice thing to see in a guitar from a brand which, historically, is associated with fancy appointments.
Other construction details leave you appreciative of PRS’ commitment to advancing electric guitar design rather than being bound to tradition. The PRS Patented Tremolo vibrato system is as smooth as molasses and stable even under vicious handling (a specialty of mine). Among guitars in this price class, I’ve grown to expect vibratos that fly wildly out of tune if you sneeze, with arms that constantly flop and dangle out of reach. Even on this import version of the system, the ridiculously simple solution of a non-threaded arm that sits in a plastic sleeve works without fail. You can situate it at various heights and swing it into any position that feels comfortable, and it will stay there. It’s a fix for the inexpensive vibrato blues that many manufacturers would be wise to study. The dark-hued rosewood fretboard, too, seems luxurious for a $500 guitar. Most guitars in this price zone pivoted to paler Indian Laurel for fretboards some time ago.
Rowdy, Raw, and Refined
I instinctively get apprehensive when I see uncovered humbuckers in an affordable guitar. Something about encountering decades worth of ghastly, harsh, thin, and nasty entry-level humbuckers will do that to you. The 85/15 “S” pickups in our review guitar go a long way toward alleviating this paranoia. In humbucker mode, the bridge pickup is balanced. There is a midrange bump that can lend just a touch of harmonic clutter and some stridency when you play chords at full volume. But lead lines sing with a heated energy that has a nice touch of silkiness around the edges. Volume and tone attenuation are effective cures, too, if the midrange is too hot for your taste. That midrange emphasis is less flattering in the neck pickup, at least when you play big rock chords. But melodic fingerpicking and a dynamic touch summon a sweet side, and, as with the bridge pickup, single notes from the 1st through 3rd strings in particular have a satisfying, ringing presence that is not at all harsh. Combined pickup tones are especially nice. They’re springy, airy, and at times have an almost-Stratocaster-but-fatter ring.
Speaking of Stratocaster tones, there’s more than a little taste of Straty-ness in the split-coil voices. In the bridge position, the fundamental split-coil tone rings a lot like a hot Strat pickup, but with less bite and muscle than a Telecaster bridge. The neck pickup comes off as a bit rowdy and exhibits more overdrive characteristics than a Strat neck pickup, but is very responsive to a nudge to the volume control if you want clear, less-driven tones. The middle position in split-coil mode, which combines the centermost coils of the two pickups, is the most interesting twist on the instrument’s inner Stratocaster spirit. It generates a thick and muscular but clear and snappy version of a Strat’s out-of-phase tones. That’s not a sound I use a lot, but I love the PRS’s take on that tonality. Each split-coil position, by the way, exhibits very little volume loss when compared to humbucker mode.
The Verdict
We probably sound like a busted record at this point—going on about how PRS tends to overachieve in the affordable price category. But, hey, don’t look at us. It’s PRS’s fault. And until they start building junk we’ll keep on raving. The careful construction, useful and flexible coil-splitting capacity, reliable, smart vibrato, and all-around stability make this instrument an uncommon value. And you could very easily spend a lot more money and fail to get a guitar that does as much, and does it as well, as this straight-ahead, no-frills machine.
