Like most shop owners, I’ve pretty much abandoned banner ads in favor of pay per click advertising. I’m a huge fan of accountability. The most interesting consulting job I’ve worked on was designing a highly complex marketing measurement system which would be able to trace the exact impact of every marketing dollar spent – and this client spent over one billion a year (that’s not a typo).

However, the niggle in the back of my mind with accountable advertising is always “but what about the brand?”. The older I get the more I realize the importance of brand, how much of an impact it has.

Here’s an interesting article on the psychology of branding, about a study which demonstrates that banner ads, despite not being noticed, can have a measurable positive impact on our perception of a brand.  Fascinating!