Bigger Ads For Bigger Screens
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to the RSS feed for this blog. Or you can subscribe to a combined news feed for all SMM publications. Thanks for visiting!
Computer monitors now have a bigger screens. If you check the visitor traffic to any website, you will find that fewer visitors have screens that are less than 1024 pixels in width. 1024 x 768 is often the most popular screen size for visitors. Web designers are usually creating websites that will give the best viewing experience at this resolution or even bigger. Perhaps it is not surprising since that is usually the screen size they are working on.
What is often forgotten is what goes on the page. If the whole screen is bigger, then presumably elements on the screen can be larger too. That clearly is the thinking behind the news that iGoogle Goes Wide, Introduces Canvas Pages as Erick Schonfeld pointed out last week.
Google’s startpage, iGoogle, is spreading its wings. Today it is rolling out a new design that shifts tabs to a column on the left so that more Google gadgets and sources of content can be accommodated. But the biggest change is the ability for content partners and developers to expand each gadget to take up nearly the whole page.
Partners that are launching with expanded gadgets
include the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, TV Guide, iLike, CurrentTV, and Go Comics. Google itself has created extra-wide gadgets for Google Reader, Gmail, Google Finance, and YouTube.
Another item that can be re-examined in this bigger screen world is the size of display ads on web pages. Surprisingly they are often 125 pixels by 125 pixels, which can even work well on that old 800 pixel width screen. In the new StayGoLinks redesign we have gone with 160 pixels by 160 pixels as the normal minimum standard for a sidebar ad. As time passes and people get more accustomed to designing for the bigger screens, then this may well become the trend.
Clearly the larger area (almost two thirds bigger) gives an advertiser much more space to develop an eye-catching ad. It will be interesting to see how quickly such ads become the norm.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=b3624093-9dcc-43db-b8c6-632b2f144351)
 |
Go To Top
in the SEO Services Marketplace
BPWrap
October 23rd, 2008 at 5:09 pm
While I agree with the assessment that the standard screen size and just as importantly the screen resolution gets far more in than in the past, I do not think web designers should forget that at the same time that desk tops with separate monitors provide this, lap tops are often getting smaller, if higher resolution screens. Since many home and business computer workers also work on a secondary computer such as their travel or take home lap top with its much smaller screen real estate, it would be a very good idea to still design pages where the most important content will fit “above the fold” on a 13″ laptop screen and keep headers trim, not the fat, self indulgent headers we are seeing so much of today. Take that bloated header with the tool bar of the browser and it does not leave much room for content on a lap top screen. Then if the nav bar is set vertical on the left, it can often disappear from view, or part of it.
Peter.
October 23rd, 2008 at 5:22 pm
Good points. Peter. I feel what most visitors came to see should be directly on the left and one should not use a left sidebar for the reasons you mention.
October 26th, 2008 at 6:36 am
Yep, you have the point here, Barry. I’ve done a research on my blogs’ reader and 82% of the readers have their screen in 1024X768!
So, it’s a wise choice to switch the ads for a bigger screen here…
October 26th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
I think that 1024×768 is used most often, though more and more people are buying widescreen monitors so I think that we will be seeing the standard change.
October 28th, 2008 at 12:50 am
Actually most types of Ads use javascript in page to bring ads from a remote server, Javascript has the ability to query many information about the client like browser type, resolution of screen, and many OS information. So its good thing to use them
November 3rd, 2008 at 10:05 am
Thanks for this,I had to buy a wide-screen monitor to improve not just my browsing experience but for better quality images/ads , we’ll see more and more people use 1024*768 screen.