The Worst Case Study Ever! (27)
The Big Idea:
We always try to make banner ads with one goal in mind, make them awesome. We have prewritten rules in our head of what makes them awesome due to experience, what we see advertised, and what we have read. But what if we could get a better understanding of what works, by understanding what doesn't work...dum dum dum!
The Method:
I asked, and you delivered. I asked you to send me the most terrible performing CTR wise mobile ads possible. You delivered me a bunch of foul looking, crap, cringe worth creatives that were born from the pits of a programmers lair. I uploaded them to Incrowd, and sent 15,000 impressions to each. Take a look at what happened...
The Results:
1.1% CTR. 4 Conversions.
@niekrac A shirtless fat boy reminding you to fix your battery. A clear call to action. Definitely not features needed for a shitty ad. (animation loop stops after about 3 times).
0.55% CTR. 2 Conversions.
I was really hoping you would go further with this idea and have a picture of a battery exploding and possibly poking out someones eye. But this one did surpisingly shit even though it was on topic, easy to read and had an obvious CTA. I don't know kind of black magic you used there.
0.51% CTR. 0 Conversions.
The battery Doctor who taunts his elderly patients by writing impossible to read text. Such an awful evil idea, yet a shimmer of beauty too.
0.53% CTR. 0 Conversions.
This one really pushed the boundaries by promising a virus and spam. IF that wasn't enough just peer that up with a fake tanned douchebag and you have a very sensual combination. 0.53% of users were obviously gagging for a virus from the douchebag.
0.52% CTR. 3 Conversions.
I usually refer to Maynzie as being a feral cunt, his ad is not any different. It looks like something designed by a teenage wannabe metal band called "Battery Resurrection". I don't know anyone who would be interested in such a piece of shit. Great work.
0.62% CTR. 0 Conversions.
You need to watch the animation for like 6-8 seconds to have any clue what the ad is about. Very cunning and confusing.
0.53% CTR. 2 Conversions.
This one is a leverages the use of a buggy lightsaber and impossible to read text. If someone was patient enough to read the text they would see the unbelievable promise of boosting your battery by 1,000,000 hours. Terrific!
0.78% CTR. 1 Conversion.
A piece of art generated from a blinded folded round of Pictionary. Bad move mate…who doesn't like an intense family game of Pictionary? This ad got some decent traction.
0.52% CTR. 0 Conversions.
A simple technique of targeting people stuck in the 90's, who are ok with a battery booster that has a main sales point of it could cause brain tumors.
0.66% CTR. 3 Conversions.
Nice use of an AA battery. Surely there aren't people stupid enough to think that you still use them for mobile phone…0.66% of the population should not be allowed to own a phone.
0.53% CTR. 1 Conversion.
Text is impossible to read, there is a little retarded girl running away from whatever the ad is promoting and creepy use of colors. A perfect palette of features to ward off curious young games.
0.52% CTR. 0 Conversions.
Arnies film career is good as dead, so now he moves on to being the front man for an android utility app. A very smart play here. People despise sellouts, accordingly the masses refused to give him a click.
0.58% CTR. 1 Conversion.
This got a genuine lol from me. It's definitely key to bring Breaking Bad into any campaign no matter how irrelevant it is. Breaking Bad fans would of been heavily disappointed once they clicked through. Great.
0.49% CTR. 2 Conversion.
Looks more like an add for an energy drink than anything else. Extremely misleading. A very nicely crafted piece of shite.
0.57% CTR. 1 Conversion.
@kokofaiiiiiii nothing says "reputable battery charging software" like a photo of Thor showing off his goldylocks hair, a font used for baby clothing crafts stores, and a hard to read call to action. Such an exquisite combination.
0.74% CTR. 4 Conversions.
@godspeed used a brilliant technique of using animation that moves too fast to read all text in the first rotation. He also adds a nice touch of not seeming to care about people with full batteries. It's a very smart way to lose an audience fast.
0.45% CTR. 0 Conversion.
@htgred introduced us to Grandma Mabel, all she wants to do is help her grandchildren out, even it if it's just to remind them to charge their cellular telephone devices. But who's got time for Grandma Mabel when you're trying to get some shawtays digits on Tinder.
0.56% CTR. 0 Conversions.
Scare tactics by the use of a big penis and a shouting black man. Very cunning. I am curious whether male or females clicked this more.
0.73% CTR. 3 Conversions.
This guy obviously doesn't have the capability to make a terrible ad because his was awesome. I wanted to wake the poor fella up. I'm sure many caring mothers would of done the same.
0.52% CTR. 1 Conversion.
(yours truly) came up with an advertising agency, default creative style ad. Armed with more features than a swiss army knife. We are talking stock photography, slogan, logo, disclaimer, cool imagery, dull colors. Could easily sell this bad boy to a eager to get their brand out there business for a few g's.
0.64% CTR. 1 Conversion.
Caurmen came up with an ad fit for a 10 yr old boy who thinks graffiti is cooler than get cooties from his female classmates. Hard to read text, no call to action and some what abusive, definitely a recipe for a limp ad.
0.41% CTR. 2 Conversion.
Looks like he tried to target all those men who wanted to last longer in bed, looks like no men have a problem with that because this ad was the SHITTEST of them all. It's got scam written all over it, and rules out a big chunk of the population by default. Congratulations mate!
Here are some trends I noticed between the shit ads:
- Both ads that used a paint tool to write text got decent CTRs
- Every single ad that used a human face got terrible CTRs
- The ad that mentioned "click to wake him up" did not mention anything about battery charging or an app. It was basically a mini banner game. This was effective for conversions.
- Promising a virus and spam doesn't scare off that many clickers.
Thank you to everyone who entered! You guys really do know how to make some horrendous ads. Congratulations to theoptimist you are the worst of them all! PM your paypal for $100 cash monie$.
Until next time,
Mr G.
Originally Posted by Mr Green
0.74% CTR. 4 Conversions.
@godspeed used a brilliant technique of using animation that moves too fast to read all text in the first rotation. He also adds a nice touch of not seeming to care about people with full batteries. It's a very smart way to lose an audience fast.
I probably can't get those with my best banner
So....were any of them positive ROI?
Originally Posted by Mr Green
But this one did surpisingly shit even though it was on topic, easy to read and had an obvious CTA. I don't know kind of black magic you used there.
many people pulled out the battery i think,
but not as many as expected to win the $100 lol
@mrgreen next case study should be on worst landers.
Originally Posted by ratalliance
This could definitely be profitable if I optimized the targeting and the CR stayed the same.
"The battery Doctor who taunts his elderly patients by writing impossible to read text. Such an awful evil idea, yet a shimmer of beauty too."
Hahaha wtf?!
Originally Posted by Mr Green
This could definitely be profitable if I optimized the targeting and the CR stayed the same.Anybody else wants me to make worst banner? I'm good at it.
^^ Yeah I'm sorry mate, you really do suck.
Let's have the 2nd round. 'm gonna hit 0.20% CTR this time!
It's ridiculous that people still click on this stupidly-made creatives....
Damn, no one converted on my banner. Guess the threat of brain tumors isn't the best selling point. Still surprised that anyone clicked it though lol
very interesting case study here, nice work Green!
An interesting thing i notice is when you see all the banners at once, none really stand out. This may happen with any banner if you put 10 on 1 page and stare at them all at once.
It's definitely something to think about when making a banner. Something i've never thought of before.
Next time i make a banner i'm going to picture it with 10 other banners on the same page and think to myself what do i need to do to make mine stand out.
I really thought adding "+ spam" was going to keep them from clicking. Good stuff Mr. Green
Are you surprised some of these actually converted, some multiple times @MrG?
^^Yes it's utter bullocks. I mean I know there are some stupid people in the world, but who clicks an ad promising viruses and spam? Yes there would be a good portion of accidental clicks but there will be some legit ones too. The winning ad was so abstractly connected to battery saver yet got two conversions. I bet if we did another case study for the best ads ever, there will some ads that performed worst than these ones.
The explanations you gave about the results on 1st post are pure fun LOL 
I'm very impressed with just how bad some of these are - I thought mine was pretty terrible, but compared to the laser focus on looking scammy some of these banners have, I'm a rank amateur
If the affiliate marketing monies ever dry up, there's a career in satire waiting for a lot of STMers, it appears!
And yeah, I can't believe some of these converted. Awesome case study - lots of food for thought.
Originally Posted by stackman
Originally Posted by Mr Green
@caurmen
Lol, totally didn't know I won this.
Obviously your optimism for winning was extremely high 
during this testing and when they clicked on the banner ads, was that direct linking or through a standard lander across all banner ads?
any help? thanks.
^^ Direct linking.
This is seriously funny. My girlfriend was looking baffled at me. Thanks for the LOLs. That's a first amongst the AM forums I joined.
fun, yet enlightful 
Best thread ever... I'm up for round two anytime
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