Ads from Solo, Google, or Banners: What’s the Best?

Among the three channels of advertising, solo ads vs Google ads vs banner ads, which is the best? If you are wondering the same, read this guide and find out!

As part of this comparative analysis of Solo ads compared to Google ads compared to Banner ads, we will point out the benefits and drawbacks of all three channels, as well as which one is the best option for your online business. So read on!

What Are Solo Ads?

Solo ads are paid targeted promotional messages sent via email. So you can say it is basically email marketing but slightly different. Because with solo ads you do not have to worry about building your own email list.

You can actually buy access to someone else’s email list to send your promotional email campaigns. The person who sells the access to their list is known as a solo ads vendor.

How Do Solo Ads Work?

The following steps can help you understand how solo ads actually work –

Find a Solo Ads vendor: You can look for a good solo ads vendor by yourself or you can visit a solo ads marketplace like Udimi or SoloAdsX.

Contact the Solo Ads Vendor: After choosing a solo ads vendor for yourself you can contact them to talk about the prices. Solo ads usually charge on a ‘Per Click’ basis. On Udimi the prices can range from $0.35 to $.90 per click.

Send Your Offer: Once you have decided how many clicks you want to buy, you can send the solo ads vendor your offer that you want to promote to their list. And if everything goes well, they’ll approve your offer and will send it to their email list in the form of dedicated emails. You can write your email copy by yourself if you want, or you can leave it to your vendor to do it for you. As soon as all the formalities are done, your solo ads vendor will start sending out your offer to their email list and you will start getting traffic through their list.

Advantages Of Solo Ads

Using solo ads for your business can be quite beneficial for your business. Here are some of the advantages of solo ads :

Economical: Solo ads are very economical. So even if you are in the initial stage of your business, you can still afford to try solo ads.

Wide Reach: Solo ads provide you a wide reach to a pre-targeted audience as you can pick a solo ads vendor who has a huge email list built-in your niche.

Time Efficient: Using solo ads can save you a lot of time as you don’t have to build an email list of your own.

Decrease Workload: It can decrease your workload because you don’t have to format your email ad by yourself with solo ads. Instead, you can leave it to the expert by choosing the right vendor who will take good care of your email campaign.

Allows Testing: When using solo ads you can experiment with different vendors or lists and can check which one is giving you the best solo ads traffic.

Allows Tracking: You can track the progress of your solo ads deal and check how many clicks and conversions you are getting by it.

Disadvantages Of Solo Ads

Some of the disadvantages you can face with solo ads are as follows:

Once you order a solo ads package, you can not discontinue or revert it.
It is not easy to find the best solo ads vendor whose email list matches your niche.
There is a risk of scams in solo ads as some vendors use ill practices like providing fake traffic.

What Are Google Ads?

Google ads are one of the most popular ads solutions available on the internet. It allows you to promote your products or services on Google search, Youtube, and/or other websites.

Google ads generally work on CPC (Cost Per Click) system. You can decide your budget according to your campaign.

There can be three ways in which you can promote your products with Google Ads:

Search Network Campaigns: whenever you search for something (any product/ service), there appear some ads on the top of your Google search result page. These are the Search Network Campaigns.
Display Network Campaigns: All those image-form ads that appear on your screen when you visit a website using google. You can use google ads to display your ad on some third-party website where your prospects might see it.
Video Campaigns: These are the short video ads that you see before or during a youtube video.

How Does Google Ads work?

Google Ads (formerly known as Google Adwords) work by displaying your ads when someone searches for a similar product or service as yours. You can work with google ads in the following ways :

Set your Goal: You’ll first need to set your goal as to what you want from your ad campaign, more website visitors or more sales or do you want to drive leads to call you.

Set your Geographic Boundaries: You can set your geographic area where you want your ad to be shown. You can choose from a small local area to a whole country.

Create your ad Content: Create your ad content, that could be text or imagery, or video, and set your monthly budget according to your needs and you are ready to go.

Advantages Of Google Ads

Here are some of the advantages you can have for your business by using Google Ads:

Wide Range of Audience: you can have a wide range of audiences by using google ads.

Targeted Audience: With google ads, you can set a geographical area to reach your target audience.

Pixel Tracking: You can install google’s pixel tracking code and track not just your clicks but conversions too.

Stop Ad: You can pause or stop an ad campaign whenever you want.

PPC: Google Ads generally charge on a PPC (Pay Per Click) basis which means you only have to pay when some clicks through the link in your ad and not when google displays it.

Disadvantages Of Google Ads

Some of the disadvantages that you can have with google ads are :

High Price: For some niches, google ads prices can go quite high. For example, in the legal niche, the price for some of the long-tail keywords can go almost $1,000 per click.
High Competition: there can be really high competition in some niches that you have to bid to place your ad on google.
Google Terms and Policies: You can advertise on google only if google gives a green flag to your product/service or offer according to its terms and policies.

What Is Banner Ads?

Have you seen those bright, colorful eye-catching ads at the very top, bottom, or sides of your screen while browsing on any website on the internet?

These ads are called banner ads. We can say, banner ads are basically digital billboards placed strategically on a site to monetize through it.

Generally, banner ads work on a Cost Per Impression basis. That means you have to pay depending on how many times people see your ad on a webpage. Other than that some more factors can affect the price of a banner ad, which are –

Position on the page
Size of the banner
Number of impressions
Time duration (usually banner ads are displayed for a month)

Advantages Of Banner Ads

Some of the advantages of Banner Ads are here:

Low Cost: Banner ads are quite low in cost. Some websites offer banner ads at as low as 50 cents.
Visual Content: Banner ads usually contain visual content like images, graphics, and/or videos. And it has been seen that visual content is more attractive than any other form for users.
Awareness: Banner ads promote your product and spread brand awareness for your business online.

Disadvantages Of Banner Ads

There could be some disadvantages possible for every good thing and so is the case with banner ads. Some of the disadvantages of these ads are:

Lower Click-through: Banner ads can sometimes have a low click-through rate as compared to other online ads options.
Technical Issues: With banner ads, you have to take care of a lot of technical stuff like the size of the banner, functionality, and visibility of the content, etc.
Website Issues: Sometimes you have to bear the technical issues of your hosting site like delays in loading site or website down. All this can affect the performance of your banner ad.

Comparison: Solo Ads vs Google Ads vs Banner Ads

Let us compare all three of these paid ads one by one to understand better which works well.

Round 1: Solo Ads vs Google Ads

User Experience: Google is more focused on giving its users a better experience so google ads don’t allow popup ads, but you can use popups in your solo ads’ squeeze page.

Targeting: Solo ads are niche targeting while Google ads are keyword targeting.

Affiliate Marketing: You can not promote your affiliate links with google ads as google doesn’t allow it but solo ads are considered best for promoting affiliate links.

Price: Solo ads have a fixed price according to the number of clicks that you want to order. On the other hand, google ads’ prices may vary according to the competition and you have to bid for some keywords.

Ease to work: you can create a Google Adword account and buy google ads but with solo ads sometimes, it can be hard to find a good solo ads vendor that has a list in your niche.

Suitability: Solo ads may not work the same for every niche but these ads could be great for anything in the Make Money Online niche. Where google ads are great for promoting your physical goods and creating brand awareness for your business.

Round 2: Google Ads vs Banner Ads

Size: the main difference between Google ads and banner ads is the size limitation that comes with banner ads. With banner ads, you can only work in a 468×60 pickles area whereas google ads give you more freedom. You can do search ads, display ads, and video ads with Google.

Ease to work: Google ads allow you to display your ad to all those sites that are part of the Google Adsense, you only need to upload your ad to google ads. But doing your banner ad separately, you need to find a site that has a good amount of traffic and who wants to offer its space for advertisements.

Round 3: Solo Ads vs Banner Ads

Targeting: Banner ads do not particularly target a limited audience base as they are open to whoever visits that site you placed your ad on. but solo ads do target a pre-built email list that already has subscribers who are interested in your niche.

Aim: Banner ads are more focused on creating brand awareness and have a low CTR (Click Through Rate). On the other hand, Solo ads are majorly focused on getting more clicks and generating sales through highly targeted emails.

Personalization: Banner ads aren’t anything close to personal in fact, audiences these days have grown the ability to just see past banner ads which many marketers refer to as Banner-Blindness. But solo ads are especially serving a highly targeted group of people hence they are much more personalized to your audience.

Solo Ads, Google Ads, Banner Ads: Which is Better for Your Business?

In this section, we are going to discuss some of the online businesses and niches to know which one of the three; Solo ads, Google Ads, and Banner Ads, is better suitable for which online business.

Affiliate Marketing

If you are in the Affiliate Marketing business then you should know that some of the paid ads like Google ads and Facebook ads forbid promoting affiliate links and products.

But with Solo ads, you can work freely and promote your affiliate offers there. In fact, many marketers consider it the best option for affiliate marketing.

Plus solo ads are nothing but highly targeted emails and as you might know, emails still have the highest open rates, CTRs, and even the highest ROI compared to any other channel of marketing.

So the bottom line is Solo ads can work great for your business if you are an affiliate marketer.

Ecommerce Business

If you deal in physical goods and have your own eCommerce site or Shopify Store, Google Ads can work amazingly for you.

Yes, you can directly advertise on google for your eCommerce storefront. In fact, many marketers consider Google ads the best option when it comes to B2C business online.

You can even tag your google ads with your Shopify store and can have better sales.

So all in all, if you are in the eCommerce business, Google ads will be perfectly suitable for you.

Brand Building

If your aim is to build a brand image for you then Banner ads from all these three options are quite suitable for you.

Banner ads are often said to have a low CTR, but that’s not a problem if your main aim is to make your audience feel your brand’s online presence.

And if placed strategically, banner ads can do a lot better than you think.

Lead Capturing

If your main motive is to capture more and more leads, although all the three options can work well if you are in any of the following niches, Consider Solo ads as these ads give you more freedom to work and a pre-targeted audience.

Some of the Niches for which Solo ads are suitable for :

Make Money Online Niche (MMO)
IM Niche (Internet Marketing Niche)
Affiliate Marketing Niche
Health and Fitness Niche
Network Marketing Niche
Crypto Niche

FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)

What Is Better Than Google Ads?

If you are in affiliate marketing or MMO niche then Solo ads are surely better than google. If you are in a B2C business, Facebook ads and Instagram ads can be alternatives to google ads.

Are solo ads worth it?

If you are in a niche where PPC is very high or if your niche is quite overwhelmed with content. Then solo ads are worth a try. Because solo ads can have quite low CPC as compared to google ads and other paid ads.

Are Solo Ads Legal?

Yes, Solo ads are completely legal. Though there could be some risk of having a fake traffic scam if you buy solo ads from a reputed. And trusted solo ads provider then you can get 100% real traffic.

What Are Display Ads Vs Banner Ads?

The words Banner ads and Display ads are often used as synonyms. Because there is no difference and banner ads are a form of display ads that are mostly displayed at the top, bottom, or side of a web page.

Should I Use Solo Ads or Google Ads?

For some particular niches like affiliate marketing and making money, online niche Google ads are not suitable. As affiliate links are forbidden on google. So for such niches, you can use solo ads.

Is SEO Better Than Google Ads?

It totally depends on your budget and business goal as SEO is better for the long-term ranking. But Google ads are better for quick results and SEO is not paid at all but google ads are.

Which Is More Profitable Google Ads Or Facebook Ads?

Both Google ads and Facebook ads work well so it totally depends on your goal, which will be more profitable for you.

What Is Banner Advertising In Digital Marketing?

Banner ads are like digital billboards that are placed on the top, bottom, or side of the webpage.