Have Banners Been Effective for You?

I've read a lot that banner advertizing isn't taken seriously by the majority of mainstream advertizers, but still can't give up completely the idea of using banners and experimenting with then. I don't have a lot to be proud of - I mean one one banner can perform better than another, but I've never been happy with either performance.
So I wonder if you use banner advertizing and how successful this is in your case.
Can you share any good sites and blogs with tips how to improve banners performance.
What's considered to be a good CTR?

Banner advertising should be a key part of your marketing strategy.

To be effective, your banner ad must be displayed on web pages that receive a high volume of web traffic. Also, the banner ad should be visible on the initial page load, window frame. Your banner advertising display must be entirely relevant to the material and content that exists on the page it is displayed.

Fill these shoes first and foremost and you'll run away with a substantial increase in genuine targeted visitors to your website. Properly executed, banner ad displays can pay off where all too often buried text links go unnoticed.

Naturally, your banner ad display should be a high quality graphic- crisp, clean and professional looking. It should easily state its purpose and request an action. Avoid excessive flare, fan-fare, blinking and flashing episodes. Banner ads should closely match and fit easily into the web page theme and the flow of the page design.