Creating a Good Advertise Page
August 9, 2008 Posted by Tyler CruzThere are many different methods available for you to monetize your blog such as selling your own products or services, signing up referrals, selling other people’s products or services and receiving a commission, contextual advertising networks, traditional banner advertising networks, etc.
However, one of the most common and effective ways to monetize your blog is to sell ads on your site privately, or by yourself. I’ve always been a fan of selling my ad space privately, and have been doing so for years – long before I had a blog or even knew what one was.
I know that a lot of bloggers out there who sell their own ads often have remnant ad inventory available. I don’t want to toot my own horn, or maybe I do, but all my ad slots are constantly sold out – I have been for close to a year. In fact, I hav
e 13 advertisers on my waiting list as we speak, even though I have 14 different advertising slots on my blog. That is 27 advertisers who wish to advertise on my blog.
Last month my blog brought in $2,746.59, and I expect August to hit the $3,000 mark.
So, why am I constantly sold out and even have 13 advertisers on the waiting lists? While I believe my prices to be quite reasonable for the amount of exposure and highly targeted traffic the advertisers receive, one of the reasons is because I have a good advertising page.
A few weeks ago, Mark Wielgus from 45n5.com made a post which showcased my blog’s advertising page and then went on to outline the reasons for why it’s effective.
There are a couple of suggestions I’d like to add:
1. Make your prices reasonable.
Obviously you want to get the most out of your ad space, but think long-term. Are advertisers going to be happy with their purchase when their campaign ends, and renew? Or are they going to leave with a sour taste in their mouth?
A happy advertiser will often share your site with their friends and colleagues, and will continue to be a consistent source of dependable recurring income.
Some of my current advertisers have been renewing with me for nearly a year. And some others who have purchased advertising such as paid reviews have come back to order more when they launch a new site or make changes to their existing one.
I’d much rather create a long-time relationship with an advertiser who will return time and time again, than try to “make a quick buck” by inflating my prices.
A good way to find your “sweet spot” on how to determine a fair way to price your ads is to simply step aside for a moment and pretend you’re the advertiser. You know your traffic. You know the quality of that traffic. And you know the quality of the ad in relation to it’s position and competition on the page. Set a price that both the advertiser and you would be happy with when the campaign ends.
Remember, you can always raise your prices later as your blog grows, but lowering them reflects very bad upon your blog.
2. Don’t oversell yourself.
Promotion is always effective and important, but so is establishing long-term relationships.
Definitely outline the key perks to advertising on your blog. Boast your strong Technorati rank if you have it, include testimonials from happy past advertisers, and clearly state your RSS readership – all that is fine. Just don’t overextend yourself.
For example, say your traffic for the past 6 months has been a consistent average of 2,500 uniques per month, but this month you’re on track to hit 6,000. Don’t state on your advertising page that you receive 6,000 uniques per month – state 2,500. You are not sure if that 6,000 is the result of some strong temporary backlink or a topical seasonal keyword. But you are sure that your blog receives 2,500 uniques. Wait until your newfound traffic is more consistent before stating that as your traffic on your blog.
As another example, say your blog gets a lot of traffic, has a high PageRank, and even higher RSS count. You could have all the metrics in the world, but if your ads do not perform, your advertisers won’t be happy. If you know that your blog gets 800 uniques per day, but your advertisers only receive 30 clicks per day, don’t oversell the fact that you receive 24,000 uniques per month because it is only misleading since you know that traffic doesn’t equate to strong traffic to your advertisers. Instead, focus on the quality of that traffic, or the affordable prices you are offering.
Please don’t rip my advertising page
While I’m referring to my advertising page as an example, please only use it as an example.
Naturally, you’ll be using many of the terms, items, and information as I am, but please don’t blatantly copy it line for line or word by word. I put a lot of time into optimizing it, thanks 🙂
I’m going to do this once I get more respectable traffic numbers, but for now I think just a contact link is appropriate.
I thought that in the begining as well, but have change the page on my blog since.
The majority of people are chronically lazy and will not contact your via a form. Just get the OIO Publisher and have it setup. That way it’s all automatic and once the traffic comes you can charge without loosing any because you are not set up.
Tyler, since I can’t copy and paste word for word, can I just use a screenshot… just kidding. Great page, I need to create one myself.
I have been wondering what the best approach would be for a new or growing blog in creating an advertising page. Tyler, any insights?
No different than a big one.
Just state accurate information, give reasonable prices, and you’ll be fine.
Any advise on pricing for a new blog?
Start really low, and very slowly increase the prices based on demand.
On that note, Tyler… is there a formula you use for the subscriber to price ration or something?
Just curious as to how you did peice that together as you RSS numbers go up?
No offensive to the guy who made the video (I know he runs an excellent blog), but the video was awkward. I kept wondering when the mirror was going to come into play. Also, probably would have been better as a Camtasia screen capture, he could have shown your whole advertise page.
you made a great point here tyler… A lot of people tend to oversell themselves and make little money with it.. in case i also had a post w/regards to that one..
http://www.melvinblog.com/2008/07/advertising
Tyler, I noticed that most of your ad formats are usually sold out when I visit the advertise page.
Where do you draw the line bewteen being in demand versus leaving money at the table for not raising prices or creating more ad space since demand outweighs supply?
I’d be interested to find out if you have a strategy as your blog grows.
Thanks,
Again, it boils down to giving advertisers a good value. I learned this with my poker forum.
Advertisers may beg and beg asking to get a slot, even offering you much more than you’re asking. You may warn them that their site might be the right type to advertiser, or that if they pay that much they won’t get a good value, but they’ll insist.
So, you let them, and then they don’t renew, or ask for a refund even though they had insisted before and you had warned them.
I tend to turn away around 30% of potential advertisers because they’re either poor marketers/advertisers and I know their campaign won’t succeed on my site, or they are expecting too much out of their advertising.
So – I basically only raise my prices once I feel there is both enough demand AND value to justify doing so.
I like your tip on pricing. Just want to add that research is also important to find proper price.
Thanks for the tips tyler! hopefully i ll earn liek you in the future!
A good advertising page really does do the trick. Thanks for the advice Tyler!
You made some nice points there. I looked on the internet for the issue and found most guys will go along with with your website.
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