Comments on: In-Text Advertising Not Evil

By: Lowell

Lowell — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 15:58:57 +0000

In-terms of in-text advertising without the distraction, our company, BrandClik provides in-text advertising without an annoying pop-up or balloon. Just a simple double underlined word that links directly to the advertisers chosen URL.

In addition, content providers choose their exit CPC and are not told what their exit traffic is worth, rather, they are able to dicate to advertisers what is is worth.

To see an example look at the link below for Commerce Bank:

http://www.stjoenews.net/news/2008/may/22/first-bowl-cause-planned/

To learn more about BrandClik or to register for free visit http://www.BrandClik.com

By: MI

MI — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 03:55:29 +0000

I have not had much success with Kontera – but I have just started using it.

In general, I have found adsense has no competition in revenue generating opportunities.

Placement of the adsense absolutely needs to be in the left ATF section to bring in money.

This is not really practical for a blog.

By: Leroy Brown

Leroy Brown — Thu, 03 May 2007 12:34:50 +0000

Daniel,

1. If I had 7 out of 10 people complain to me, then the ads would come down instantly – any kind of heavy backlash like that would do some heavy damage to my readership. I don’t mind losing a few stragglers, but that would be serious.

2. I see where you’re going with this, but i still have reservations. When the guy with 20k uniques starts monetizing, he’s not going to realize the full potential of that traffic, if he follows such strict rules. If he has to keep advertising far away from the content, and hide it in the less viewed areas of the page, then it’s hard to imagine him making as much as he could. I still hold that it’s OK to tick off some readers in the quest to make money. It’s just not OK to tick off most of them.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Thu, 03 May 2007 10:05:34 +0000

Leroy, good points, here are my counters:

1. yeah it is difficult to determine what effect the ads have on traffic, specially if the blog is on growth. still if you get like 7 our of 10 people saying they are heavily annoyed buy the in-text ads there must be a tangible impact.

2. even if your main objective is to make money I think those ads work against it. Big money comes from big and respected blogs. Stuck kontera ads on your blog and I will doubt it will grow beyond a certain point. Sure you will start making money earlier, but once that guy with 20,000 uniques start monetizing his blog it will be on the five figures range.

By: Leroy Brown

Leroy Brown — Thu, 03 May 2007 02:46:30 +0000

Re: Daniel
Thanks for stopping by. So far, my traffic has been increasily heavily, even after adding Kontera ads. It could be argued that I’m missing out on even more traffic gains, but ultimately who can tell, really?

If the ads cost me a bit of traffic, then I’m ok with that. There comes a point when you have to ask if you’d rather have massive traffic or a steady income. Which is more important to you – a blog with no income that averages 20,000 uniques a day, or one with less traffic that earns you several thousand per month?

Re: James
The CTR on Kontera ads have been probably about twice that of Adsense so far. I don’t know if Kontera is ok with disclosing CTR, so I wont’ for now – and I’m too lazy to read their TOS to find out. But the ads did account for fully 14% of my online income last month, so they do have some serious revenue potential.

By: Classifieds

Classifieds — Thu, 03 May 2007 00:45:53 +0000

It would be great if you could tell us how well do the links in the text convert to clicks?
Normally I pass them by on my way down the page (as I am generally too busy reading the article)
Of course let’s not forget… how much is the monthly payout?
I don’t mind them at all and don’t find them intrusive, but as mentioned, I go right past them.

James.

By: Oh No, say it isn’t so…Pop Ups are back!!!

Oh No, say it isn’t so…Pop Ups are back!!! — Wed, 02 May 2007 14:53:53 +0000

[...] should Stay Away from In-Text Advertising. Leroy from Green Lama then posted about it and said that In-Text Advertising is Not Evil. I’m not sure where you all stand on this one but i for one agree with daniel 100% on this. I [...]

By: Adam Ferguson

Adam Ferguson — Wed, 02 May 2007 13:54:45 +0000

I find the inline links extremely obnoxious actually, but once you get used to which links are real and which are ads, it’s not a big deal. It’s not stopping me from reading your site, so if it’s making you some money, I say go for it.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Wed, 02 May 2007 13:27:36 +0000

Thanks for adding to the discussion, I appreciate!

First point:
“I’m going to continue to use Kontera ContentLink for the foreseeable future. The added income far outweighs any perceived loss of usability to me.”

The problem is that loss of usability means loss of traffic. What if this extra income you are gaining now could be reducing your future traffic? Sometime to take into considation.

Second:
You mention Adsense is more intrusive. If it is placed “inside” the content than I agree they are almost equally intrusive. In fact I also think people should avoid adsense units inside the content .

If you think the ads will not affect your readers or your traffic than I guess go for it, for every rule there is an exception.