Banner Ad Marketing

[Bladez]

As part of my new job, I've been given the duty to sell ad space on our website. We have 2 large banners ads at the top of the page, and 2 small ones at the bottom (I had nothing to do with design/layout or placement of the ads). So far I've had absolutely no luck. Nobody is interested in banner ads. Have any of you ever sold banner ad? If so, what kind of results did you get from it? Any tips and tricks you can suggest to get people buying?

Website here (http://www.northernstar.ab.ca)

We publish 4 magazines for different sectors of the oil and gas industry.

[Drazan]

Most banner ads are placed through click through services.

If you already have advertisers in the magazines offer the banners with an increased bundle of advertising.

Mark your ad boxes as ad boxes or have a small "click to advertise here".

Your advertise page should have a distinct area for online advertising.

The highest return on banner ads are in content ads. 300x250 pixels.

Selling by impression sounds more impressive than a monthly subscription. You get up to 20,000 impressions a month for $XXX type of thing. Makes it sound like they are getting a lot more for the money. This works only if your average website page hits far exceed the impressions you can sell.

Well there's some ideas for now. there's a lot of different ways to approach advertising on a website.

Jade

[Bladez]

Biggest problem I'm having is the fact that we have a low traffic website. I've been following the hits, and right now we're averaging around 15 - 16 hits per day....In the last week, our highest hit day was last Tuesday. We got 32 hits.

We do have a specific page for the online advertising. Sadly it takes a little bit of navigating to get to it. And because I don't sell the print ads (I'm not technically a sales rep) I can't include them in any of the print packages. The sales reps can, but they don't because they don't get commission from the banner ads, so they don't think about them.

Every month I get in touch with the people running ads in our magazines and talk to them about web advertising, plus I put a print ad in all of our magazines promoting the online advertising, but so far, it hasn't panned out. The most common response I get is "I'm not interested. We've tried banner ads in the past and haven't found it worth it". And because I haven't sold any yet, my boss is starting to come down on me.

[jlknauff]

Your online ad prices are way off. No one in their right mind would pay those prices to advertise on a website with such low traffic.

[Bladez]

Your online ad prices are way off. No one in their right mind would pay those prices to advertise on a website with such low traffic.

You're telling me! I was blown away when I saw their prices for online advertising. I asked about lowering rates, and they said no. Maybe next time he asks me whats going on with them I'll tell him again that the prices are unreal.

[jlknauff]

Take a look here: http://www.federatedmedia.net/

You'll be able to see rates of other website and how much traffic they get; then you'll be able to educate your bosses. They probably still won't listen, but at least they won't be able to blame you anyore.

Hope that helps.

[Bladez]

Thanks for that. Maybe once they realize we're not a 1,000,000 + website they'll reconsider things.

[Drazan]

15 to 16 hits a day? ... Sorry but that is smaller than my smallest personal side.

My old pownuke site got on average 900 page views a day.

That site doesn't have a hope of selling webspace until you can get over 20K a month - or there abouts. People want results from their adspace.

I think your boss should invest in some good SEO and placement of his own.
;)
Jade