Re: Refusal to carry advertisements

From: Philip Utschig <putschig_at_ameritech.net>
Date: Thu 02 Mar 2000 17:55:26 -0600

Hello O-A er's. Great list!

This is in response to Katherine Gelhar's questions on
refusing advertising. She had five questions; I've
answered a couple:

1) How common is it for sites to screen the
   advertisements they carry to see if the banners and
   the sites they advertise are appropriate to the host
   site's audience? Conversely, how common is it for
   sites to pay no attention to what ads are being
   placed on their pages?

I cannot imagine that an online publisher would accept
any advertising unconditionally. As a K-12 teacher
site, I am only going to accept advertising that I
think benefits my teachers. It would be irresponsible
as a publisher to bother my customers with advertising
that is irrelevant to them.

3) Are there any other common reasons to turn
   down an advertiser? How common is it to turn down an
   advertiser because the ad isn't appropriate for the
   site's audience?

About 1 out of 20 potential advertisers do not fit our
demographic profile.

I think there is a certain assumption that an
advertiser looks to niche sites to do demographic
targeting, and that car parts will not sell well on a
professional teacher site. This is probably different
for mass audience sites.

If I accept all ads, my average clickthru rate will
suffer, and my advertisers will get a lower return on
the advertising. For people who complain that online
ad costs are too high, I say that is a direct result of
improper targeting. Not one of my clients have
complained that my advertising costs are too high, yet
I've been sold out of inventory for months. They would
complain if the clickthru rate was low. Furthermore,
if I accept all ads, then I can no longer boast higher
than average clickthru rates, and the value of my
product is reduced.

In short, accepting all advertising is bad for web
visitors, bad for advertisers, and bad for publishers.

Best regards,

Philip Utschig, President
Evolving Education/TeachWeb
www.teachweb.com
putschig_at_teachweb.net
phone/fax: (773) 871-0284




Received on Thu Mar 02 2000 - 17:55:26 CST