Re: WebAdverts alternative

From: Kyle Yamnitz <c598249_at_showme.missouri.edu>
Date: Fri 17 Nov 2000 11:13:20 -0500

MELANIE SHINEY <melanie_at_shiney.com> WROTE:
> I'm new to this list and am looking for an effective
> way to quickly serve banners on our site. Currently, we
> run WebAdverts to serve 5 banners on each page, and
> we're doing about 1M page hits per month. As a cache
> busting solution we're using iframes in conjunction
> with javascript. (We were using cgi, but it seemed to
> really slow things down, with no solution for the
> caching problem.)

Hi Melanie,

I've been using WebAdverts myself for quite some time.
I think it's an incredible product for the price. It
does have its limitations though (no rich media, no
campaign balancing, and no database connectivity for
heavily trafficked servers). Aside from that, the
program is excellent. I'm currently serving over
250,000 ads per day with it without problems on
LessonPlansPage.com (3 ads per page with a little over
80,000 of each). Almost all are served via SSI. I'm
afraid I may approach my limit soon, so I'm also
considering alternatives. If I can make it work, I'm
sure you can too. Anyway, here's a few suggestions in
case you would like to continue to use WebAdverts
(which you may be using already):

1. Disable IP logging. This will make a huge
improvement all by itself.

2. Use SSI for serving all your ads.

3. Use as many different ads.pl files as you can (i.e.
ads_1.pl, ads_2.pl, etc.). This can also be very
helpful for "zoning" your site (i.e. front page zone,
content type a zone, content type b zone, etc.).
Advertisers will like the ability to target to
individual topics on your site. In my case (lesson
plans for teachers) advertisers can target their ads to
the Math section, Science section, etc.

4. Since you're serving 5 ads per page, make a
different WebAdverts instance for each of those 5
(i.e. if you're using different ad types, /banner,
/cube, /button directories would keep individual ads.pl
files from being called repeatedly). This goes along
with # 3. On my site, I have directories just like
what I listed above.

Personally, I haven't seen anything under $1,000 that
compares to WebAdverts (and no, I'm not affiliated
with WebAdverts in any way - I've actually had some
complaining posts on their forums). If you find
anything that compares, please let me know as I would
like to take a look :)

Take care,
Kyle Yamnitz
EdScope, L.L.C.
Expanding the Scope of Education:
http://www.EdScope.com





Received on Fri Nov 17 2000 - 10:13:20 CST