NONE: Re: ONLINE-ADS>> Link Exchange
Re: ONLINE-ADS>> Link Exchange
Mark J. Welch, Esq. (markwelch_at_ca-probate.com)
Sat, 24 May 1997 10:36:17 -0700
Joel Comm <jcomm_at_worldvillage.com> wrote that he does not
consider LinkExchange (formerly known as "Internet Link
Exchange") to be a "legitimate advertising tool," because "The
large majority of the 100,000 are personal home pages, not
worthwhile for any advertiser." He also complains that LE
does not provide targetting, that many sites have several
banner exchange banners on a single page, and the LE banners
most often appear at the end of the page.
I won't disagree with much of what Joel has to say. Member
sites in LE currently cannot target their ads (although paid
advertisers can target ads based on about 50 categories).
And of the 100,000 sites, probably the vast majority are
"personal home pages" (although I suspect the bulk of the
5 million pageviews per day are NOT on "personal home
pages"). And many sites (though I think by far a minority)
have banners from several banner exchange services on a
single page.
But all of this misses the key point of advertising: you choose
a medium for its effectiveness for your message. If you take
a look at my current LinkExchange banner and stats at
http://cgi.linkexchange.com/cgi-bin/pubstats.exe?X963477
you will see that for this very narrow-interest banner, I am
getting a 150:1 click-through ratio. (The same banner on other
ad networks, even resized, gets roughly the same performance.)
But given that I am not using deceptive or vague advertising,
and given the very narrow focus of the page being advertised,
I think I am getting a good return on my "investment." I am
getting my message out there.
The result is that every day, 5 to 15 new people visit my
advertised page because of the ad on LinkExchange, and
those people are actually interested in the subject (since I
didn't use a vague or deceptive ad to draw them to my page).
I consider that to be effective.
Certainly, I can get a better response rate if I buy targetted
advertising. If I bought a keyword on Lycos or Alta
Vista, I might get a 3% or 5% (or higher) click-through ratio.
But I would pay a huge premium for those visitors, certainly
well above $1 per visitor. I could buy one or two categories
on LinkExchange, based on which categories generate the
best click-through ratio (and I'd probably be paying something
like 50 cents per visitor). But of course, I'm not paying anyone
any money to advertise my page: I am using exchange credits,
based on traffic at my site. I pay about 300 adviews for
each new visitor drawn to my page through LinkExchange.
Note that some big advertisers are using LinkExchange:
MyYahoo ran a very big campaign for a while (I haven't seen
it lately). And LinkExchange also provides a vehicle for very
small advertisers to buy $10 or $100 worth of impressions;
most ad networks can't handle small orders like that.
Finally, I think every ad network, including banner exchanges
and "paid-only" networks, is promising more enhanced
targetting and other capabilities soon. As I have often noted,
SmartClicks has shown some potential by providing
targetted exchange advertising; some other issues are
discussed at http://www.ca-probate.com/adfuture.htm
-- Mark J. Welch (510) 462-8483 http://www.ca-probate.com/
-- Web Site Banner Ads (Networks, Brokers, Exchanges, Software, PSAs):
-- http://www.ca-probate.com/comm_net.htm
-- Web Counters: http://www.ca-probate.com/counter.htm
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