I'm interested in running ads served by Project Wonderful (http://www.projectwonderful.com/), a potentially nifty ad service run by Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics and Oh No Robot. It seems to be doing well, though so far I've only seen ads for other webcomics served through the network. Its approach appears to be the polar opposite to Speechbubble's, working in a way that favours smaller advertisers.
Could PW be added to the provisional approved ad networks list?
BTW the Talk About Comics Blog (http://www.talkaboutcomics.com/blog/) is devoting quite a bit of space lately to new players in the online advertising industry, and it looks more and more like the practices that made the last generation of online advertisers so distasteful are going the way of the dinosaur. Except that no kids will ever think popup ads are awesome death machines.
Well go with "conditional approval" again this time, as they are such a new service. Looking through the site, I don't see any policy about what sorts of ads they allow/disallow either. I assume it's just those button-style ads they show in terms of format, but as for content... judging from their attitude I think they'll be sane about it, but if ads for porn sites or sex toys start popping up, that wouldn't be good.
So yeah, give it a try for now, and let me know how it works out.
I can refuse porn ads*) on a case-by-case basis from within their system**). Shouldn't be a problem.
*) Or any other ads I don't like.
**) Or I should say, I will be able to do so, once I get an invite to set up ad space on my site. I have no idea how long that will take.
Sounds interesting. I might do this... maybe...
Also, Reinder, sorry you fell out of the Lazy Grind ;)
's all right. I chose to, because at 13 hours a page, I'd ruin myself if I continued. Better to have some time off to steadily work on new pages.
whoa! 13 hours per page?!?! Is that just drawing or is that including brainstorming and coming up with a script for that strip?... though I'd think that your story seems to be written out way ahead of time... I should really time myself to see how long mine takes... but man 13 hours? whoa.
That's just from the moment I tear off a Bristol sheet till the moment it is posted in the update queue. Yes, it surprised me too; before my long break, pages took 8 to 10 hours, max. I've never been fast, but now I've got slower. Writing, including the many rewrites, is not included.
Wanna time yourself while working on a ROCR guest comic? I'm still looking for a few good guests...
I won't be able to do a Fan art for YOUR comic until I read the archive to get a better understanding of the characters and overall plot... and I have not had many free hours asside to read the archives of a 10+ year webcomic ;)... Friken Freefall took me 10+ hours at 30 seconds per strip. I'm sure yours would be 45 seconds.
just looked at your archive... can;t tell how many strips you actually have... but I'm thinkintg it may take me 3 days.
... maybe I'll just read your last two stories....
Actually, the only other comic I did Fan Art for without reading the archive was Freedom Fries... which was inspired by a MB event at the Cornstalkers, but I think it worked enough to be a "random" comic for inbetween my arcs.... but then I realized that it could possibly work with a JACK cameo as well, as I had recently obtained permission to use Jack as a Cameo... so I may have a mini 3-5 strip arc :P
once I get some time I'll read some of your archives. But I was thinking I should do some fan art for you.
Actually, now that I think of it, If I can make it work out in time, and squeeze it in... could I possibly use Kel as a Cameo (if I can make the strip work out that is). The boys are going to the swimming area after their hike, and there are not a whole lotta places that would use your characters in a proper fashion (given the time difference). But I just got the the idea to have Kel sun bathing nude (as I have seen several strips involving nudity already in yours ;) I'd figured thsi would work), and then have Ranger Bob come up to her and tell her its not a nude beach, and then she'd say that she see plenty of Anthros around not wearing clothes..... I dunno something like that... I usually don't finallize a strip plot until i draw it :p
Unsure If I can pull it off to work within the strip plans I've set, But if I can hopefully work it out right, It would be the first time that i'd have slight nudity in my comic... oh wait... there was that shower scene with Dave... nothin below the belt though :P
*shakes head*
anyway, could I have permission to try that? (strip would hopefully go up on Wednesday or Friday). I mean if you'd rather not have the character cameo in such a comic (for whatever reason(s)), that's understandable ;) no biggie :)
Cameo? No problemo.
:D
On the topic of Project Wonderful... Wow! They came out of nowhere, and I'm seeing those ads all over the internet already. Dang they took off fast.
Yep. And that's with several potential ad hosts still in the queue, like myself.
I advertise through PW as well, giving myself $ 10 a week to play with (and by the way, I was surprised to find that the US dollar had dropped back to E 0.72, making these ads extra-cheap for me), and I've got good value out of some of them. A buck here and there was enough to revive my visitor numbers, which had sagged a bit since switching to guest reruns. I was particularly lucky to bag the skyscraper ad at Talkaboutcomics, just when Joey Manley was telling the readers of the blog there to take a good look at the ad space. I paid nothing for that for the first twelve hours or so, and it brought in several dozen visitors. Also, having people come in from a wide range of places has pushed the referral spammers out of my daily referral top 10s. That alone is worth the $0.20, because it's good for my blood pressure.
So while there are things that can be improved (for one thing, the service sends out far too much email), I'm happy with it as an advertiser and think recommend that people with a lesser-known comic should get on board and bid on ads, especially the ones that are now going for $0.20 or less.
Set up an account to check it out... Hmm, seems that I can only sell adspace by invitation only... i was hoping to see how one edits what kind of ads they want... i'd basically only want webcomic ads, that or art sites.
well, I suppose I should make some new ad banners and check it out that way.
Yep, I'm still waiting for my invitation.
I think the system is that hosts can set their control panel to approve advertisers individually, automatically re-approve advertisers who have been approved before, or just leave it wide open. There may also be a "block this ad" button to reject ads on sight in case of the wide-open invitation.
So far, I don't think there are many advertisers that aren't webcomics or art sites. That will change over time, as it should, but for now, it shouldn't be necessary to impose it as a restriction.
well, its not so much I want to make money off of this, I just want to earn the money to then buy ads :p
I've spent a lot in ads to start an audience.... but I still don't have that many viewers.
I need to make totally new ads for all sizes because my style has changed since the last time I made an ad.... Well actually, I did make a new ad for ZOINKS! magazine. They had a 2-for-1 special that i jumped on.
But I have a few cameos to work on right now, PLUS I am reworking the text graphics on my site too :P. But I really wanna try this out! its sounds exciting and people are talking about it all over the webcomic cummunity (as far as I'm seeing).
As far as your Project Wonderful ads are concerned, don't spend too much time on them. You have little space in the buttons anyway, and while skyscraper or banner ads do work better if you design them properly, there aren't that many good slots for them on PW yet.
For webcartoonists, PW is good for picking up crumbs in a large number of mini-campaigns - bids on sites that have ad space available for little or nothing. Use what you have and save your work on newer, prettier ads for bigger campaigns (I think there will come a time when I run bigger campaigns on Project Wonderful, but that won't be for a few months).
I suppose I could, but I just wanted to make a whole new batch at the same time.... My tower ads kinda suck though :p They are self insulting or viewer insulting :p
Ok, I put some bids in to experiment with this.... so far I am not sure how they figure out how much you per minute/hour/days you are buying.... Unless its so obvious I missed it... I bid 20 cents until I am overbid... but is this 20 cents per hour or day? And then is it recalulated to the minute?
I'm sure its somewhere, but I just did not find it... Unless its so obvious I missed it... Could not find it in the FAQs when I asked "cost per day" or per hour.
*shrug*
I guess I'll find out as the week unfolds.
It's per day, recalculated to the minute. Look at "My money" for an overview, though it won't be all that meaningful if you haven't yet got any bids accepted.
Yea, its starting to make more cents now (ok, bad pun :p). I have one active ad thus far. this is pretty interesting.
Side note: Reindeer, Holy crap have I been having a hard time drawing Kel naked!!! And I thought it took me forever to draw Lucy's breasts... and she had a shirt on! Anyway, I'm still inking the comic and hope to have it up within 2 hours of this post... since it was discussed here, I'll post here again when its up :P I reworked the "plot" of the strip like 4 times with a different scenerio. I think this one works the best and I find it funny. :p
Well, Its funny to at least me... fucking bitch to draw everything... had to draw everything seperate and resize... not my favorite method...
http://fesworks.com
But it's there now. I wonder how long it takes for the Crossover and Cameo Archive folks to discover it... nice work!
Thank you!
haha, Well this is one of those archive people that allows people to submit an alert to them of such an event... i forget the place, but I remember I needed to tell them to add a few Badly Drawn Kitties cameos into DMFA, not to mention my own comic...
I love doing cameos.. even if their presence may be a bit too inside, its one of things I wanted to do with the comic to begin with. I think Its in my Application here too. I always get permission for cameos and such.
Lucy - BDK
Sabrina & RC - Sabrina Online
Kel - ROCR
future:
Zelda - Life's a Witch
Kel - ROCR
Skippy - Freedome Fries
Jack - Jack
Mike, Brad, Jade, Zelda Serenity - Punks & Nerds
Lucy - BDK
waiting on a responce for Otra & Winter from Girly.
sometimes I feel like I made a webcomic to further geek out over webcomics I like :p
http://crossovers.dragoneers.com/
Holy Crap! I'm on there already!?!?!
EDIT:
I wonder who submitted them... I wonder if it'd be in bad taste to submit notices on your own comic... would that be in bad taste? personally, I elect to wait for someone else to notice it... seems more exciting :p
anyway, yea that was the site I saw before. I just submitted 4 BDK cameos that appear in DMFA :D
Back on the Subject: Project Wonderful is pretty damn sweet! I gave myself $8 to work with and its been pretty fun doing this! I've only been sticking around the cheaper ones... not a wide variety of sites at that level though.
Quote from: fesworksHoly Crap! I'm on there already!?!?!
EDIT:
I wonder who submitted them... I wonder if it'd be in bad taste to submit notices on your own comic... would that be in bad taste? personally, I elect to wait for someone else to notice it... seems more exciting :p
That must be a very recent entry, as the last time I checked I couldn't find you on there.
I submit things from my own archives, because they clearly hadn't got noticed yet at the time.
QuoteBack on the Subject: Project Wonderful is pretty damn sweet! I gave myself $8 to work with and its been pretty fun doing this! I've only been sticking around the cheaper ones... not a wide variety of sites at that level though.
Yeah, it's time Ryan sent out some invitations. I think that's the flaw in waiting until there are enough advertisers to fill the site - the advertisers are waiting for suitable hosts. Someone should remind Ryan of the Metcalfe effect.
Rrright! Project Wonderful ads are live on my front page and in my archives! I've given them a spot where they're hard to ignore; we'll see how well this works. Xepher cartoonists, now is your time to put up ads on my site, because they're still going for $ 0, and I know from years of linking to other comics that a link from my site is worth a little bit more than that :P
I would, but all my money avaialable (as limits) are tied up right now, but I might be cancelling a couple soon.
Other than that I just spent $500 on a Wii, extra controllers and 3 games :D
Heh...I think I'm in already. I don't have any money, but as long as $0 is enough, I'll stick around.
I saw your ad, but it was outbid overnight. Thanks!
Eh...not really a problem. I'll just throw it out wherever $0 is enough.
That's pretty much how I work. I got some up at http://www.webcomicsnation.com/reinder as well, by the way, and I'll soon ad in a second ad box on Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan. Even though the first one isn't bringing in that much money yet, I think I ought to experiment and see what works.
I've opened a second and third front in my struggle to get paid advertising: new Project Wonderful ad slots are now available on Chronicles of the Witch Queen (http://www.webcomicsnation.com/reinder) (off Xepher.net) and more importantly, above the fold on ROCR.net (http://www.rocr.net/). The new ROCR ads should also appear on all sidecomics and thus get many more pageviews than the older ones. Can't say the same about COTWQ, at least not yet.
Get them while they're free, folks!
Last time I post something like this, promised:
My bids have been dropping lately, and I need money for more computing equipment! Many spots still going for $ 0.10! Bid! Bid! Bid!
....yes, I can be such a whore at times.
I'm out on funds, and don't have the cash to upload for more ads (anywhere) at the moment... I'm saving up for actual site adds that have their own banners... either that or restart my TWCL avatar ad.
Because Xepher will ask about this eventually:
My PW ads are doing about as well as I could reasonably expect. I think they're still somewhat undervalued compared to other ad blocks that rake in the same number of page views, but meh. There's probably a reason that I haven't figured out yet. It's in the ballpark with other 10,000 pageviews/day sites.
However, I spend much more through PW than I earn - which is one of the reasons the ROCR comics now get 10,000 pageviews a day. Whether this is worth it, financially at least, really depends on how the google ads are doing. I don't know until I either get the home PC working again, which I don't want to spend too much time on right now, or until Google sends me their next payout. It's unlikely to be big money anyway.
For my ego, on the other hand, having more than 10,000 pageviews (on the comics archive - the blog is not counted in this) is doing me a lot of good.
That's cool. My ads must not look good enough for people to click. I have not been approved to have the ability to host ads... perhaps I'm too small of a site, but then I wonder how some of these other sites got approved.
Perhaps I am not advertsing on the right sites... the ones that may have a similar audience to my own... Oh well.
Maybe you need to prod Ryan North a bit. That sometimes happens.
Reinder: Heheh... I'm always curious. :-) Glad to here you've gotten some more viewers at least.
Fesworks: I haven't seen your ads, but I do know that with a lot of the small PW ads, I can hardly tell what they heck they're even for. Half the time I don't know if it's a comic an ad for t-shirts, or an electronics dealer. Get some people who know nothing about what you do to look at your ads and tell you what they think. See if they work on them.
Hmm, I think I'll make it a GIF and animate it saying its a webcomic or something... I've been getting a few clicks here and there, but I have not paid for too many ads on the bigger sites. ROCR gave me the most clicks... only about 6 for a few days though :P.. that and Kitty Litter was good. I might try Questionable Content and Girly... I think Darken got on there too.. I think I'll have to re-search the bids for webcomics again... but right now I've been grabbing a bunch of the super cheap ones and new ones... to feel out certain types of sites... Guess I'll have to bite the bullet and go for those bigger ones.
these are the strips I have:
(http://fesworks.xepher.net/LINKS/psi_banner_117x30.jpg)
and when space is Available:
(http://fesworks.xepher.net/LINKS/PSI_486x60_Banner3.gif)
perhaps they could use some reworking.
Yeah, if they don't charge more for animated ads, definitely do that. Not only does it get a little more attention, it also gives you more virtual "space" to display stuff. The big banner is good, it actually lets me know what I'm clicking on, and has a semi-clever tag-line to draw me in. Do something like that for the small ads. I'd avoid the acronym PSI, as it sounds like the greek letter, or the mind-reading stuff you'd expect in sci-fi... or is it psi-phi? :-)
oh crap, I forgot to put the decimals in the small ad... I wanted to nix the original title because it was too depressing (and long), and it is nowhere near a depressing comic as what I originally intended (ironically doing the comic made me less depressed :P )
I suppose I should just bill Fes and Ernst and avoid the name of the comic in the ads.
I have to be a bit creative with that small one though... don't wanna loko like its too crammed with info and not to flashy and flickery (I skip those because they are annoying).
Anyways, I'm down of funds for right now... I'll do a bit more research on certain sites, but I wanna try and get an ad on a Top Web Comics sometime too... With this Arc I am doing now... this is my big thing that might be interesting enough to get more of an audience than that camping saga :P I just bought an avatar at at The Webcomic List, That got a lot of trafic last time.
By the way, as long as we are in here, on a side note, the commission I bought from Suku Suku (http://suku.xepher.net) is coming along super awesomely! she showed me the sketch today! Too bad she is stuck with school stuff for a while.
I'm taking a short break from advertising (I've simply let my funds run out) to evaluate, see how much lasting difference my ads have made and how far my numbers will drop back without any further advertising (preliminary answer: quite far). I'll top up my funds in a few days, but I just might wait before bidding on new ads until after the weekend, because there's a change on the way in the ROCR site that just might affect how I promote it for several months to come. We'll see.
It does look like a drop in visibility results in a drop in ad bids quite quickly. I still think my ads are undervalued, but that might just be my ego talking.
Yay! I recently got approved! I'm gonna try this for a while and see how it goes.
aka, Reinder, get yourself a free spot on mine ;) :P
I'm still working on the changes to the site. May be a little while before I get around to putting up new button ads. Sorry.
:P well fine :P
Well, one more top-up for my funds, one more round of the standard ROCR buttons, and on Sunday, there'll be changes!
Don't take it the wrong way if I don't approve all your ads ;) gotta have some diversity y'know :P
I'm hemorrhaging money! But the ads do work. I'm getting much-improved pageviews on my archives in particular, even with the rather awkward shift to White House in Orbit that's going on right now. I think I'm going to shoot for the moon and try to become one of the bigger sites, pageview-wise, within the PW network. That would make my ads even more of a bargain at current rates than they already are!
I wonder how I'm doing within Xepher.net. I don't know if the big all-XN pageview overview page still exists, but if it does, I couldn't find it. Xepher, am I Pwning Amber yet?:P
DMFA has to be the biggest site on this server, I bet, I mean, her fanbase must be huge with the amount of support she got over the summer.
Err... pageview wise, you're about 1/5th the size of her site, raw data is about 1/6th.
http://xepher.net/stats/xepher-net/
Note: because the log files are just getting HUGE now (around 4 gigabytes each month) I've started rotating and compressing them more often. Thus, the stat page above will usually only show the previous week or two, rather than an entire month.
yay! .35% ! :p
Heh...you've still got 7 times as much as me...
I'm almost surprised I even have that much...
Dragyn, make me a 31x88 mini banner and I'll put a link on my site.... might do something, might not I only get about 20 unique pageviews a day.
Well, that does resolve the issue of whether I should put in a new bid on the Sore Thumbs site. At least I should be able to take Hellbound by this time next week.
Hey, Fes...is this what you meant?
(http://beastling.xepher.net/images/ads/Miniad1tall.gif)
...or did you mean the other way?
oops... yea, I meant the 88x31 way... the standard mini :P sorry!
Alright, let's try this one, then.
(http://beastling.xepher.net/images/ads/Miniad1.gif)
That's what you asked for, right Fes?
yep. I'll stick it into my rotating mini-banner set next to my News spot... I'll probably break that into two ratation spots since I think this would make 13 mini banners now... got cluttered with having them all out.
Cool. Thanks. You have any I could put on my site, about the same size? (I'm probably just blind, but I didn't see any on your site)
In my Links section at the bottom :P
(http://fesworks.xepher.net/LINKS/psi_banner_88x31.jpg)
Speaking of which I am behind make link banners for sites... I make custom size ones that are taller, but shorter than the basic 486x60 so I can fit two on the same line (mine at 400x80)... I need to make some more for more sites I like.
EDIT: Updated my page and seperated the random images 3 times 5, 5, and 3... I have static images above and below, so There might be doubles occasionally.
Heh. I found them just now, too. I'll add that when I get the links page rebuilt.
I caught up now...you really have improved.
I'm going to make a strip comparing the first strip to the current ones at some point... and then I'm just going to scream at it while Fes and Ernst make fun of me :P
I think we've hijacked Reinder's thread...
I can steal it back. Got a couple of $ 0 ads going right now...
Well, here's a first. I just rejected a Project Wonderful ad and banned the advertiser. It's easy to do. Italian lotteries, be gone! (http://rocr.xepher.net/weblog/archives/001907.html)
Quote from: reinderI can steal it back. Got a couple of $ 0 ads going right now...
Which I have as well... 2 spots that are open too... You don;t put your ads up for long periods of time do you? I always select a year. What do you do? A week?
with how small my site is, I think I'm going to drop the big banner ad and make mine 6x1 minis instead... take up less space.
When I started out, I did a year, but lately I've been keeping the ad periods shorter - a week to a month. Ads typically have diminishing returns over time, and my wallet isn't bottomless either. Also, I'm still not quite sure what exactly I'll have on my website in a months' time.
I always put $$ caps on so I don't need to worry about the time so much.
That's just a matter of priorities, really.
Speaking about priorities, the following comment has nothing to do with them... but how do you say your name right? It may be as simple as "rain-derr", but I keep thinking "reindeer"...
(http://imagecache2.allposters.com/images/ADVG/481.jpg)
:P
The simple pronunciation is adequate.
you must get that a lot... I guess I was hoping for a funnier response :P
personally I get called "Fez" sometimes... and I'm like "... That's an 's'. ".... *shrug*
Holy CRAP! Cost of ads on Comic Space are super high!
http://www.projectwonderful.com/advertisehere.php?id=580&type=2
might be worth it for a day...
I'm not planning to do any more major advertising until the 2nd week of January. I have too much irregularity in my updates right now... delaying the arc by 2 holiday strips and then another on the 1st.
BTW, I'm planning on using Kel in a clothed Web14, single panel cameo that may appear in 2-3 weeks... "Wrong Number" with her Crystal Ball :P I'm also planning on using Tetra from Wind Waker and Bon from a DMFA strip if I can get permission from who owns that character.
Do you happen to know any other comics that have characters using cyrstal balls or crystal pendants to communicate?
Comicspace isn't nearly as expensive now as it was two weeks ago.
Acid Reflux had Crystal Ball cafes.
thanks for the info! I'll have to check them out and see if I can include them.
Only because we were talking about it in here, I'll be getting that multi-cameo strip up tomorrow methinks.
I have a proper Kel Cameo (clothed) with her crystal ball, God and Anathus from Acid Reflux (love that comic, too bad its over :( ), Tetra from Legend of Zelda (part of an inside joke as well), and a character from DMFA, only it's not Amber's, but I'm using the character in the DMFA context of which it was used.
Hogan (http://crossovers.dragoneers.com/) is gonna hate me by the time this arc is over. I have at least 3 more cameos coming up after these three (Tetra won't count), and he'll need to create new profiles for at least 3 of them! MWahahahaha!
*wipes tear*
oh, I'm mean :P
Hogan's a bit busy to go around hating anybody now.
Some of my characters have crystal communications. You've never met them, though. So it really wouldn't make any sense to include them. Probably better that way, anyway.
I was thinking of that for a while, as well as Darken (unsure, but seems like there might have been such things used)... but I already had enough cameos in this strip... which is delayed until Friday... I have guest strip up now. Work is killing me and I gave them a choice.. either I quit or I just work Sundays, but I'll finish my schedule for this weekend either way (i'm not one to walk off the job..... asside from one job I had).
perhaps in the future something will come up again. I'm just a cameo whore, but having cameos of comics I liked was one of my comic's main goals. I don;t use the cameos to advertise my comic... like I won't make ads, or post on the webcomic forums or even my own site of what cameos are coming. I like to surprise people and see if I get any reactions. Plus I want people to read my strip for its content more, and not just for a cameo I have coming up... so I guess I'm a Cameo Slut and not a Cameo Whore as much. :P
Here is a sneak peak of what is coming for Friday. A simple single panel cameo:
(http://i92.photobucket.com/albums/l40/fesworks/sample-1.jpg)
text and final strip coming friday.
Quote from: dragynSome of my characters have crystal communications. You've never met them, though. So it really wouldn't make any sense to include them. Probably better that way, anyway.
Actually, My characters never met any of the characters that are cameo-ing in the current crystal comm mixup.
Actually, I didn't recal anyone in your comic using CrysComs... I re-read the archive to check... I didn't see anyone.. unless I misinterpretted a scene or an item as a non-crystal (I'm thinking Beastling's neck thing was a pendant and not a crystal.. and it seems to be for teleporting).... unless you met I've never "met" them as in they have not shown up in the comic yet?
Well, If something was missed, and you reply in time, I'd love to include another cameo for Monday's strip to taper off the CrysCom mix-up, but if not, no wrries, It can end with what I have for Friday's.
for those that don't know, Zelda is a different character from Life's a Witch that cameoed for 3 strips a few weeks back.... making panel one an inside joke.
(http://fesworks.xepher.net/COMICS/00091a.jpg)
I meant, you've never seen them. They're part of my newer comic. (Yeah...I haven't publicized it much at all.)
One of them is on the current page, if you're interested. It's at http://beastling.xepher.net/PE (The thing floating there also serves for communication.)
I've decided to go with something else for the time being. Looking forwards to your new project though :)
Fair enough. I didn't really expect you to use him, since you know nothing about him, yet.
Xepher, would "There's Always Porn" be an acceptable site to have as a PW ad?
http://theresalwaysporn.com/
I've always just denied them by default...
Hmm... It's not much more offensive than a lot of webcomics, and it's not actually porn, merely about porn. Hmm... your site's pg-13 already, so as long as the ad itself isn't directly offensive (aka, no nudity/sex or graphic depictions thereof) I guess it's okay.
What I want to know is "why doesn't the cheap bastard bid on my ad boxes?" Especially because I've totally advertised on his.
So far, I've never denied anything for offensive content. I have, however, denied and banned some ads for websites that looked scammy to me.
I deny all sites that only sell things... though I have approved a site that has a free game... Tiny Toyz or something... Seemed interesting... but I try to only approve webcomics and comic related sites.... I've been getting a few people's blogs too... I deny those... at least for PSI and Ardra... I'd probably allow blog stuff on my "2 Cents" section.
Fes, if what I wrote (quoting the very smart Matt Skala at length) in my weblog (http://rocr.xepher.net/weblog/archives/001985.html) today is correct, then that policy is counterproductive. The network needs new money to function at all, and that new money is more likely to come from people who primarily are there to sell stuff.
Not that it matters much, at the scale at which you and I operate, but it's the principle that counts. I say that a lot, which is probably why I'm having trouble making rent.
The situation with my own PW ads is brutal right now. Oddly, the only one that's doing at all well is the one on the blog, which I would think would be a much better match for Google ads, considering that it's a text-based publication that gets most of its readership from searches. Anyway, anyone still interested in bidding after reading that blog post can snap up some of my ads for pennies.
Well, I think it's going to fluctuate a bit, but the real problem is when people have too many ad-spots.. but that's usually a problem for the smaller sites.
I mean, I can;t afford to spend a whole lot on advertising, but since PW, I've spent a SHITLOAD of money on advertising I would otherwise NOT have spent... people lose track of mircopayments, and I think people are not being a little bot more intelligent about placing ads.
Personally, PW is awesome because price is ditacted by what the buyers deem as what they are worth. If ROCR's ads are low, it's because the people bidding don't feel that it's worth more right now. As a salesperson, you just have to deal with it.
As far as my own sites, It's a matter of opinion. I never really wanted to have ads EVER, and if I did It was just for webcomic promotion. So that is why I try to only approve webcomic ads on PSI... the things is, I'm not trying to have PW ads to make money, though it would be nice if everyone could break even and pass the money around. But that's me, but I also see what you are saying.
EDIT: also, because I like you and ROCR, and I know people will be visiting because of the Crossover Wars, I'm bidding on you mini Banners :P
waiting to get invited by PW to host ads...
I've been trying to use the 'free ad space' so far. A lot of work for the effort, really.
You too, eh? I hear that a lot. The invite system seems to be broken.
I'm thining that they don;t have the capacity for any more.
it already takes forever to load things.
they need to find a way to split the sites a bit better... or whatever they do.
Yeah, I heard that from a cartoonist at the small press minicon I went to today. They can't handle any more.
They could communicate that better, though.
Wow, must be nice to have a for profit system that can't handle any more customers. I know if I was in that position, and losting revenue because of it, I'd be pretty fracking quick about fixing it.
Yes, I see the irony in the fact that I say this, yet it's taking me months to get the new server in place. :-)