Ads on this blog

Seth Godin (sethgodin.typepad.com) wrote a post yesterday linking to this blog and pointing out that I run ads on it.

He observed that you can learn a lot about how online advertising works by running ads on blogs.

He's right and that is one of the reasons I do it.

But its not the only reason and not the most important reason.

I don't like leaving money on the table. This blog does around 2 million page views per year on the web and another million plus views in my feed.

Those page views are worth real money and while I don't need it, someone does.

And so I run the ad networks that can gnerate the highest effective cpms for this blog. That is FM and FeedBurner first and Google and Yahoo second.

I hope to generate $40,000 this year to charity with this blog. I am certain I'll generate at least $25,000.

That's real money that will get a tribeswoman in africa a cell phone or a underpriveledged child a scholarship.

So that's why I run ads on this blog. I hope you agree that its a good cause and please click on the ads and buy from the sponsors.

Comments

[Rob Deichert]

Great to see you're donating the proceeds, as you've written before the networks etc need to make donating easier.

I believe there is an untapped behavorial play for charities to follow up with people who visit their sites and drop off before they donate. There's a lot of money spent on marketing and the bucket is leaking.

[Christian Cadeo]

Even if you don't donate the proceeds, you have every right to monetise your thoughts and insights. If people don't like it they can jus not read it.

[Rick]

That's a nice chunk of change that you donate. Bravo.

However, I think you just violated the Adsense TOS by encouraging us to click on ads.

[Zoli Erdos]

Fred, I wonder why they feed version of your post as well as ALL other blogs I follow via feed display the identical Lenovo ad forever. I don't know if it's feedburner or FM, but someone is not doing a very good job here.

[ivan]

$25,000 - that's one heck of an expensive cell phone

[SimonG]

Fair enough, but I find the presence of ads on a blog the equivalent of junk mail. If I could turn them off I would do so in an instant.

So no, I will not please click on the adds and buy from your sponsors. I will instead continue to donate from my own income, regardless of which blogs I read or how often I browse the internet.

As for your donation of add revenue, yes the benefit to the recipient is clear. However it does leave me a little uneasy linking charitable donations to advertising, which with adsense also links it to your site's popularity. But, with money going to the right places .. how can I complain?

[Tommi]

Hi... just to give direct feedback, here's a few intuitive counter reactions:

a) If it is really charity you're after, maybe you should consider adding e.g. a UNICEF banner instead of the ones that now appear. I'd really see this a more efficient strategy. YMMV.

b) I've almost already unsubscribed from your blog, just because of those tiny little Lenovos... they just lack style, that's all.

Good luck with your studies, though! :)

[Dennis Bennie]

Fred, Good for you, donating all the ad revenue to charity. You have very right to advertise, however, you shoud be very selective about the ads. How do you make these decisions? The next question: will you advertise to gain traffic ?

[Tom]

Fred:

Well put. Keep them going. I think it would help explaining to your readers how John Battelle and FM work to bring in the good adverstising around select / clean communities.

John, how about comment from you on Fred's Blog.

[Carla]

Hi Fred, what scripts/plugins are you using to manage the ads on your site. I have been considering running ads on mine.

Thanks

[Austin Hill]

Hi Fred,

Thank you for the great community leadership that this provides. We reference you as an example on the About page of our new social giving experiment called the Million Dollar Blog Post.

We are raising $1 for charity for every comment left on the blog post that includes a positive wish for the world.

We are very interested to see what happens when a large community of people gather together and each say they care of about something.

Can a self forming community raise a million dollars for charities? We hope to find out.

We would love to know what you think of the project. You can read about the background at of the project here.

Thanks.

Austin