Is Online Advertising Valuable?

All too often I hear the words, “I don’t do internet advertising.” As the owner of a web site that promotes local recreation, I have been trying for two years to sell ad space to local restaurants, canoe liveries, campgrounds, etc. I have a handful of successes with about a 50% cancellation rate at the end of the first year. Why so many dropped accounts? The most common reason given is that no one told these businesses that they learned of their service on my web site.

This is a ridiculous standard that no other advertising medium is expected to meet. Experts estimate that it takes somewhere between 8 and 13 views of a product or service before people will read, buy– even consider becoming a consumer.

Newspaper advertising is not targeted. Billboards are large, but again, not targeted, Radio is not targeted. Television may be marginally targeted with cereal advertised on the kids’ shows, soap on the “Soaps,” etc, and magazines are perhaps the most targeted, but also the most expensive form of traditional advertising. Direct mail is also targeted. All of these channels have what appears to be dismal return rates. Targeted direct mail by non-profit organizations generally gets less than a 2% response rate, and that is high compared to the others! So why does anyone think that the internet will produce better results?

Advertising is, at its core, a way to put a brand in front of the public to build familiarity. And web logs, blogs, are highly targeted venues, many with strong followings. It just makes sense that advertisers should want to use this channel of exposure. Many companies do now choose to advertise on blogs.

However, bloggers are usually not corporations, but individuals. They want to be sure that they will be paid for displaying advertisements. They want to have control over what appears on their blogs, and they often want to be part of the process.

Advertisers want to be sure that they are getting what they pay for. Viral marketing is the current trend, and personal endorsements sell products. But if a company pays someone to post about their product they want to be sure that the post is positive, well-written, and in good English (or whatever the language of the blog).

PayingPost is an internet advertising broker that can step into this wide gap between companies and individuals. It is free to register with PayingPost for both parties. Once a blogger is registered, various opportunities will be offered him or her, to either post news releases from companies or to write about products. Although the tone of the article is specified, no blogger is forced to accept an assignment for a product that they are not comfortable promoting. The article must be approved by PayingPost, and if it meets the standards, the blogger will be paid the agreed-on amount of money.

For any writer interested in promoting products on their blog and making some extra cash, PayingPost.com is recommended.

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.03 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.02 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to date in March: $5.92