Finding companies to advertise on our site

[Smile Wall]

We are a business aimed at raising money for charity, offering people a chance to publicise events, projects, motivational stories including business and personal start up ideas plus a chance to win a weekly cash prize. Our target audience is mainly students and our membership database is growing each week. We currently have over 2000 members. Our views and click rates are good. Our business model is that the prizes should be covered by the advertisements on our site. We are currently using GoogleAdsense and the revenue from this has dropped dramatically. We also have no say in the adverts posted and want to start choosing companies that fit with our positive ethos and also into the giving people a hand onto the first step of their ladder whilst helping us to raise money for charity. We wanted to offer new companies a chance to a advertise with us but are finding it really hard to get companies to sign up as they think the site is too good to be true. How can we convince people that our site really is genuine and find the right type of companies to advertise with us. Advertising doesn't have to cost a fortune and we are looking for smaller companies to place adverts or for a sponsor. What would be your advice please? We are called Banana Crumble but don't google that as you just get cooking recipes so use the www and our name and co.uk or search on Banana Crumble good news and you should find us. Many thanks for your help and hopefully we can help some new start up companies if their target audience are students.

 

[mattk]

First off, when I click the "Advertise with us" link at the bottom of your page it generates a mailto: link. This won't work in 2019, as the vast majority of people use web-based email, not traditional email clients. Therefore, I would suggest you turn this into a contact form page.

Secondly, when I clicked the link I was expecting to see a page which describes the options and benefits of advertising on your site. It wouldn't surprise me if a lot of companies click that link and then exit.

Finally, have you considered affiliate advertising? This gives you a lot more control over what your users see than AdWordds.

 

[The Ecom Guy]

You could strip out the adsense blocks and replace with static "Advertise in this space" banners, so all your traffic is seeing the specific areas they could advertise in.
It depends on how much Adsense you are currently getting per month. If it is literally a few £'s.., then it is easier to write off the loss of this revenue whilst you build up higher paying sponsorship placements.
As Mattk mentioned, ditch the mailto: link and have it as a hyper link contact which goes to a contact page where you have the basic fields and where by the potential client can explain where they want to place their banner. You could also put your prices on that page so they are aware prior to them getting in contact with you. Totally up to you.
Personal opinion is do it based on Months, rather than impressions

 

[mattk]

The other problem with AdSense is that people (like me) have ad blockers, so won't see the ads, let alone click on them. Affiliate links get around this as they are hosted on your server.

 

[Darren_Ssc]

Secondly, when I clicked the link I was expecting to see a page which describes the options and benefits of advertising on your site. It wouldn't surprise me if a lot of companies click that link and then exit.

Me too

 

[Nochexman]

...We wanted to offer new companies a chance to a advertise with us but are finding it really hard to get companies to sign up as they think the site is too good to be true. How can we convince people that our site really is genuine and find the right type of companies to advertise with us...

As a prospective advertiser I can't see on your website what you are offering me (or any prospective advertiser for that matter).

 

[Smile Wall]

Thanks for all of the above comments. We will look into these as a starting point over the next few days and try and take on board your comments. Thanks again and if you think of anything else please feel free to add .

 

[fisicx]

I've just been looking at the site and still have no idea what it is you do. I see a prize draw, vouchers, selfies and good news stories but no structure or focus. It's just a collection of random stuff.

There is no motivation for anyone to advertise on the site. People posting their smiles won't be clicking on adverts. People reading good news stories are there for the stories not the promotions. If there was an advert then it needs to relate to the story. This means using an advert aggregator (like adwords).

But....

Many people now use advert and tracking blockers. And too much advertising can put people off.

It's not easy.

 

[Smile Wall]

I've just been looking at the site and still have no idea what it is you do. I see a prize draw, vouchers, selfies and good news stories but no structure or focus. It's just a collection of random stuff.

There is no motivation for anyone to advertise on the site. People posting their smiles won't be clicking on adverts. People reading good news stories are there for the stories not the promotions. If there was an advert then it needs to relate to the story. This means using an advert aggregator (like adwords).

But....

Many people now use advert and tracking blockers. And too much advertising can put people off.

It's not easy.

 

[Smile Wall]

We are in the process of looking into all of these to try and incorporate them into our site. Is there a formula for what you can charge for people to advertise on a site ? Last month we had over 37,000 impression on our site ? The Smile Wall, vouchers and articles were all designed to help with page views to try and increase advertising revenue. Thanks for your thoughts

 

[AstEver]

What products do you want to sell? Only banners or can you also offer mailing, social media, articles? I think that the website should be 'cleaner' as it is, in my opinion, too heavy to make any ads clickable, and clickable you want them to be. Make the website fit for advertising/monetising.

We wanted to offer new companies a chance to a advertise with us but are finding it really hard to get companies to sign up as they think the site is too good to be true. How can we convince people that our site really is genuine and find the right type of companies to advertise with us

Why do they think so?
Can you present the audience profile and a media pack to potential clients? What about statistics?

Is there a formula for what you can charge for people to advertise on a site ?

You can sell advertising banners for example on PPC, PPM, PPA basis or time basis (100% impressions during a period of time). You can display banners as images so that adblocks won't block it.
As for prices, you know the minimum price as it should not be less than what you earn from AdSense.

 

[Smile Wall]

What products do you want to sell? Only banners or can you also offer mailing, social media, articles? I think that the website should be 'cleaner' as it is, in my opinion, too heavy to make any ads clickable, and clickable you want them to be. Make the website fit for advertising/monetising.

Why do they think so?
Can you present the audience profile and a media pack to potential clients? What about statistics?

You can sell advertising banners for example on PPC, PPM, PPA basis or time basis (100% impressions during a period of time). You can display banners as images so that adblocks won't block it.
As for prices, you know the minimum price as it should not be less than what you earn from AdSense.

Thanks for this. Please can you explain what you mean about the site needing to be 'cleaner'. Our feedback on the site has always been positive so interested in what you views are. Thanks again and are still looking into the options available to us.

 

[AstEver]

Our feedback on the site has always been positive

Whose feedback? Since you are looking for advertisers, you need a feedback from them, from potential clients, businesses, etc.

I do not know the nomenclature but I mean that there are too many elements on your website which make it not advertiser-friendly. There are too many stimuli that are distracting a visitor's attention lowering the chance of making the advertising noticeable - and in effect clickable. Imagine that your potential client's i.e. advertiser's brand has green and yellow colours on their creative.

I would use more minimalistic design and had in mind both the user experience and advertising attractiveness. I believe there are web designers on the forum and hopefully they will express their opinion.

 

[DRDR]

People are signing up to your website to try and win the cash prizes. You mentioned you are trying to target students but it is mostly older people that are in your list it seems. And it is alarming that many people actually did not claim that prizes which is very unusual since I run competitions every week and I don't recall anyone ever not getting their prizes.

If I was an advertiser, I would need to know how many people visit your site per month and their demographics. I'll need to know in one glance what is it that your company does and how it can benefit me to buy placement from you. And right now, I don't know what your company actualy does or why you are giving money away so people can join your newsletter list. That tells me your newsletter database would be filled with people that just want price draws. Selling placement on your website is something that involves constant sales outreach to people that can make the decision, people will not come to you and offer to give you money to advertise on it. And you must have decent targeted monthly traffic as well.

 

[saythisinstead.co.uk]

Advertising got a lot more sophisticated when the internet came along.

Companies need to know what benefit they will get by advertising with you.

Your traffic is far too general to make it attractive to advertisers.

37,000 general visits represents a tiny number of revenue possibilities for any given ad in any given industry.

A huge amount of online advertising is done under the pay per click model. Any given ad may get only 1 or 2 [or even zero] clicks from your site in a month, which wouldn't be of interest to either party.

Needs a rethink.

 

[Darren_Ssc]

There are countless examples of businesses advertising on small charity websites, local sports clubs and such. They are not expecting any click-through traffic, they are paying for the follow link and the follow link only. I know of one company who sponsor over 100 local football teams, 99% of which are nowhere near where they operate.

Increasingly, buying links in this manner can be a waste of money but if the cost is low enough it is still deemed worth doing.

 

[saythisinstead.co.uk]

I agree that 'local' or 'specialist' [football] websites can just sell advertising/link-back space I've sold that kind of space in the past for some specialised sites.

The site owner in question here is struggling to find takers and I suspect it is a combination of the site [take a look at it if you haven't already], maybe the approach they are using or some other reason. Most business people I know these days understand that 'unmeasurable' advertising is a problem.

They could advertise and have the link go to somewhere they could measure....but if they see no clicks then they're unlikely to want to continue paying.

That's why I think a rethink is needed.

Regarding 'approach' I did some work a couple of years ago for a site run by 2 girls. They approached local firms looking for sponsorship in return for a free ad on their website. They door-knocked local businesses with the line....'we're not selling anything...just 2 local girls on the cadge'

We filled all the spots on the website in less than 2 days.

 

[Graham Tyers]

Your best bet is to join in the data rat-race and get a big 20-cogs banner on there and stick all the other data harvesters and paid-for-survey sites in your path and churn them visitors to within an inch of their lives.

 

[Darren_Ssc]

They door-knocked local businesses with the line....'we're not selling anything...just 2 local girls on the cadge'

Thanks for the tip, I may try that one.

 

[saythisinstead.co.uk]

Thanks for the tip, I may try that one.

YODA SAID:

Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try.

 

[fisicx]

There are countless examples of businesses advertising on small charity websites, local sports clubs and such.

Indeed there are. But your site bounces around all over the place with no logical structure or purpose.

Thanks for the tip, I may try that one.

Looking forwards to seeing you in drag...

 

[Annoying Donkey]

'we're not selling anything...just 2 local girls on the cadge'

We filled all the spots on the website in less than 2 days.

There you go... just grow a pair of boobs...

 

[saythisinstead.co.uk]

There you go... just grow a pair of boobs...

Or get a couple of girls to go out and use the same script?? ;0)