» Online Advertising, Profits or Pointless?

When I started Positive Space I may have been a bit naïve, I thought that Adsense could result in some decent pocket change, if only I could get a couple hundred unique visitors a day. Boy was I wrong, but at that time I could really care less I was more interested in blogging for the sake of self-education and personal development. While my reasons for blogging haven’t changed much, my faith in online advertising has.

The truth is that as an online publisher, you can expect horrible pay unless you really have a lot of time and resources. While it is possible to “optimize” your ad placements to obtain better results, what this really boils down to is making them extremely intrusive and highly compromising good design sensibility. Earlier today I read an article entitled “On advertising” by Mandy Brown that really put it into perspective for me.

Mandy states that “any economy which charges ever less for ever more intrusive ads will eventually be successful not in creating wealth but in driving the readers away,” which I can’t help but agree with. As I approach what is inevitably the necessity for the 3rd design of Positive Space, I have seriously begun questioning what methods I will use to attempt to create some sort of revenue. This year’s tax return has made it painfully obvious that my current approach is nowhere near adequate.

We Need a Standard for Evaluation

The truth is no matter what approach is taken, nothing will work until some sort of standard for measuring both the direct and indirect results on online advertising. I mean lets face it, PPC sucks and CPMs are way too low and only getting lower. Not to mention all the tricks that “savvy” individuals use to game these models in their favor, which only decrease the effectiveness of advertiser’s initiatives causing them to question their spending even more.

Then we have to think about the factors outside the control of the content publisher. Neither models take into consideration the effect that poorly designed ads have on the content providers themselves. Most online advertisements are comprised of a bunch of cheap gimmicks that ultimately only annoy rather than intrigue, as Mandy has stated.

My Quasi-Conclusion

The only thing that can be concretely drawn from this situation is that as it currently stands online advertising is in need of some desperate help. The market is primed to reward someone who can devise a solution that benefits both sides this dilemma.

I am not afraid to say that I am currently able to pay my hosting bills and that’s really about it, which is fine for a personal blog, but not encouraging. In fact, this site easily obtains more traffic and interaction than most sites, which to me paints a bleak future for the viability of online advertising as it currently stands.

03/09

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9 Responses to “Online Advertising, Profits or Pointless?”

J. Jeffryes
March 10th, 2009 at 8:46 am

One of two things will happen:

1. micropayments will become reality, and readers will pay bloggers directly for content

or

2. the promise of big money from advertising will continue luring in more new writers than the number that wise up and quit

People still spend a lot on lottery tickets, so I’m betting for #2.
summerbl4ck
March 10th, 2009 at 9:55 am

You’re absolutely correct that the online advertising industry is in crisis. Banner ads don’t pull an adequate customer response to justify the cost. Interactive advertising does marginally better, but still costly and instrusive. Readers are becoming increasingly savvy about consuming content and interacting online while also filtering out distractions like banner ads. Unfortunately this also means that the ability to use ad revenue to cover your costs of doing business is also diminishing. I expect we’ll see subscriptions coming sooner than later for everything from news to magazines and blogs and even social media.
P.J. Onori
March 10th, 2009 at 10:04 pm

If you figure this problem out, believe me, you won’t need to advertise on this site as you will already be a billionaire.

I too have spent quite a bit of time wondering how to create any semblance of a sustainable ad model for my site. From my perspective, one needs ample amounts of either two things — cred/authority in their respective field or oodles of traffic volume.

Both require a tremendous amount of effort, each for different yet equally difficult reasons. Even then, it can still be hard to get a serious income from writing online.

Good luck to you on this. Really, if you do find a way to make this happen, write a book and you’ll make far more in the book sales then you’d ever make in ads.
Zinni
March 10th, 2009 at 10:40 pm

P.J.

Unfortunately what you are saying is so true, online advertising is desperately in need of an innovation. I wish I ad the answers because I would definitely write a book about it, but right now I am thinking way smaller, maybe products?

The truth is, there has to be a way for a reasonably successful blogger to make money from their efforts. The audience definitely exists, John Chow and the other “make money online” guys have proven this. We know the problem exists, now creativity needs to solve it…
Faith
March 11th, 2009 at 11:31 am

Unfortunately, the intrusive, gimmicky nature of much advertising wasn’t born online. Everyone has to decide if he is a Sham-Wow or a Lexus. There’s a conventional way to advertise siding and windows, mass market residential real estate services, and used cars - then there’s Absolut. Readers scan newspaper headlines and ignore the ads, flip magazine pages past obvious ads, throw away the coupon mailers the mail carrier brings, and mute the television. Online they just click away. Not coming back to a site is the same as throwing away the coupon mailer unconciously, out of habit.

Businesses that use shameless, tasteless huckstering would say that if they are making money, who’s to say it’s wrong? On the other hand, a lot of people who make the Web their business have, shall we say, more refined sensibilities? Or at least higher standards - we want to be surrounded by truth, beauty, and good taste, and to be seen as people who know the difference.

Following Sturgeon, 90% of online advertising is almost inevitably crap because 90% of everything is, well, crap.
Stewart Kirk
March 12th, 2009 at 9:15 am

Isn’t the truth that almost everyone (often rightly) beleives that nearly all online ads are either pointless or scams; thus no-one clicks through that much anyway. It doesn’t seem to make much sense to in effect de-optimise your blog or website just for the sake of a few pennies when ultimately you may end up driving people away. At that point the core purpose of your site (selling your own services or promulgating your own ideas) becomes lost.

If, and when, online advertising becomes something other than internet enabled snake-oil salesmen, and advertiser work with the website owners to ensue the ads really are appropriate to the content and not intrusive on the content or the design of the website, then website owners may actually be in a position to make some money out of a mutually beneficial arrangement.
EXXCORPIO
March 18th, 2009 at 2:34 pm

I think ad works for a blog with a good content and even can make paying your hosting bills but, if its intrusive and not of a good taste it’s gonna kick all your visitor away.
samantha
March 26th, 2009 at 7:40 am

now I feel even worse. Out of work 118.dollars to my name rent due and i thought internet! I hear people can make money doing that!bad idea huh? Thanks for the eye opener.
AndrewBoldman
June 4th, 2009 at 7:54 am

Great post! Just wanted to let you know you have a new subscriber- me!