Posted by arlene

Understand types of ad buys

Buying ad space is an art unto itself. You can do it yourself or hire a savvy media buyer to do the job for you. Hiring someone else (assuming this person is a real pro) has the advantage that he or she already knows the terrain and can smush together several clients’ media purchases to get a better deal for all. Whether you buy the ad space or spring for the services of someone savvy, you ought to understand what’s what. Generally, ad buys fall into these types:

Run-of-site: Your ad appears in rotation with other ads (it is rotated among all other ads that have been sold on a run-of-site basis). These might include ads from other companies as well as in-house ads produced by the site running the ads to promote its own features.

Specific pages: Your ad appears on selected pages containing content that’s of interest to your target users. For example, if you sell hiking boots, you may place ads on a site that deals with outdoor sports, but only on the pages devoted to hiking, climbing, or backpacking.

Keyword searches: Your ad appears on pages that are displayed when a user searches for a designated keyword. In this case, you pay for the opportunity to place your ad in front of any user who searches for a keyword. If your site sells bare root roses, for example, you might want to buy keywords such as gardening landscaping flower, or floribunda.

Targeted to users: Your ad is served only to those specific users you want to reach. You can target based on the browser or operating system used, the type of domain name (.org or .edu, for example), or the geographic location of the LISP. You can also target users who have certain preferences or profiles.

In general, to attract new customers, buy ad space in a broad market, such as run-of-site advertising on a general-interest site, a search engine, or a topic of general interest to your target market. To penetrate more deeply into a targeted market, buy select keywords on big sites or run-of-site ads on specialized niche sites. (The deepest targeting occurs, of course, when you target directly to users.) Sometimes placing your ad on a page immediately preceding the page that’s directly related to your product or service gets good results. With this head-them-off-at-the-pass strategy, you can divert members of your target audience to your own site and its offerings before they open a page full of content related to your topic. The idea is that people click on the first instance of whatever they seek. If they see your ad before they get to the goodies, that’s where they click.

Negotiate good rates

Like used-car prices, online ad rates start high and are almost always negotiable. Don’t assume you have to pay the rate that’s published or first quoted. Your initial offer can be less than the asking rate: Up to 30 percent less can be reasonable. Also, like most commodities, ad space can be had at a bargain during slow sales periods. Mid-winter is one such slow time, because sales are often sluggish after the end of the year, especially in January. Also, you can often get better rates by making your buy through a media buy service, although you pay for the service itself, which may cancel out your gains.

Centralized services such as bCentral’s AdStore (store.bcentralcoma) can be useful for smaller budgets. These services sell ad space in big sites, such as major search engines, and in targeted niche sites for various industries. They have the collective-pricing power of media buy services but don’t make recommendations or do custom buying for you.

Exchange ad space

Another option for extending your reach without laying out a lot of cash is to trade ad space on your site for ad space on another site. You can get even more clever, in fact, and barter your ad space for some other commodity. For example, you may be able to give a specific amount of ad space on your site to another business in exchange for print ads in that business’s print directories or newsletters.

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