For Sale By Publisher Helps Site Owners Sell Their Own Ads
For Sale By Publisher today launched a directory of web sites seeking to sell their own ads and bypass ad networks. Direct sales of ads is attractive to publishers because it allows them to keep 100% of their ad dollars, and attractive to advertisers because it lets them cut specific, long-term deals with site owners.
Many blogs and small site owners go this route, often by selling monthly sponsorships. These ads can be very lucrative, especially for web sites that operate in a hard to reach niche, but they are also a pain for web site owners to manage. Unless you have the luxury of hiring a sales staff, finding advertisers and managing the sale of ads can be a tiresome chore that distracts from other jobs that web publishers face (like site management and content creation).
For Sale By Publisher hopes to create a directory of these do-it-yourself ad sellers so that advertisers can easily locate places to advertise, and publishers can spend more time creating content on their web sites. The service is a simple directory that lets site owners set up a profile for their site that includes a description, traffic metrics, contact method, and the type of ads that are available (text, image, interstitial, email, or RSS). Advertisers can then browse the directory and contact site owners directly.
Though a very simple service, I think For Sale By Publisher could be a helpful one for small time publishers. It can let them focus on creating their sites and not have to worry about locating advertisers, which can be a major time drain. I'm not clear how For Sale By Publisher expects to make money themselves -- for now it appears they hope to sell advertising on their publisher directory, which doesn't seem like it will work long term. But there is certainly the potential to sell ad brokering and management services to publishers, and/or placement services for advertisers, once their directory is filled out.
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Very cool. Never really understood why this wasn't more of the norm.
Posted by: HighFivez.com | August 16, 2007 9:36 PM
This looks like a great idea. Their home page has quite a few typos on it though - hopefully these aren't representative of wider sloppiness.
I know that this sounds pedantic, but attention to detail counts.
Posted by: Jack | August 17, 2007 1:14 AM
@Jack: It's an indication that we're coders and designers, and not copywriters, which we're hiring to go over the site with a fine tooth comb.
I hope the design and functionality of the site puts you at easy.
Posted by: Mubashar Iqbal | August 17, 2007 7:33 AM
Sounds like a good idea. I find the font hard to read though.
Posted by: Ali | August 17, 2007 7:49 AM
I like the concept. But what does it say about their business/idea if AdSense is so highly visible on the site? You are trying to offer an alternative to ad networks but are using them prominently.
Posted by: Ryan Williams | August 17, 2007 12:25 PM
Beautiful layout, so quick and easy to use I almost didn't notice the Google ads while signing up. Wondering if this means their site members can't advertise on the site...
Posted by: Robert MacEwan | August 19, 2007 5:19 PM