29 Responses to “Advertising on Okdork?”

• Cameron Olthuis
  March 29th, 2007
  5:56 pm
  
  

  I think you should find some people to sponsor you personally… for example some burrito place. Then you can eat free burritos everyday and tell us all how much you love that place.

• Noah Kagan
  March 29th, 2007
  5:57 pm
  
  

  Cameron,

  “Just when I think you can’t get any dumber, you go and do something like this…and TOTALLY redeem yourself.” Brilliant. Bonus points for who knows what movie that line is from.

• jonathan
  March 29th, 2007
  6:16 pm
  
  

  dumb and dumber

  put an add to ottobib.com on here, and ottobib.com will link to okdork. completely irrelevant linkage

• Will Kern
  March 29th, 2007
  6:25 pm
  
  

  Dumb and Dumber….so what do I win, my microphone finally

  Will

• Marshall Middle
  March 29th, 2007
  6:54 pm
  
  

  The best part of the movie is when they’re driving around on that dinky scooter. Sell ad space, or affiliate yourself with things that you like and use, like that nifty phone your were so enammered with

• Johns Wu
  March 29th, 2007
  6:58 pm
  
  

  it probably isn’t worthwhile for you to put adsense on this site, since your topic probably pays a low CPC. also, your template isn’t really optimized for a high ad CTR.

  BUT, since you are a PR6, you can make ez money selling links through text-link-ads.com. keep in mind though, that you would probably make more selling these links yourself. it just takes a little more effort to manage.

  let me know if you decide to sell links, b/c i’ll probably buy one off you haha.

• Will Kern
  March 29th, 2007
  7:01 pm
  
  

  I agree with Marshall, if you are going to sell space, pimp it out to companies / sponsors that fit the theme of the site. Or, what if you had some sort of arrangement with a few companies where you had a sponsored area that companies could intro their new products in, this would be a good segment to do some market testing with…..

• Sean Ness
  March 29th, 2007
  7:41 pm
  
  

  Most people probably read the blog via an RSS feed and never would see the ads anyway, so, no I don’t think it would impact that many people.

• The Financial Ladder
  March 29th, 2007
  7:57 pm
  
  

  You should advertise on your blog, I’m surprised your not. You can make a nice chuck of change from it. Plus perhaps you can hook us up with some of those ad firms and help support some of the little people

• Brian Breslin
  March 29th, 2007
  8:43 pm
  
  

  if i send you a gift certificate to a burrito place, can i have a banner that says “okdork powered by Brian’s generosity” ?

  or how about we make some fake ads of you endorsing stuff. like mentos, or other items.

• sri
  March 30th, 2007
  12:01 am
  
  

  I think ur green compliments H&R block’s colors. U should approach them…or u could simply put H&R block ads urself and send them an invoice every month. Who knows, it might get paid.

  I am going to put a banner of a penis pump on my site and send an invoice to Noah Kagan.

• sri
  March 30th, 2007
  12:29 am
  
  

  Noah, idea for u.

  Approach VC’s and say u need $10 million. Come up with this fantastic business model that will sit well with them. Now, after getting the money, chuck ur business model out of the window.

  Put the $10 million in a CD earning 5%. U will get around $500,000 a year. Show the VC that u were profitable by $300,000 and u pocket the balance. They will be extremely happy knowing that u are profitable even in ur first year. Tell them ur target for the next year is $400,000 and keep doing the same. They will be so happy with u. In the 3rd year, tell them ur closing shop for health reasons and return $9.5 million back to them. They will gladly take back that amount.

  Ethics and me are like 2 peas in a pod.

• Joe Budde
  March 30th, 2007
  6:54 am
  
  

  Do the ads. I like the new product testing idea…

  Make sure the ads are those flashy moving around a lot ones. Or maybe the underlined word ones where with a mouse over a video pops up and wont go away for 10 seconds. I think those are my favorite.

  Also, I don’t think I would mind if you did a forbes.com type ad with the quote at the top. They have some solid quotes up there. To be honest, I just like seeing the quote most times I go there to read the articles.

• Joel Mueller
  March 30th, 2007
  8:41 am
  
  

  I’m not connecting the focus of growing the site (not monetarily) and getting sponsors/advertisers. How would Mehul’s suggestion of adding ads increase your eyeballs?

• MosiLager
  March 30th, 2007
  8:45 am
  
  

  Have firefox with adblock so won’t see the ads anyway… so go ahead, try it out.

• Jason H.
  March 30th, 2007
  9:51 am
  
  

  1. Sign up for affiliate programs with CJ or Linkshare, and only advertise for the companies that you care about.

  2. Do what TC is doing—get four to six companies (that you love) to sponsor your site by putting their square banners on your site, and charge them a monthly fee.

  3. Call your lovely friend Heather Luttrell at IndieClick to see if she knows any cool, new advertising model that you can try out on your site.

  And, here is a question for you, Noah—What kind of Ads do you like to see and click on other people’s blogs?

  P.S. Sri, for a second, I was wondering what the hell were you smoking with your “penis pump banner� comment, but you came back with your $10 million in a 5% CD idea—it was simply brilliant

• Daniel Elmore
  March 30th, 2007
  10:02 am
  
  

  > 1. Would you mind if there were ads?
  Yes. Especially AdSense. Text-link-ads are pretty non-obtrusive though, I guess I wouldn’t mind them that much.

  > 2. What can we do to make it unique, tasteful and enjoyable?
  That is the unanswered question in online advertising. Good luck.

  > 3. If you think ads suck, what can we do to grow Okdork.com?
  Whaa, it’s not growing already? I think you need to know deep down what you want to achieve with the blog. If it’s all about the numbers, then sure you can do some hacks to jump into a new quadrant. But if you’re happy with what you’ve accomplished and simply want to keep expanding it, maybe you just need to keep doing what your doing, after all it is working.

• wendyness
  March 30th, 2007
  11:07 am
  
  

  I already feel like you advertise at times when you have those user generated posts that have the, “posted by xx from xx.com.” So maybe bank on that a little more and sell a post to a company with real product; have the post explain the product or why you’d use it. Endorsing in a sense, but not.

• Clay Cook
  March 30th, 2007
  11:49 am
  
  

  Do sponsorship - your CPM will be so much higher.

• Sean Tierney
  March 30th, 2007
  1:26 pm
  
  

  Noah-

  -dedicated sponsorship is the way to go if you can swing it but I don’t have any specific sponsors to recommend. You’ve got a solid and vocal readership which is definitely worth something.

  -consider doing a “Product review Thursday” that is paid “advertorial” but still an honest critique. You won’t lose readers as long as you keep it authentic and the advertiser understands that you’re not going to kiss ass and taint your review.

  -i just put adsense on my blog yesterday to test it out so I’ll let you know if it produces anything. My gut is that the sponsor is the way to go as people have suggested here.

  -Sean Ness’s point about people using RSS is a good one. You have well over 500 readers which is the threshold to be able to do the feedburner ads. You’re already using feedburner… why not activate those and see how they perform? My partner uses them on his blog http://www.kstaken.com and they produce more than his adsense.

  -as far as how to grow it- you’re kickin ass now. just continue to be authentic Noah and it will continue to build. How about doing a coast-to-coast roadtrip couch-surfing at the homes of your readers who volunteer to give you a place to stay? Everyone who has a blog would undoubtedly write something about it. Plot your trip out on wayfaring.com and let people follow. Find a sponsor. My buddies did it w/ 10mph.com and had Chipotle provide them free burritos the entire way…Hell, i would do this myself right now if we weren’t doing JumpBox. make a documentary about interviewing others and exploring the age-old question of “how do you know what you want to be when you grow up”- that in itself could be your calling…

  sean

• Noah Kagan
  March 30th, 2007
  2:53 pm
  
  

  I love my readers. Seriously, you are friends not readers. That is too one-sided. I hate ads. You guys/girl pose great questions/suggestions.

  My thought now is I don’t want to put adsense, I do want to do something cool and I want to give back to you.

  Here is my idea based on your input:

  I only take sponsorships of cool things that I can give out to you. Simple? Fun? Woot!

• Noah Kagan
  March 30th, 2007
  2:55 pm
  
  

  Daniel,

  Great questions. I think consistency is key and my site with you has grown slowly. Just the way I love my chicken cooked, slow roasted. Quality is always over quantity in my book.

  Money is not that important to me and growth is. Mehul asked me what I thought about putting up ads and so I thought I would pose it to the people who would have to see the ads.

  I think the interesting point of advertising is when you actually show sponsored/advertised things to people who WANT to see them.

• Noah Kagan
  March 30th, 2007
  2:57 pm
  
  

  Joel,

  You are spot on. Money is not the priority of the site for me, it is growing the readership. I just was curious if there was a way that helped growth, made money and I could give back to you. I don’t have the answer…

  Brian,

  I will slut myself out any day or time for a great burrito=)

• Noah Kagan
  March 30th, 2007
  2:59 pm
  
  

  Sri,

  You are ridiculous. I definitely played with the magic 8-ball today and it said that you have a great opportunity with stand up comedy. Want to do a weekly comedy post related to business on okdork?

• sri
  March 30th, 2007
  3:28 pm
  
  

  Noah…thanks…sounds interesting!! Weekly basis would be hard. Even comics recycle their jokes. But I can give it a shot.

  Jason H, glad u liked the idea. I think its better for start-ups to put their VC money in a CD and use the CD money to build the company.

• Brian Breslin
  March 30th, 2007
  7:37 pm
  
  

  ok i have a crazy idea for a new model of ads. its a hybrid of two existing models. I don’t have the math skills to do it, but i’d be happy share it. cpm+cpc bonuses what i think would be neat would be a video ad. get a cool company you like to sponsor 1 ad slot under your photo. no audio unless you mouse over it.

  i do like the VC idea. if they go for it, can i get in on the gig?

• Justin
  March 31st, 2007
  12:41 am
  
  

  just monetize it man. take it as free income that you can go eat a bit more, save up to buy a house, pay for every increasing gas or even donate to a cause…

  like jason calacanis, he takes his earnings from his new vodcast and gives it to a charity. if the ads are not obnoxious, i dont think it will kill the experience.

  on my blog, i dont earn much but i treat it as a learning experience to understand how ads can work better through different placement strategies

• Matador
  April 1st, 2007
  2:27 am
  
  

  I think you should just monetize it. Everyones doing it.

• Tony
  April 2nd, 2007
  2:48 pm
  
  

  Serve AdSense just to SE traffic. And go with text-links for everybody, we’re not going to notice them anyways.

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