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

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

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.

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?

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=)

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.

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!

-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