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While most display advertising revenue is generated through traditional banner ads, revenue from less traditional advertising implementations is growing significantly. Many publishers who sell directly to advertisers would like to expand beyond the IAB standard ad units in their proposals, but struggle to come up with ideas that excite advertisers without being too overwhelming from a technical perspective.
There are multiple benefits to including non-traditional placements on an advertising proposal. First, these placements help your proposal to stand out; most advertisers are always on the look-out for new ideas, and are anxious to try new, creative ideas. Second, because many of these implementations create additional ad “inventory,” they can increase your overall earnings even if the number of visitors to your site remains steady. In other words, they can help you make more money from your existing traffic base. (By the way, if you’re enjoying this article, you may want to subscribe to our free newsletter; we’ll send monetization tips straight to your inbox each day.)
You’ve probably come across ads that pop up over a website for a few seconds. While many visitors may view these as obnoxious, they are very effective. Below is the ad that shows up over Entrepreneur.com for a few seconds when visitors navigate to that site:
Many advertisers love these types of ads because they’re hard to ignore (meaning that they know their messaging will at least be seen). These should be used somewhat sparingly in order to maintain a good user experience, but can definitely generate some incremental revenue.
More and more sites (including this one) are now using Hello Bars to drive visitors to important parts of their site. While this implementation is most commonly used to highlight internal features (such as a membership or newsletter subscription), it can easily accommodate an advertiser’s messaging as well.
Below is another slightly different implementation of a similar idea. This may be easier to implement for many advertisers since it utilizes a standard size of creative (in this case, a 728×90 leaderboard):
A number of sites use “pop-ins” in the corners of their pages to present visitors with ways to click through to other popular pages on the site. This implementation can also be used as part of a package for a third party advertiser.
Here’s an example of this in use on Wired.com. This ad is small enough as to not be too obnoxious or obtrusive, but is effective because it naturally draws the eye of visitors.
For sites that have their own video, inserting pre-roll ads (i.e., as that run before the video plays) can be a very attractive offering to advertisers. Inserting video ads is pretty straightforward with services such as Viddler.
ESPN.com sells quite a bit of pre-roll video; they have video players integrated into most of the site, and generally run an ad before a clip from one of their shows:
For some advertisers, it may make sense to target only visitors in certain areas of the country. Most ad serving platforms, including DFP, allow publishers to go all the way down to the city level.
If you have a potential advertiser who is promoting a product or service that will have regional appeal, offer to target specific regions of the country for their campaign. Here’s a shot of the control panel in DFP that allows you to target only specific ads with your campaign:
For more ways to boost performance, also see our feature on How to Improve Advertiser Performance.
Allowing advertisers to sponsor articles or groups of articles is a great way to get them additional exposure without creating too much new content. There are a number of different ways that this can be packaged and presented; below is an example from Entrepreneur.com, with three different advertisers sponsoring articles:
A “welcome page” ad implementation effectively creates a brand new page whose primary content is an advertisement. Forbes.com uses a welcome screen to show an ad whenever visitors navigate to their site:
After a few seconds, visitors are automatically forwarded on to the page within Forbes.com that they were attempting to visit. This high impact placement may lead to some user frustration, but is a great way to prominently position an advertisement. If you run this type of ad, be sure to charge a significant premium for it.
For sites that send out an email newsletters, there’s an opportunity to include advertiser banners within the body. This high visibility placement is a great way to monetize email, and something we do with out mailings:
If you’ve developed a mobile app on any platform, you have a great line item to add to any proposal. Offering an advertiser the ability to “own” your mobile app is a very attractive line item. This is generally done through banner ads (the 320×50 is the standard for mobile devices, while a 728×90 works for iPads).
Below is an example of a sponsored app in action; Dunkin’ Donuts sponsored the “Beat the Streak” app created by Major League Baseball:
If you have a large list of email subscribers, you may be able to “rent” out this list to advertisers. If a potential advertiser is active in email marketing, offer to include sponsored emails on their next campaign. This essentially involves you (the publisher) sending an email to your subscribers on their behalf. The example below is from WhichTestWon, a site to which we subscribe. They occasionally send sponsored emails on behalf of third party advertisers:
For more on how to sell and send these, see our Ultimate Guide to Sponsored Emails.
If you have a large social media following, you may be able to monetize it by making posts that mention an advertiser. Here’s an example of a sponsored tweet from Perez Hilton, who was compensated to ask his followers to engage with the official Twitter handle for an upcoming theatrical release:
We’ve covered this topic in great detail in our feature article 101 Ways to Make Money with Twitter.
Running online conferences or webinars can be a great way to generate some additional revenue. If you can present on an interesting topic and get a decent number of visitors to attend, offer up a sponsorship role to an advertiser.
Clickz.com runs webinars regularly, and signs up premium advertisers (such as IBM and Bing) to sponsor these events:
If you have a paid product on your site, you can offer an advertiser the opportunity to “sponsor” a free trial for all visitors. This basically involves making the premium features of your product free for a set length of time, and acknowledging the advertiser as the one responsible for delivering this benefit:
Many sites now offer advertisers a way to take over the white space around their normal site with hard-to-ignore ads. This practice is known as “skinning” the site, and it results in a high impact ad around the borders of the normal site dimensions. Here’s an example of a custom skin on IMDb.com to promote a TV show:
This takes a bit more work from a technical perspective, but can be easily replicated once you’ve figured out the initial specifications.
The opportunities for creative ad placements continue to multiply; there are dozens of unique ideas that publishers can use to improve the advertiser experience as well as their own bottom line. If you’re interested in expanding your offerings beyond banner ads, the best advice we can give is to keep your eyes open when browsing. There are creative implementations all around you; take note of those that you think are well done and easily added to your site.
Have another idea for a unique line item to include on a digital ad campaign? Let us know about it in the comments!
While most display advertising revenue is generated through traditional banner ads, revenue from less traditional advertising implementations is growing significantly. Many publishers who sell directly to advertisers would like to expand beyond the IAB standard ad units in their proposals, but struggle to come up with ideas that excite advertisers without being too overwhelming from a technical perspective.
There are multiple benefits to including non-traditional placements on an advertising proposal. First, these placements help your proposal to stand out; most advertisers are always on the look-out for new ideas, and are anxious to try new, creative ideas. Second, because many of these implementations create additional ad “inventory,” they can increase your overall earnings even if the number of visitors to your site remains steady. In other words, they can help you make more money from your existing traffic base. (By the way, if you’re enjoying this article, you may want to subscribe to our free newsletter; we’ll send monetization tips straight to your inbox each day.)
You’ve probably come across ads that pop up over a website for a few seconds. While many visitors may view these as obnoxious, they are very effective. Below is the ad that shows up over Entrepreneur.com for a few seconds when visitors navigate to that site:
Many advertisers love these types of ads because they’re hard to ignore (meaning that they know their messaging will at least be seen). These should be used somewhat sparingly in order to maintain a good user experience, but can definitely generate some incremental revenue.
More and more sites (including this one) are now using Hello Bars to drive visitors to important parts of their site. While this implementation is most commonly used to highlight internal features (such as a membership or newsletter subscription), it can easily accommodate an advertiser’s messaging as well.
Below is another slightly different implementation of a similar idea. This may be easier to implement for many advertisers since it utilizes a standard size of creative (in this case, a 728×90 leaderboard):
A number of sites use “pop-ins” in the corners of their pages to present visitors with ways to click through to other popular pages on the site. This implementation can also be used as part of a package for a third party advertiser.
Here’s an example of this in use on Wired.com. This ad is small enough as to not be too obnoxious or obtrusive, but is effective because it naturally draws the eye of visitors.
For sites that have their own video, inserting pre-roll ads (i.e., as that run before the video plays) can be a very attractive offering to advertisers. Inserting video ads is pretty straightforward with services such as Viddler.
ESPN.com sells quite a bit of pre-roll video; they have video players integrated into most of the site, and generally run an ad before a clip from one of their shows:
For some advertisers, it may make sense to target only visitors in certain areas of the country. Most ad serving platforms, including DFP, allow publishers to go all the way down to the city level.
If you have a potential advertiser who is promoting a product or service that will have regional appeal, offer to target specific regions of the country for their campaign. Here’s a shot of the control panel in DFP that allows you to target only specific ads with your campaign:
For more ways to boost performance, also see our feature on How to Improve Advertiser Performance.
Allowing advertisers to sponsor articles or groups of articles is a great way to get them additional exposure without creating too much new content. There are a number of different ways that this can be packaged and presented; below is an example from Entrepreneur.com, with three different advertisers sponsoring articles:
A “welcome page” ad implementation effectively creates a brand new page whose primary content is an advertisement. Forbes.com uses a welcome screen to show an ad whenever visitors navigate to their site:
After a few seconds, visitors are automatically forwarded on to the page within Forbes.com that they were attempting to visit. This high impact placement may lead to some user frustration, but is a great way to prominently position an advertisement. If you run this type of ad, be sure to charge a significant premium for it.
For sites that send out an email newsletters, there’s an opportunity to include advertiser banners within the body. This high visibility placement is a great way to monetize email, and something we do with out mailings:
If you’ve developed a mobile app on any platform, you have a great line item to add to any proposal. Offering an advertiser the ability to “own” your mobile app is a very attractive line item. This is generally done through banner ads (the 320×50 is the standard for mobile devices, while a 728×90 works for iPads).
Below is an example of a sponsored app in action; Dunkin’ Donuts sponsored the “Beat the Streak” app created by Major League Baseball:
If you have a large list of email subscribers, you may be able to “rent” out this list to advertisers. If a potential advertiser is active in email marketing, offer to include sponsored emails on their next campaign. This essentially involves you (the publisher) sending an email to your subscribers on their behalf. The example below is from WhichTestWon, a site to which we subscribe. They occasionally send sponsored emails on behalf of third party advertisers:
For more on how to sell and send these, see our Ultimate Guide to Sponsored Emails.
If you have a large social media following, you may be able to monetize it by making posts that mention an advertiser. Here’s an example of a sponsored tweet from Perez Hilton, who was compensated to ask his followers to engage with the official Twitter handle for an upcoming theatrical release:
We’ve covered this topic in great detail in our feature article 101 Ways to Make Money with Twitter.
Running online conferences or webinars can be a great way to generate some additional revenue. If you can present on an interesting topic and get a decent number of visitors to attend, offer up a sponsorship role to an advertiser.
Clickz.com runs webinars regularly, and signs up premium advertisers (such as IBM and Bing) to sponsor these events:
If you have a paid product on your site, you can offer an advertiser the opportunity to “sponsor” a free trial for all visitors. This basically involves making the premium features of your product free for a set length of time, and acknowledging the advertiser as the one responsible for delivering this benefit:
Many sites now offer advertisers a way to take over the white space around their normal site with hard-to-ignore ads. This practice is known as “skinning” the site, and it results in a high impact ad around the borders of the normal site dimensions. Here’s an example of a custom skin on IMDb.com to promote a TV show:
This takes a bit more work from a technical perspective, but can be easily replicated once you’ve figured out the initial specifications.
The opportunities for creative ad placements continue to multiply; there are dozens of unique ideas that publishers can use to improve the advertiser experience as well as their own bottom line. If you’re interested in expanding your offerings beyond banner ads, the best advice we can give is to keep your eyes open when browsing. There are creative implementations all around you; take note of those that you think are well done and easily added to your site.
Have another idea for a unique line item to include on a digital ad campaign? Let us know about it in the comments!