Advertising: Tips for Bloggers - part I

Hello everyone!  In this first article I'll be answering questions that concern those of you who may be interested in or might already be using your blog to host ads.  Next week I'll be covering the other side...questions posed by those of you who'd like to know more about advertising on blogs for your business.  But first I'd like to start out by saying:

1. Please know that I am not a trained professional in the area of advertising and marketing.  I have learned quite a bit since I first began offering ads here on Creature Comforts, so that is the knowledge I will be sharing with you.
2. This series will be more beneficial to all of us if everyone takes part by leaving comments, questions and feedback from their own experiences as each topic is addressed.  It's okay if you are just starting out and are feeling a bit behind.  I believe that there is no such thing as a stupid question, so please ask away.

Sooo...let's get started with the nitty-gritty, sometimes confusing and important world of advertising shall we!  Let's begin with some of the more commonly asked questions:

"I'm thinking about offering advertising on my blog, but I don't really know how to get started or when the right time is to begin."

Well, I personally waited to offer advertising here on Creature Comforts 
until I felt that there was enough incoming traffic to provide a 
worthwhile service to potential advertisers.  I had also begun 
receiving quite a few queries regarding ad placement, so I decided to 
take the plunge.  I don't think there is a specific science to this...
you really need to do what you feel is right based upon what you know about your blog and your readers.  Be prepared to offer in depth 
information regarding your statistics to interested advertisers as well as provide assistance to advertisers who need extra help when it comes to ad design, etc.

Additional things you may wish to consider:

• Offering advertising changes your blog from a pastime into a business.  Are you able to devote the time needed to keep it functioning at it's current volume?  Will this change be an asset to your life or an unwanted stress?
• Advertisers reply upon consistent content to drive visitors to your site where their ads will be featured.  Will you be able to deliver this consistency over an extended period of time?  What will you do in case of an emergency or other unexpected event?  How will your blog function at that point in time, and how will that decision effect your advertisers?
• How will you respond to advertiser interest?  Will you put together an ad sheet that outlines your rates and stats, or will you simply copy and paste that info in your reply email?
• As a business owner you will need to pay taxes on the money you earn.  Be prepared to apply with the proper agencies and keep careful records on your earnings for tax purposes.
• Do you have a method for accepting payments?  I use Paypal and have found it to be very useful.  If you don't have an account set up, you may wish to do so before you offer advertising.

"I'm not sure how much to charge for ads on my blog."

There is a basic formula that can be applied to help you determine the range that your ad rates should fall within: $.01 per page view per day for a basic ad.  Note: your number of readers is different than your number of page views (it will be lower), so be sure to calculate using the correct number.  Using this formula, if you have 10,000 views a day your ad should be priced at about $100 for a standard monthly ad.  That being said, pricing is completely up to you and in many ways will be determined by the content you feature and the sorts of advertisers who are interested in your blog.  For a reference point - I have intentionally priced ads here on Creature Comforts well below the industry standard.  A large reason for this is my desire to make advertising affordable for the independent artisans that I feature.  Were I to strictly feature high-end products I would be capable of charging more, but that isn't something that I personally choose to do. 

Another route 
would be to contact other blogs with a similar demographic as yours and 
request ad rates from them.  This will at the very least give you a
 good place to start.  Ultimately you will just nee to use your best judgement and if necessary test out different rates to see how the response is.

"I've been offering advertising, but so far I have had little interest or none at all.  How can I get people to advertise with me?"

It can definitely be disheartening when you first start out.  Try to keep your chin up...you can turn your blog into a profitable business with some hard work and planning.  The first two pieces of advice that come to my mind are:

1. Be consistent.  Keep a consistent level of quality in the content you post.
2. Blog often.  The more you post, the more visitors you will have.  That being said, quality does tend to outweigh quantity in terms of gaining loyal readers.  So try to keep both of these rules in mind simultaneously and you will build interest and trust with your readers and potential advertisers.

To break the ice you might try a limited-time special for ads on your blog, or host a giveaway with the prize package including free advertising.  I also highly encourage ad trades with other businesses/bloggers who share similar interests as you.  To do this, you can either approach the bloggers who you have a rapport with and offer to do a trade, or announce your interest in trading on your blog or other social media site such as Twitter and Facebook.  I would suggest limiting ad trades to just a few, and select from those that are the most relevant to your blog.

"What sorts of businesses should I accept advertisements for on my blog?"

Again this will be entirely up to you to decided based upon your personal aesthetic as well as your reader's interests.  It can be tempting (especially at first) to take on anyone who shows interest, but ultimately it won't do much good for either you, your readers or those advertisers if their products are not a good fit with your site.

"What size should the ads be?"

You can offer ads in whatever size you want.  Keep in mind that they
 will need to fit inside of one of the columns on your blog.  If you
 don't know what size your column is, do a search on your blog host's 
help database... they should have info on this for you.  An easy way to
 check on the size of an ad or image on the web is to use your mouse and
 right-click the image (or control click).  This will open up an info
 box where you will see a button titled "Properties." Click this and you
 will see the size of the image.  The image size is measured in pixels.  An ad should be at a resolution of 72dpi (dots per inch) to make it web ready - anything higher will slow your site down.

So that's it for now.  I hope that some of the information here was helpful to you.  If you'd like to print this article for reference and printer friendly version is available throught the link below.  If you have a question not answered in this post 
please feel free to leave a comment below or in the message board and I'll try to answer it as
 well.  Remember, your personal experience and insight is valuable for all of us and I'd love for you to share any thoughts you might have with us.  Thanks for reading!  xo Ez

Comments

[Caila]

Thank you so much for such an informative post! I'll have too look up the rest of this series. I took a class from Alt Summit today with Melanie of You Are My Fave and she suggested this post. I'm so glad I took the time to look it up! I'm not quite there yet, and I've only really been blogging for 5 months, but I have this bookmarked for future reference. Thanks again!

[anne]

This is so helpful, Ez! Thank you!