Monetizing Social Network

[anand84]

What is the best way to monetize a social network like MySpace? On websites such as this, the traffic can be huge, but close to none will be interested in clicking on ads.

One of my friends has a similar website close to 2 million hits per month but monetary wise, it has not been anything good. How can he monetize his site to the maximum extent?

Thanks

[markwelch]

The key here is usually context -- finding ways to present appropriate advertisements in exactly the right context.

However, no matter what you do, the likely result is still going to be very (very, very) low clickthrough rates, and "effective CPM" rates far below $1, often far below $0.10 eCPM. (Do the math: with 2 million pageviews per month, an effective CPM of $1 would mean $2,000 in revenue, while $0.10 would mean only $200 in revenue.)

[anand84]

Hi MarkWelch

Thanks for the reply. Will it help with the bigger networks like BurstMedia, ValueMedia etc? My friend has 2 million pageviews and $30 per month in revenue from Adbrite which is simply pathetic..

[johntext]

Try an ad exchange.. you've gotta be able to do better than $30.

[Kurgano]

Shop for advertisers directly. Anything above 1 million views/100,000 unique visitors is usually enough to land a couple if your content is targeted. 30 dollars is low for that kind of traffic.

[markwelch]

My overall with "social networking" sites has been quite awful, to date -- vast amounts of traffic, no sales.

That view was reinforced last week when I was finally able to run "Placement Performance" Reports for my Google AdWords campaigns -- so that I can see where my content ads are running (previously, I could only tell by looking at the referring URL for SOME of the clicks received).

I was astonished to see that my ad was being displayed A LOT on MySpace sites. The clickthrough rate was only a hair's breadth from zero, and those clicks were driving no sales, so I've begun to add MySpace to my site exclusion lists (but Google doesn't make it easy, as you must go through a series of steps to manually ad a site to each campaign separately).

[Chuck Hamrick]

Try writing product reviews or site reviews with a single affiliate text link. Or if you have a website that is converting traffic just link to it after a recommendation. People are looking for recommendations.

[Skeptic]

Myspace has started to mask/encrypt links on members pages, so I don't know if any advertising/monetization there is going to work from now on.

[edited by: Skeptic at 5:57 pm (utc) on June 30, 2007]

[Compworld]

I'd mix and match different networks. Here's a list I found on another site w/o the links to the sites in order to abide by the Webmaster World policy.

CPC:
Cost per click - the cost or cost-equivalent paid per click-through.
Google Adsense
Yahoo Publisher Network
Chitika
BannerBoxes
Adbrite
Clicksor
Searchfeed
Revenue Pilot

CPM:
Cost per thousand impressions
Tribal Fusion
Casale Media
BurstMedia
RealTechNetwork
ValueClick Media
24/7 Real Media
Bannerconnect
Adtegrity
Ad pepper Media
Rightmedia
Advertising.com
Accelerator Media

CPA/CPL
Cost per Action - model in which payment is based solely on qualifying actions such as sales or registrations.
Linkshare
Commission Junction
ShareASale
WebSponsors
Advertising.com
Azoogle Ads
Maxbounty

[edited by: Compworld at 4:04 am (utc) on July 1, 2007]