Getting Advertisers (Sponsors) for a site, looking for advice

How to get corporate sponsors, looking for guidance

[techdmc]

Hi Everyone,

Please pardon me if I sound like a noob for this post. I've been doing web dev for some time, but know NOTHING about getting web advertisers (sponsors). So, please allow me to build my case.

I've seen sites that have corporate logos on them (think Sprite, Red Bull, Volcom, American Express, etc), typically toward the bottom of the site. I assume these are some type of sponsors (or advertisers, partners). Does anyone know how to get these on your site. Or how to approach a company to pitch them on advertising with you. I'd guess the corporations are paying to have their logo on the site. Just no clue how it's done. Hopefully that makes sense.

Thoughts?

[lorax]

Sounds to me like you should be reading the posts in the Affiliates [webmasterworld.com] forum. :)

Corporations pay attention to numbers on the bottom line. Your task is to prove to them your site is worth advertising on. There are many different ways to do this part but ultimately it comes down to how much traffic your website generates and how much it converts to a sale on their end. Learn about the affiliate networks.

[roycerus]

Sponsorship only works in industries where showing your name (brand) is important in being chosen. Industries like higher education, hosting, beverages, credit cards will sponsor high traffic sites.

There needs to be a clear demand for the service and it should be directly related to what the consumer is reading or viewing.

For any other kind of advertising Adsense is probably the best option at this moment.

[techdmc]

@lorax.... thanks for the link/ info. Much appreciated!

@roycerus... that is good information, thank you so much!

If you don't mind, let me tweak my question a bit. Do you think the demographic you are targeting makes a difference?

Thanks!

[Leosghost]

Do you think the demographic you are targeting makes a difference?

does a bear ..........?

is the pope ..........?

You want to interest red bull<= example..

You write to their market..

[roycerus]

It makes a difference when you have behaviour targeting working - but just demographics doesn't work always. The intent of the user makes a difference too.

Like for example if webmasterworld shows me an ad for American express it doesn't really effect me that much. But if they show me an ad for say some new website acceleration service - the intent matches somewhat - I am in webmaster mode here.

But in any case we've seen unless there is a very strong will by the sponsors to advertise on your site - plain banners no longer work well enough and will not give the advertiser enough ROI.

We tried to get sponsors but directing any sponsor company to target us through Adwords makes things much simpler for us in terms of time spent negotiating and explaining.

[lorax]

Understanding who you're selling too is critical. If you don't know your audience then you're wasting your time and money. Know who they are, where they live, what motivates them, what they desire, what they covet, where they work, who they talk to, type of house/trailer they own, how much $$ they make, where they live, the cars/trucks they drive and why, where they went to school or didn't, how many graduated high school, how many serve in the armed forces, do they smoke, do they drink, did they get married in their 20s or 30s, percentage of divorces.....

You get the point. The more you know, the more you can craft your message to inspire the action in your favor.