Where to sell ad inventory?

[JamesR]

So, if you were a website with high daily page views, where would you go to sell your space? How can a popular site cash in on its viewers without annoying them to death with popups? (no offense webmasters, they just annoy me as a surfer)

[rcjordan]

>where would you go to sell your space

If "space" means banner impressions, most aren't. Engage, Burst, and other banner brokers are down to 65 cents net CPM for their better sites not serving pop-ups. Some webmasters are reporting an effective rate of 7 cents CPM. I would advise anyone building a site on the past banner revenue models to pull the plug now. Banners, for most sites, will only produce sidebar income.

added:
Targeted in in, but being found by a media buyer is tough. If your site produces opt-in PII, it goes a long way in convincing them if/when they DO find you.

[Brett_Tabke]

When you look at the reality of web advertising right now, it is either Targeted or die. Both burst and engage are running 50-80% defaults. That makes bottom like effective cpm's in the .10-.20 range. At that point it is questionable whether a site can make it or not. Seems like the brokers are currently trying to hang on to their longer term site contracts and rewarding them with more banners - while those that sign up short term (month-to-month or quarterly/yearly) are getting a much higher rate of defaults.

We've been running many targeted ads this fall that are down in the $4-$6 range. Last year those would have been $12-$15 ads. If it weren't for targeted, I'd be looking hard for other sources of income.

If I had the staff and a good sales person, I know I could easily outsell what the brokers are sending us. If you have the inventory (50k a day or more) I think this is the way to go. I'm slowly testing the waters.