Monday, May 4, 2009

Banner Ads, Badges and Advertise on Today.com search success

Hi all you today.com exiles. I am still showing my noobie roots and don't know where to go to create 1. A banner ad and 2. A badge with html code. I had a lovely blog makeover done by Lady Java and she has been more than helpful. I don't want to bother her with my silly questions, because I'm sure this is an easy one!

Any site preferences for creating banner ads and badges?

Congrats to today.com exiles for the advertising on today.com google search success. Tee hee. This should help discourage people from advertising on today.com, afterall, who would want to advertise on today.com with a click through rate of less than .02%?

It is so expensive to advertise on today.com. For about $75, you too can advertise on today.com and receive maybe ten visitors for your money. Seems like a place like ADSENSE or Project Wonderful would be more worth the money.

What today.com doesn't tell you about advertising on today.com is that your payment through paypal is automatically a recurring payment. If you don't pay attention and you tried to advertise on today.com one time, you will find yourself paying every month for dismal advertising results.

To avoid paying to advertise on today.com unwittingly every month, you must cancel the recurring payment through paypal. Cancelling your advertising on today.com so that you don't have a recurring payment through paypal takes time and finesse. It is my opinion that today.com is well aware of this fact and hoping that advertisers will let at least one month go by before they realize that they have paid for an extra month to advertise on today.com.

12 comments:

In Plain English May 4, 2009 at 8:04 AM  

I forgot to add that if you use project wonderful, I have a line of boxes at the bottom of my site that I will keep open and free for any today.com exiles that want to advertise. I have to delete the current ones right now, but if you are a today.com exile, bid and I'll delete any non today.com exiles for a month or two.

flit May 4, 2009 at 9:18 AM  

Lady Java usually includes a badge with the code in her blog makeover packages, so I would ask her about it - I'm sure she wouldn't mind.

I don't know where to go online to make that stuff - I just do them in paint shop pro or whatever.... usually, if I'm looking for a specific size, I steal one that IS the right size and then just erase it and put what I want on it.

LadyJava May 4, 2009 at 10:52 AM  

Hi P.E..
I did include the badge at your blog dearie.. It's right at the bottom under your Follower I believe :)

Let me know if this not what you mean..and if you need more badges.. I do those too..lol!!

PS: Flit you are right! It is included :)

In Plain English May 4, 2009 at 11:05 AM  

yes, yes, she included one...I wanted another badge and was wondering if anyone used a specific site or software to make them? I'm learning, however slowly!

Ms Terri May 4, 2009 at 3:44 PM  

Hey, guess what! THIS post is now the #2 result that comes up if you do a Google search on --> advertising on today.com.

The #1 search result? It's still Flit's post, directly below on this blog!

I know very little about advertising, but even so, I thought that the rates Today.com was charging seemed high.

I was also taken aback when someone asked, in the Today.com bloggers' forums, what the average click-through rate was on the ads (which seemed like a basic piece of information we would need if we were to pitch ads the way they wanted us to), and the marketing guy said that they did not reveal that information -- and that it would be misleading for them to reveal it, because banner advertisers benefited by the exposure, not just the click throughs.

Even with the little I know about advertising, that just sounded wrong, and it sounded like they were probably trying to hide a low click-through rate.

Then I saw that for their "headliner" package, you have to pay extra to get the click stats for your own ads! Again, I'm not that knowlegable about advertising, but that sounded strange. I have run some ads on Project Wonderful, and for buying ads that cost as little as 1 cent per day (and sometimes even cost nothing), I've gotten stats for unique impressions, overall impressions, number of click throughs, and much more, all accompanied by pretty graphs that I can look at on the computer, or download to my heart's content.

In Plain English, I use paint.net for all my graphics, including banners and badges. Most of my stuff looks very amateurish, so it may not be the best choice if you want to look more polished. What I like about it, though, is that it is free and it's fun to use.

flit May 4, 2009 at 4:49 PM  

I posted an article about those very things on my old blog that I don't update regularly any more just today.

Also included more backlinks for articles about today.com sliminess

In Plain English May 4, 2009 at 6:29 PM  

How good is a .08 (that's point zero eight) % click through rate?

That's the click through rate on my previous today.com advertisement.

flit May 4, 2009 at 6:55 PM  

I don't know what the standard is - but to me, it doesn't seem worth it ... now that I would ever consider having ANY sort of dealings that might make THEM money again

In Plain English May 4, 2009 at 8:11 PM  

well, for $75 bucks, I got about 10 visits. That's the overall gist.

Ms Terri May 4, 2009 at 8:24 PM  

That doesn't sound good! To compare, try running an ad on Project Wonderful. They'll calculate the price per click-through for you, so you can compare it easily. IIRC, it was costing me about 2 cents per click-through.

Of course, some click throughs are a lot better than others. But there is a big difference between 2 cents and $7.50!

In Plain English May 5, 2009 at 6:48 AM  

Oh, I'm definitely using project wonderful and will never again advertise on today.com. At .75 cents per 1,000 UV's, If I got 1t 1,000 click throughs at the above $7.50, well, I would have paid $7,5000 to earn .75 cents in theory. Puts it into perspective for me!

Ms Terri May 5, 2009 at 6:21 PM  

Out of curiosity, do you remember how many times your $75 banner was shown (how many page impressions it received)?

Post a Comment

Blog Makeover by LadyJava Creations