could you care about a small banner ad?

[guydewdney]

as an aside to the donations thread - could you care if there was a banner ad at the top of the page - forsome product / service?

1) i couldn't care less - as long as its MB / car related
2) i couldn't care less - whatever it was
3) I dont like the idea, but will suffer for the money it would bring in - as long as its MB / car related
4) I dont like the idea, but will suffer for the money it would bring in - whatever it is
5) I hate banner ads - whatever they are
6) other comment

note - I'm talking about an ad the size of the MB logo - non animated (so quick to load) and not a pop up (god I hate those)

 

[R2D2]

Koolvin built the site, designed the site, maintains the site, upgrades the site, subsidises the site and has loads of experiences in running sites. If Koolvin says he'd rather not get into banners and advertising then thats fine by me coz after all it's him that actually does it all.

 

[guydewdney]

oh - by all means - i'd bow to his greatness - but i was just wondering if anyone else gives a hoot about a small banner ad - as it brings in dosh (thats obviously needed / wanted)

so if K thinks this is out of order - then fine - he can vote like the rest of us - or delete this thread!

Guy

 

[scotth_uk]

One banner ad never killed anyone. Hopefully it's just a polite pic somewhere on the screen.....

 

[mapleleaf]

Koolvin built the site, designed the site, maintains the site, upgrades the site, subsidises the site and has loads of experiences in running sites. If Koolvin says he'd rather not get into banners and advertising then thats fine by me coz after all it's him that actually does it all.

I think what we are trying to do here is to help Koolvin fund the site in a formalised and predictable (in terms of cashflow ) manner rather than the somewhat adhock "cry for help" method that seems to have sprung out of the blue.

 

[Dieselman]

It really would be interesting to find out how much we are talking about???

I don't have a problem making a donation to a non-commercial site, and am prepared to do this if it keeps ads off the site. Maybe a quarterly sub might be the answer, so that members that drop off don't have to pay for a whole year.

 

[GrahamC230K]

It really would be interesting to find out how much we are talking about???
.

The answer is here

http://mbclub.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=7525&page=2&pp=15

 

[Dieselman]

The answer is here

http://mbclub.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=7525&page=2&pp=15

But it's not. The figure suggested by K says that it would cost over 2k if Poundhost didn't sponsor the site, but it does and we have a small banner as recognition.
Should we be assuming that we are actually to pay for the hosting, i.e. that Maff doesn't want to carry on sponsoring.

I don't have a problem with paying but some proper figures would be appreciated so that donations, if required, can be better judged.

 

[Shude]

Do not think for a minute that the moderators haven't discussed the prospect of banner ads or member subscriptions in order to raise some money to cover the costs. There are several problems with either strategy.

If we are to have one or more banner ads, we have to approach the companies involved with some kind of business plan and also a contract, they would have to pay us a certain (probably very small) amount of money to simply have the advert there and then we'd get a certain amount for each referral click. Here are some of the problems:

1. Standard banner ads are huge, we'd either have to lose some serious space to them or make the clients use really tiny ones, which means less money.

2. We'd have to stop any commercial members. If you work for a company and want to sell something your company offers through the forum at a good price, you'd not be able to. Imagine how cross you'd be if you were paying to advertise on a website and yet some companies get free advertising right in the middle of the forum threads! Some of our members provide some good deals with us and I'm afraid if we'd want to keep our banner ads we'd have to prevent them from offering through the forum.

3. Like it or not it would probably drive some members away or prevent some people from ever signing up, which naturally we don't want.

4. According to Maff (@ poundhost) there have been practically zero referrals through the "powered by" logo at the top of the page. In order for banner ads to work, people will actually have to visit those sites that are being advertised. I don't think I've ever found myself clicking on an advert on a forum and I think I'm in the majority when I say that!

What we *could* do is have sponsored forum sections. For example if we had a tyre shop OWN the wheel/tyre section then they could offer some good deals through the forum and pay us for the privilege of it carrying their name. This sounds cheap and americanised "the WHOEVER TYRES wheel/tyre forum" or the "wheel/tyre forum sponsored by WHOEVER TYRES" but having a business partner like that could be very useful for both us and the tyre shop, give them a forum presence and they can answer wheel/tyre questions, these would naturally be biased towards a sale but then so many threads have companies listed in them that they would be pressed to offer a very good deal. I think there could be a future in that kind of strategy.

 

[Kinky]

Could I sponsor the Off-Topic section?

 

[pammy]

Could I sponsor the Off-Topic section?

You don't need to - you are it

 

[Ian B Walker]

Could I sponsor the Off-Topic section?

I was going to say that it is already bagged by Mrs G. But she got in first with one of her pearls of wisdom

 

[guydewdney]

fair nuff - just thought that if (for example) mercedes performance wanted to advertise, they would get a decent number of clicks - bloggs's pink pens ltd would admittedly not get many clicks...

i dont see why a banner ad (for example -

would put peeps off - its not that big - is it?

 

[cbenz]

Similar to what Shude says, I think you have to be careful with banners\sponsorship.

There is a similar forum in the US which I often browse (some of you may also) and from what I can see, there has been a fair amount of disagreement re advertisers\sponsors and what is posted.

People haven't been able to refer people to other forums or websites for information because 'the sponsors would not approve'. From what I have seen, it has caused a fair amount of trouble.

I have no probs with sponsorship\banners, it's any additional red tape\freedom of speach restrictions it may bring that needs looking at.

K does a great job and having been a member for nearly a year now, I have 'met' some great peeps with wonderful advice and knowledge.