Tip #37: Read the OpenX “Direct Ad Selling Practices” study
A couple of weeks ago, OpenX released a study of direct ad selling practices, based on survey data from the OpenX community. If you have not read it yet, it is well worth downloading the study.
In particular, the report outlines five different techniques that publishers with direct ad sales income of more than $5 CPM generally use, and which may be worth considering using yourself if you are planning on selling your inventory directly. For smaller publishers, this is very useful and valuable information to have. Kudos to OpenX for releasing the information!
I’ve been selling my ads directly for a while and enjoy cutting out the middle-men.
One thing I want to do is go after the “long-tail” of my potential advertisers… the ones that have a monthly budget of 1/10 of my larger direct deals.
These advertisers aren’t really worth it for me to set them all up manually so I’m looking for a solution to do more of a self-service model.
I’m pretty much open to anything at this point… openX (hosted or not) google ad manager, whatever.
Any ideas on solutions to accommodate all these “long-tail” advertisers without creating a ton of busy work for myself?