Proven Tips to Finding Advertisers For Your Blog

Surf around blogs today and you are likely to find a majority of blogs having some form of advertisement placed on and around the blog. Some of these advertisements could be in the form of Google Adsense, text links (you got to be careful with that) and image advertisements. I went on a hunt for image advertisements for my asian recipes blog recently and was successful in securing my first order. It was a direct sale and I was pretty pleased with that. Afterall, I get 100% of the payment and there is no middleman involved. Let me share with you my experience in securing my first direct order.

Work on Your Blog
You must have something to sell before you approach someone to buy from you. If you want to sell apples, you have to show your buyers a beautiful plump and unblemished apple which is enticing enough to be bought. Definitely not showing them a half-bare orchard where the apple trees are still immature. Put yourself in your potential advertiser’s shoes - would you be keen to advertise in a blog which is brand new or does not appear to have much valuable content? Again, a good looking blog is likely to appeal to advertisers compared to a badly designed blog. Keep your blog as simple looking as possible so that your advertiser’s advertisement would look prominent.

Check Your Market
Be realistic with your pricing. If you are only able to offer a few hundred page impressions per day, chances are it would be more realistic to sell the advertising space at a low price of say USD10 - USD15 for starters. Test the market. It may be worthwhile to approach smaller companies who would be willing to give online advertising a try at a relatively small sum of USD10 per month.

Target Potential Advertiser
If you are blogging about cars, approach advertisers in the car industry business. They are more likely to advertise on your site compared to a company which deals with water heaters. You can do a search of these sites on the net for potential advertisers. For instance, search for used car dealers or parts manufacturers to advertise in your blog about cars. Alternatively, look through other sites in your niche and who their advertisers are. You are not precluded from approaching these advertisers directly but you must know where you stand as far as pricing and exposure from your blog is concerned.

Sell
You must have a good sales pitch. You must be able to tell the potential advertiser why your blog is relevant to their business and how your blog can contribute to their business. This is where statistics and information about your blog plays a crucial part. They might not care much about page rank but they might be interested in branding or click throughs. Avoid lengthy sales pitch like those sites which sell affiliate products. A short and concise but professionally written email should suffice. Address the company with proper salutation like “Dear Sirs” or “Dear Mr. ..author’s name..” if you can find the site’s author’s name. Check your spelling and grammer. After all, you are trying to work out a business deal. So, be professional about it.

Be Clear with Terms
I can’t help this because I am a lawyer. So, I wrote a simple one page terms and conditions on the advertisement for the potential advertiser’s perusal before they decide whether to take up the offer or not. This helps to minimize any misunderstanding between the parties on how the advertisement works. For instance, you cannot assume that advertisers would not assume that by placing advertisement on your site, they will get x number of visitors or conversions. A disclaimer would be useful eg. “The Publisher makes no representation or warranty on the amount of traffic to be directed to the Advertiser’s landing page url“. A clause which provides for future variation of pricing would also be useful in case your blog grows in value and you wish to increase your pricing in tandem.

Sweeteners
You can use sweeteners to try to clinch a deal. Assuming you are selling the ad space at USD30 per month, why not give them a discount for long term advertising? Or perhaps a special mention in a post to acknowledge their business. A “thank you” card would go a long way towards impressing your new advertiser. However, don’t oversell. If you sound too desperate to clinch a deal, the advertiser might take advantage over you or decline advertising altogether thinking that your site might not be genuine or worth its money.

Look In Demand
Before approaching advertisers, make your blog advertising space look busy. You might want to exchange banner advertisements with friendly bloggers to create a “demand” for your ad space. Some might find this unethical but I think it is not. Afterall, you are trading advertisement space with a fellow blogger and that in itself, is a barter of some value. Some bloggers place affiliate advertisements in vacant advertisement slots. Showing a couple of vacant “Advertise Here” slots is not likely to generate the amount of interest to a potential advertiser.

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. 21 Apr 08 | About Money

parisB | April 21st, 2008 at 6:41 pm
Woohoo! Good on ya for clinching the deal! I’ll take note of your points on the agreement thing.
Giddy Tigress | April 22nd, 2008 at 5:18 pm
I’m glad I used the “sweetener” method even before I read your excellent post. And it was all because I utilized by shopping and bargaining skills
pablopabla | April 28th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
ParisB : I am sure you can draft out something

lilian : I am still waiting……..

Giddy Tigress : Women are usually better with that
keeyit | May 28th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
What I can sell then ?