The growing fragmentation across the Internet has of course changed the advertising landscape forever. Advertisers now look for a centralized place that can send out their ads in a decentralized way. This is why the big players have been buying up companies already doing that.
What this means for everyone, is more people getting a piece of the pie will result in sharing of the revenue. This means every time an ad is sent out to an outside site, there is less revenue for the content provider.
Portals have struggled with this as each internal click provides more money for them, while each time they send someone somewhere else, money declines. In other words, if an ad they distribute is viewed on another site, they receive a smaller portion of the proceeds.
How this applies to online content providers is it's better to make your own deals if at all possible, as you will of course get a bigger piece of the pie. That is going to be harder to do with the big companies, as they won't or can't spend the time making deals with millions of online content providers; the reason Google Adsense (GOOG) and other programs have been so popular.
What will work even better, and which all veteran online businesses know, is developing your own product or services is the best way to make the most money online. This doesn't mean we should drop ad-based strategies, just that anyone without their own product is leaving a lot of money on the table.
When talking about product, it could be a book, anything digital or a regular product; depending on your niche.
The point is there are ways to greatly increase your revenue when you have your own products. Don't forget this as you hear endlessly about social networks, online video and ad-supported online business models. Having your own product is still a the best strategy for online success. Ad-based revenue can be included as a nice extra.
I am a PR specialist and came across your blog about the growing fragmentation of the Internet changing advertising via search. I wanted to propose a possible blog entry about how Internet advertising and targeted e-mail campaigns are being used to drive down patient recruitment costs for clinical trial research, according to Experian Research Services. Finding patients via traditional mass marketing channels alone is not enough, especially when it can cost as much as $8 million a day, each day a drug is delayed in a trial. Experian Research Services explains how: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2007/10/prweb564664.htm.
Posted by: Libby | November 7, 2007 2:41 PM | Permalink to Comment