Why Online Publishers Need to be Marketers - Article by Larry Chase - Internet Publisher, Speaker, Author and Consultant

Larry Chase - Internet Marketing Consulting

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Why Online Publishers Need to be Marketers

Many people have a visceral reaction when I say publishers need to be marketers as well. Why? Because they fear the division of church and state is at risk, that the advertising will have an overbearing impact on the editorial content. But this is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about survival.

It behooves publishers to help their advertisers formulate a sound marketing plan that will be executed on the publisher's web site. Why? Well, if they don't, the chances are the banner ads will have lower clickthrough rates. Advertisers look at these numbers because they're available. Wouldn't you? I do. If the clickthrough rate is sub-par to direct response numbers of 2-5%, then the publisher risks losing that advertiser. And we all know how expensive it is to find a new client to replace the unhappy old one who flew the coop. The cost of landing a new client is likely more expensive than investing in trying to make the existing ones happy.

Historically, it was the ad agencies who devised the marketing strategy and execution of the ads. But for a myriad of reasons, many advertisers now find themselves dealing directly with the publishers, circumventing the agencies entirely. Thus, the marketing part of the quotient has been overlooked more often than not, resulting in ill-conceived banners, leading to poor performance, resulting in unhappy clients, and ending with the end of that relationship.

So now that we've decided it's in the best interest for publishers to help their coveted advertisers be successful with their exposures, let's examine some basic ways we can help them achieve this goal; which is, not coincidentally, in alignment with your goals.

First off, the file size of the banners should be very small, say between 4K-10K max. If they're any larger they run the risk of loading after the surfer has read the text, which loads before the banners. So the surfer can click on something else, and never really see the banner, even though the logs will show it was sent. Make sure there's some incentive for people to click on the banner. I call this "Give me a damn good reason to click on me" advertising. A banner with one's name and a passive tagline provides no incentive to click. Also, use action oriented verbs like "click" or "Enter", to boost response rates. Research definitely shows a direct cause and effect when you do so. Furthermore, make sure you have those ad banners refreshed as often as possible. Follow the "wear-out" factor closely and be pro-active by telling your advertiser that the creative is starting to wear out and it's time to replace the banners with new ones you've already created in advance for just this reason.

You may also want to offer your client a direct response technique called "split copy testing" to establish which offer works best. Then, throw away the weaker offers and keep coming up with new ones to try to beat the original benchmark. In short, test, test, test, and never stop testing.

If the advertiser sees that you're looking out for his/her interest, they may just stay around longer, even if the first volley of banners aren't so successful, they may see that you're working in their best interest. The rule of thumb that I use with my clients is to say to myself, "If it were my money, what would I be looking for".

Traditionally, the publisher is not a marketer. But as you know, many traditions are being challenged in this new flat-open marketplace presented to us by the Net. Being a marketer on behalf of your advertiser also gives you an added value that other competing web publishers probably don't offer. And in this marketplace, where thousands and thousands of new ad avails come online every single day, you're going to need all the added value you can get as the competition ratchets up to levels never before imagined.

Distributed Printing: Take out a calculator and figure out how much you save every time someone downloads your sales information and prints it locally, rather than, having you print it, warehouse it, handle it, and mail it. Keep this in mind when you are selling your web site budget to upper management. It helps rationalize the site's budget. I refer to this as fuzzy rationalization. "You haven't made hard dollars, but you surely have saved a few."