Hi all,
I just wanted to give you a quick update. As you probably know, we really want to implement some features, like on-site notifications, a better like system, and perhaps even an app or better mobile functionality. These things cost money that we just don’t have yet.
We understand that ads often suck. We ran a bunch of trials a couple of years ago and got feedback from members to find out what people are cool with and what irritates the heck out of everyone. Video ads, embedded links, flash-based ads, pop-overs, pop-unders all did not make the cut. What we settled on a tiny little outfit called Project Wonderful, which mostly advertises web comics and blogs. People bid on our ad spots, largely based on traffic, and we get a little change regardless of whether people click or not… but people do click, because some of those web comics are pretty darn cool.
Project Wonderful doesn’t pay us a whole lot… seriously, it has been pennies a day, and now a couple bucks a month with the increase in traffic. But, now that we have more traffic, advertisers that have strict guidelines for minimum traffic will finally talk to us. Yay!
Tonight, I added something called Taboola to the bottom of all pages and in the right-hand column of most pages. The ads show content from different places around the web. I choose to work with Taboola because their ads are not intrusive, they almost never ask you to buy anything, they’re supposed to be relevant, and we have control over what displays.
Unlike Project Wonderful, these Taboola content links are PPC (pay-per-click), which means that each time you follow one of those links to read a story, you’re giving us a few cents. As these clicks add up, we’ll be able to implement more new things here, so please, don’t block them! Support them by reading, and us by clicking whenever something strikes your fancy.
Everybody will see different ads, so I can’t tell what you’re being served. If for any reason you don’t like the type of ad you’re seeing, you can hover over it and you’ll see a white “x” in the top right corner. Clicking it will let you report an ad that isn’t fit for AM or remove it so you don’t see ads like it anymore. I can ban specific advertisers or genres, based on what you guys want as well, so if you're unhappy with the content or think it's not for for AM, email me a screenshot and I'll follow up with it, too. If you don’t want to be served personalized ads, you also have the option to “opt out” of their cookies, by clicking the blue triangle.
I’m very excited to be launching this new ad program. I think it jives well with the type of site AM is, and will enable us to implement the features you want to see here. I do welcome your feedback, and hope that you’ll check out our sponsors whenever something relevant to you pops up.
Thanks!
