Advertising on NY Ski Forum and Magazine?

Got the word from the forum developers that advertising is coming to the forum and the magazine.

Until now the basic forum software has been free.  We have paid a small amount for customized upgrades.

Now advertising is coming to the forum to help defray costs.  This is money that would go to the developers not us.  The company that is developing the forum (we are basically beta testers) wants to add more staff, and that costs money.

We have the option to buy our way out of it. Curious about what people think?  Leaning towards buying out but was curious about what people think.

Will these ads have smokin hot .......

JK.

Save your money. Nuttin wrong with some adverts. Every place else has them.

The developer wants to add jobs. I like the sound of that. Give it a shot, I guess you can always buy your way out of it if you don't like it..

Maybe this advertising can eventually but money in your pocket too..

save your $...nothing wrong with ads....capitalism.. America..stuff like that

We were actually running Google Adsense ads on the blog last year.

During the season they were great ads. Ski ads for the EPIC Pass, and other cool stuff.

Problem is in the off season you get stuff like this:



Not really what I want to be looking at.  I've asked the developer if there is anyway to turn ads on and off so I could run them when I want. TBD.

FYI - it's not that expensive to opt out.

Ads don't bother me, assuming they're on the edges of the page and you don't have to "click" to get past them. I'm always able to completely tune them out anyway!

The girl on the right panel is cute, gets me every time

You've probably noticed that ads are up in the forum.  Going to leave them for at least few days, to see what we get.

Clearly at least some of them are IP targeted as I'm seeing some cheesy ad for some candidate in my district.

Feedback welcome. Curious to hear what ads people are seeing and what they think.

Looks ok so far. If you decide that you don't like it, there are several alternative platforms that are ad-free, but allow you the local option to advertise or use the google ads program.

is there any chance you can have some control over what gets advertised to limit it to just skiing related ads to prevent seeing viagra ads

Having been in the Advertising business for the last 20+ years, I think it is a great way to offset costs.  That being said, I agree with ausable skier in that there should be some control by the moderators to be able to refuse ads that don't have any value to the readers of this blog.  I think that Harvey and SBR know who the audience is and can make sure the ads are pertinent...also the peanut gallery will let their voices be heard.

sudsnbumps wrote

Having been in the Advertising business for the last 20+ years, I think it is a great way to offset costs.  That being said, I agree with ausable skier in that there should be some control by the moderators to be able to refuse ads that don't have any value to the readers of this blog.  I think that Harvey and SBR know who the audience is and can make sure the ads are pertinent...also the peanut gallery will let their voices be heard.

This is why I posted the thread originally.  There's no control over ads coming through Google Adsense.  This is not a function of this specific forum software but of the advertising itself.  I remember a very similar discussion on FTO - and Admin saying that it was just a choice of ads on or off.

Some may remember we were running text ads on the blog in 2010.  What I found was in the winter, most we ski related ads, but in the summer, you got all kinds of junk.  

My original thought was to just buy out of them.  The cost is based on total "pageviews." Every time you look at a page, it's a pageview (doh!).  In the first year of the forum (June 2010 - June 2011) we did 100,000 pageviews. The way the buyout is priced - I could afford that. But in the last three months we've already hit that number, so the cost is rising.

We are working on a customization that would allow us to turn ads on and off at will, (paying only when ads are off) so we'd have the flexibility to run them during the season when - hopefully - ads would be more ski related.  But it's close to the season now, and I'm seeing a bunch of political stuff, which IMO stinks.

It's not a huge deal, but I appreciate the feedback. And depending on finances, ads may be here to stay. Hope not, but we will see.

If advertising significantly defrays your costs Harvey, do it.  I can't imagine that any of us would stop frequenting this site due to ads.  They are a necessary evil.  Just keep them on the edges.  

Harv

No problem with ads from me.  Most seem skiing related so far.  It would be nice if you could keep them PG or below so this can stay a family blog.  It seems you do have some younger readers.

Can you let them run for the winter and let the readers decide whether to keep it or not?  Might not be too bad and why spend the money if you don't have to.  Google Ads are usually pretty easy to ignore if you are not interested in what is being advertised.  

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70s Gore Kid wrote

The problem with opening up to Google ads is that it is next to impossible to limit what shows up.

Almost.  Correct answer = impossible.

It SEEMS like ads are getting more relevant.  Less wrinkle cream, more snow sports.

I think two things are happening - the season is coming, and also as the Adsense bot crawls the forum it's starting to figure out what we are all about.

Still hoping to get the ability to turn ads on and off, but feeling better about what I am seeing the last few days.

ausable skier wrote

is there any chance you can have some control over what gets advertised to limit it to just skiing related ads to prevent seeing viagra ads

"What you see is what you search"

It looks like ads are coming from DoubleClick based on your recent search queries (stored in Google cookies), not the Forum content.

Denis.N wrote

ausable skier wrote

is there any chance you can have some control over what gets advertised to limit it to just skiing related ads to prevent seeing viagra ads

"What you see is what you search"

It looks like ads are coming from DoubleClick based on your recent search queries (stored in Google cookies), not the Forum content.

It's funny because it's true.

I'm fine with the ads, I'm reasonably good at tuning out.