Make money from your web site - the best banner ad networks

Banner advertising payout rates have definitely decreased over the last couple of years, but there is some good news for web masters looking for a flexible and reliable way of selling banner ad space. If you're more interested in implementing pop up/under ads as a means of generating income, learn more in our pop up and pop under revenue guide.

Teaming up the best banner advertising network rather than intensive marketing to individual clients can save a lot of time and provide you with a steady income. The size of that cash flow is a numbers game - the more relevant ads you display, the more you will probably make. The networks provide the clients and the ads, you simply implement some code in your banner space and the ad will appear. In your association with these companies, you will be known as an "affiliate" or "publisher".

Best Banner-Popunder Network Our recommendation for generating income Save yourself the hundreds of hours of trial and error that we experienced & view our review of the best banner advertising network around - click here!

We decided to research the best banner advertising network for publishers/affiliates who have a site of our size. We tried many different networks, but only one stood out - more on that later. Many promised a great deal, but returned nothing. Some networks allowed very unethical advertisers to peddle their wares. On investigating a number of networks, we also discovered a few of them did not pay in accordance with their terms and conditions - worse still, some did not pay at all.

The following is a list of desirable affiliate/publisher features that you should look for before agreeing to "rent" out your prime advertising space to an agency:

Targeting

Does the network provide ads that are relevant to your subject area or that would appeal to the users of your web site? Irrelevant ads will not only fail if you are participating in a CPC campaign, but they may annoy your visitors.

CPC, CPM and CPA options

A good ad agency will give you a mixture of CPC and CPM ads. CPC ads pay when a visitor to your site clicks on a banner through to an advertisers web site . CPM advertising is based on $X.XX per thousand views (impressions). Another variation is CPA - a visitor clicks a banner, passes through to the advertiser's web site and either purchases (a sale) or expresses interest (a lead) in the companies products or services. CPA pays the highest but usually has a much lower conversion ratio.

Control over ads displayed

The better ad networks have comprehensive publisher/affiliate administrative interfaces where you can preview a banner and decide whether you want that particular campaign displayed on your site. This is particularly useful if you (or your visitors) object to certain kinds of advertising - such as those wonderful flashing ads that we have all grown to love ;0) - an interesting and amazing fact is that those flashing ads do draw high clickthrough rates - figure that one out! If your agency is really on the ball, there will also be visual flags in your administration area to indicate that the ad contains references to adult material, gambling or tobacco related products etc.

Default ad control

Most agencies have quotas on the number of ads appearing to particular users. After that quota is filled for the hour or day etc., "default" ads will be displayed. These banners do not earn you any money - but they do tend to display community oriented ads, so you can also be promoting positive social messages - but be sure to check this out before signing up. Quality agencies will also give you control over these default ads allowing you to display your own offers instead. This gives you further opportunities in making money from this prime advertising space. If the default banner rate is too high in proportion to paying banners, and those non-paying banners promote other businesses, then these networks are well worth avoiding.

Rates

The days of the $10.00 CPM ads are pretty much well over, unless you find advertisers yourself by direct marketing, but there are still great payment rate differences between networks. Shop around carefully. You should aim to receive on average US$.40 - $.65 CPM or at least US$.15 - $.20 CPC.

Referral Bonuses

Another way to benefit financially from your publisher/affiliate association is to be paid a percentage of any referrals of new affiliates or advertisers to the network from your web site. Again, the rates vary greatly between networks, but an ongoing rate of 5% is a level that can provide you with decent residual income in the years ahead. With advertising campaigns quite often running into thousands of dollars, it is possible to draw a good supplementary income from referring advertisers.

Payout Schedule

Look for a banner network that pays promptly. I came across a couple of agencies that paid up to 4 months after the end of month! A common pay schedule is anything from 15-30 days after the end of month.

Terms and Conditions

Before joining any banner ad network, ensure you read the terms and conditions carefully. The banner advertising industry is well known for its share of fraud - perpetrated by all parties. Some agencies combat this with Draconian rules, which gives publishers and affiliates very little flexibility - look for an agency that takes fraud seriously, but still gives you some room to move. It is also EXTREMELY important to read the terms and conditions carefully, otherwise you may be breaking the rules without even knowing it. This usually results in termination of your account and forfeit of any money that you have made.

Variety of mediums

Many major ad networks now also offer pop-up and pop-under campaigns as another means of creating income from your web site. For a more detailed look at the pop-up and pop-under industry, read our guide.

And the winner is..

So, back to the results - who did we find to be the best banner ad network? The FastClick Ad Network. Learn more about why we chose them as the top banner agency.

Other revenue generation options

Another way to derive income from your web site is through affiliate programs that offer text links. Descriptive text links are not only kinder on bandwidth and load times, but tend to draw higher click through rates. The other great aspect of text links is that when implemented correctly, they can also assist with search engine rankings! Learn more of the benefits and pitfalls of the text link affiliate game and also some of the better networks around.

While you may not make a million dollars through banner ads, they can be a good way to recuperate web site maintenance costs. If you do make a million bucks as a result of our recommendations, donations will be gratefully accepted! ;0)

Suggested Reading

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Make Money With Ads

Making money from your Web site can be a difficult challenge. You write good articles and you link to great ads from all sorts of sources that you know your readers would love to buy from. Yet you make no money. What could possibly be wrong? Here are a few tips that just may turn your money making non-existence around. Remember, you have to sign up with the affiliate program and use their links if you want to make money.

1. White Space - If you have a large chunk of space on your Web page that is blank your readers will wonder what is wrong with the page. They'll think your coding is wrong or you forgot something or your pictures didn't come in and left a big blank space. Either way, if makes for a bad user experience.

Imagine you were reading your favorite magazine. The text and pictures stopped halfway down the page and the rest of the page was left blank, white. What would you think?

You need to fill in this space at all costs. You can do this with more words of course. You can add a picture or other form of graphics. Or, you can use an ad.

When using an ad to fill in white space you don't want it to look to much like all you want to do is sell something. Make it match the rest of the page and look like it belongs there. You can do this by using an ad that is a picture or piece of artwork or something else that is related to the article itself.

2. Ads As Pictures - There are a few affiliates that are great for using pictures as ads. One is Amazon and the other is AllPosters.

You're writing an article about your trip to the ocean with your kids. Why not decorate the page with a picture of the ocean? You can do this and possibly make money from it too. Just choose a picture from the AllPosters affiliate site and add it to the page.

If you are writing about your son's favorite toy, link to the toy over on the side of the page using your Amazon affiliate number. You can also add the picture type ad to the article itself so the reader of the page will know exactly which toy you are talking about at the time they are reading about it.

3. Product Reviews - Did you read a book or buy something that you really liked? Write about it. Write about what you liked about the book or other item and link to one of your affiliate ads promoting it. Did your son just buy a new baseball mit and he really likes it? While you are writing about your son using the mit for the first time at his baseball game, link to the mit on Amazon from the article. This way if people reading your article want to buy the mit they'll know where to get it and you'll make money off it at the same time.

Tell your readers what you liked about the latest book you read. Explain to them how it made you feel or what you learned from it. Then link to the ad for that book.

4. Google Search - Put a search box on your site. Not only will your readers be able to search your site to find what they need but they will also be able to search the Net. You can do this and make money at the same time. Google offers a search box that pays. Sign up with Google Adsense and add the code for the search box to the top of all your pages. Then when someone needs to do a search you just may make some money.

5. Related Products - If you are writing about a book, or other item, you like also link to related items. Make a column under the article where you wrote about the item you liked, or to the side of the article, where you link to books that are similar to the items you are writing about.

Let's say you wrote about a science fiction book you read. At the bottom of the article, or over to the side, link to that book along with similar science fiction books that you liked. Make sure you use your affiliate links and when people buy any of those books you will make money.

6. Includes - Includes are a simple piece of HTML code that you can use on your Web pages to place ads, menus, pictures or just about anything you want. Includes won't make you money, but they can help you manage your ads. Place a little piece of code on your Web page where you want the ad to show. The ad links to where the real code lives. The code for your ad will be in a small file with just the code for your ad.

I use this all the time in my personal Web sites. I place the same ad on many pages. Then whenever an ad has lost it's usefulness or becomes outdated I can change them all at the same time by just changing the code inside that small file, called an include.