Question

Topic: Advertising/PR

Help! Don't Know How Much To Charge For Ad Space!!

Posted by Joyful on 4/27/2013 at 12:11 PM ET 250 Points
I am launching a website to provide consumers hand-picked professionals in a certain field. I will also be marketing full-time on behalf of the website. The dilemma is, if I'm recommending 3 professionals in a particular trade and giving detailed/warm descriptions about who they are, how much do I charge them per month to have that spot on my site??

This is hard because although I want to generate traffic and increase brand recognition, I'm also charging for my time and ability to influence decision-makers to count on me as a trusted source. I was thinking maybe charge a little at the beginning and then increase? Help!!!!

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RESPONSES

  • Posted on 4/27/2013 at 12:20 PM Accepted
    The obvious answer is to charge what it's worth to those professionals. But until you have significant traffic and a success story to tell, I suspect it will be very difficult to get them to pay anything. This is a little like selling ad space in a magazine: until you have the subscriber base it's hard to get an advertiser to pay for the space.

    Suggestion: Give the space free until they land a gig based on your referral. Then charge a fee that's roughly equal to 10% of their gross billing to that client if they want to continue to be on your list. This will demonstrate to them that you have a stake in their success, and that you're willing to invest in yourself and your service because you're that confident in the future results.
  • Posted by Joyful on 4/27/2013 at 12:28 PM Author
    The problem is there is no way to monitor what the sales are as a result of my marketing strategies. I am basing the need for a marketer in these industries because there is a need for it based on my past field experience. I have established the relationships already and I already refer work to these business owners, I just don't get paid for it. Would putting together a presentation be useful to show what hiring me would cost vs paying me a small monthly fee? Most of them already know me and have actually tried to hire me. The problem truly lies on setting that monthly price.
  • Posted on 4/27/2013 at 12:34 PM Moderator
    Without the details it's difficult to answer your question. Maybe the approach should be to make some assumptions and see what you think your service should be worth to the professionals you're representing. Then if you charge them, say, 75% of that amount they should be eager to pay it.
  • Posted by Joyful on 4/27/2013 at 12:38 PM Author
    Thanks! I will do that. Now let's hope I can turn my brain to 'off' and just stick to that one solution.
  • Posted by Moriarty on 4/27/2013 at 1:07 PM Accepted
    A question - you're already referring people to these professionals. Ask them how much those clients have made for them. You could charge on a referral basis. I guess that's the tracking problem? There are a few work-arounds to this, Google for example has a system to track phonecalls made from mobiles that click the phone-number. As someone in the field, you'll probably know a good few of these tricks already.
  • Posted by Jay Hamilton-Roth on 4/27/2013 at 1:10 PM Accepted
    Unless you/they can measure the results of your efforts, it's going to be an uphill battle. Maybe someone contacting one of your featured businesses will mention you site, maybe they won't. If you could find out their "usual" monthly client income, then you have one data point to compare against. If your website could track the actions of the visitor (have a "special offer" link for each of your listed businesses), you have another data point. If you can develop some case studies of being on your list (follow ups with consumers & businesses), you have another data point.
  • Posted by Joyful on 4/27/2013 at 3:23 PM Author
    Love the suggestion about tracking mobiles. I had no idea that was possible. I think I'm going to offer a 30-day free ad trial OR X amount of traffic to the site (whichever comes first). The question now is, how much traffic do I consider to be "successful?" Having a love/hate relationship with marketing as we speak....more love =) Thanks for all of your help, guys! Y'all have no idea how much I appreciate it.
  • Posted by Joyful on 4/27/2013 at 3:28 PM Author
    Jay Hamilton-Roth,

    I agree with follow-ups with consumers and businesses. In the future, this will be huge to track effectiveness of my site. It's a lot of work but, extremely beneficial. The whole point of this site is to help SMALL business owners grow their business. I do not want to feature a large number of vendors. They will all be hand-picked by me and I will serve as quality control as well. In the long run, I plan to have those few featured spots be a prime piece of real estate on my site. So, any suggestions on how to monitor data points is greatly appreciated!
  • Posted by Moriarty on 4/27/2013 at 4:06 PM Member
    Just in case you missed them - you can have specific landing pages on your client's websites (if they have any) specific extensions to their landlines that are phoned through your website (= trackability) - this sort of basic idea is often overlooked when things like Google Analytics can offer so much - but is incredibly complex. I can barely get my head around their interface, to me it's totally illogical. Never mind me, if you can use it effectively, it's an amazingly powerful tool that allows you to "watch" where visitors are looking. How they do it is beyond me - and be warned, Google Analytics uses Javascript and 90% of users now use javascript blockers.

    A long time ago there was a php version of Analytics available that runs serverside (and therefore can't be blocked). I doubt it had anywhere near the flexibility of the modern Analytics software.
  • Posted by cashone001 on 5/15/2013 at 4:17 AM Member
    I think if you If you charge too much for the reference you provided, you might end up with no advertisers at all while charging less will be leaving money on the table. However, there are no standard pricing structures across the Internet. You need to do some research on it to find the rates that will maximize your revenues. I agree with Moriarty that tracking could be make easier for each call the user made by Google set redirected number.
  • Posted by Joyful on 5/15/2013 at 12:18 PM Author
    I agree! Luckily, I found a phone service where I can track how many calls are going to that extension. Also, it has the ability to record calls so I can hear what the average quoted price will be for each contractor. Thanks for the suggestion- I could not agree more with your opinion.
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