Jason Calacanis expresses his delight for the new Gawker ad, pushing comedy series Monk in a very visible way. In a media buyer’s world this is a sort of a roadblock, with all major ads displaying more or less the same thing. Check out Gawker, and/or the image below if the campaign is over.
Now, Gawker is a big blog with a solid readership. It’s no surprise that they have a sales person and the opportunity to tailor solutions to the advertiser. That means more money for Gawker, a special solution always costs extra.
It also further underlines the fact that blogs aren’t so far from the mainstream media anymore. These kinds of ad bookings usually end up on more traditional sites, but Gawker running them is perhaps not a first in the blogosphere (anyone know this?), but certainly an important pointer to other big blogs regarding the fact that they need to work harder with tailored advertising. Google Adsense will get you a few steps on the way, but I dare promise you that this particular campaign brings in more than Adsense would in six months…
Originally posted on January 19, 2007 @ 5:02 am
Anthony says
I think this technique of custom ad solutions is something smaller blogs outside of the blog networks should use to offer advertisers something with more impact on the blogs audience than they can get via Adsense or Text Link Ads. Small should mean more flexible and not just follow whatever everyone else does.
Thord Daniel Hedengren says
True. However, smaller blogs will have some trouble attracting advertisers with the necessary know-how/media agencies to deliver these custom ads. It’s not entirely easy.