Ask HN: Who do you use to sell your ad space? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Who do you use to sell your ad space?

17 pointsdawson18 comments

I'm considering buysellads.com but would like some other recommendations (as 25% seems expensive). I don't need an agent, as I have interested advertisers, I just want a hosted SaaS solution that can supply the code and handle the merchant processing, CPC/I and inventory etc.

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@dawson I can't speak to isocket, as I've never used or talked to anyone who has used the software. What i can offer you about BSA are a few things:

- You’re not locked in to fixed 30-day rate pricing; publishers at BSA can also sell ads on a CPM basis.

- I'm not sure what type of site you have, but if you look around our directory (http://buysellads.com/buy) you will see many sites that have sold a ton of ads.

- It's true; we charge a 25% commission (includes payment fees, BTW). As such, we're incentivized to actually sell ads for you.

- For many people, the commission comes down to either a) selling ads commission free and keeping 100% (minus payment fees), or b) selling more ads, and likely making more money, with someone whose goals are aligned with yours… it's one of those 100% of a pie that's worth $100 or 75% of a pie that's worth $200 scenarios.

- If you were looking for a commission free ad-selling tool, I'd recommend using something free like OIO Publisher.

- There are dozens of publishers at BSA who would likely sell plenty of ads directly to advertisers without us; however, with BSA in the mix managing their sales they sell a ton more.

There’s also a bunch of non-biased reviews of what BSA has done for other publishers here: http://www.google.com/search?q=buysellads

(Disclosure: I founded BSA and my blood, sweat, and tears are in the BSA software… so I might be a little biased)

I haven't had a great experience with your service or support so far. I registered two days ago and logged in, came back a few hours later and couldn't login anymore. On contacting your support (which took over 3 hours to respond), I was told no such account existed and was asked to register again. I did, and received an email this time saying it was a success and all was fine. I added my website and waited for approval, two days later and this afternoon I'm still waiting for approval, I emailed you saying can you approve it and suddenly it's now disappeared from my dashboard completely, not waiting for approval nor is it approved! I emailed support just over an hour ago and am now waiting for this to be resolved.

I can't argue with you on that - poor 1st experience. I assume you'd rather not share your domain submitted here... if you have a moment, would you mind emailing me the domain and/or account email you signed up with to todd@buysellads.com so that I can look into this for you?

It seems likely that you're somehow not receiving emails from the app, and I should be able to figure this out for you.

ah, I see your account & support ticket, and the site was denied. I tried visiting the site URL and it doesn't resolve... which is likely why it was denied. I'm happy to help troubleshoot some more if you want to ping me at todd@buysellads.com

This was my fault and not BSAs, I didn't enter the URL correctly on submission, apologies.

no worries, glad we could help get this sorted out for you!

(Disclosure: Founder of isocket)

isocket is used by the web's premiere publishers like TechCrunch, Cheezburger Network, Lookbook.nu, GameZebo, Vator.tv, etc etc.

@Dawson - OIO is free, but it puts a lot of the support on your shoulders. So you've got a mix of options - SaaS software like isocket that includes support for you and your advertisers, brokerage services like BSA that include support and commissions, or total 'on your own' stuff OIO.

You mentioned already selling some ads on your own / having interested from advertisers. Congrats!

Going to give https://www.isocket.com/ a try.

It's tough for many publishers to find the right ad solution because their traffic, audience, and level of involvement in the business differ.

I work at isocket and want to point out that BuySellAds is great for some people. If you're looking to sell month-long tenancy campaigns on a subscription (pay-until-they-cancel) basis, BSA is the best tool for the job. And for that service, they'll assess a 25% commission on all the ad revenue you generate.

If you're looking more flexibility in your ad packages - CPM, daily/weekly/monthly campaigns, grids, takeovers and a flat fee pricing, you might want to look at isocket. See http://www.isocket.com/group/techcrunch for an example. We're about to release a "free-until-your-first-sale" program so there's essentially no risk in trying us out.

If you've got more questions, feel free to reach out to me at jason@isocket.com.

Amazing how recommending one of your competitors (even for only certain use cases) makes my impression of your brand that much higher. Thank you!

The percentage a network takes is irrelevant. What really matters is your total net revenue. Fill rate and eCPM are the biggest weaknesses of most networks/agencies.

+1 for you, 100% correct.

You should try Adclays (http://www.adclays.com). It helps publishers sell their ad space directly to advertisers. You can choose between monthly ad spaces or per CPM. You can also add backfill code so you still earn if your ad space is not sold. We take 15% of the sale.

Contact me and i can work out a better deal for you.

Disclaimer: I own Adclays.

Some constructive criticism:

Without logging in, there is hardly any information (beyond marketing language).

The latest blog post appears to have been November 18, 2010. Just below the title there's the default "Your Awesome Tagline" as a subtitle.

The FAQ only says, "A complete support page is been put together based on popular questions."

In short, these are some big red flags for any business interested in your product.

Buysellads.com looks great as a self service option. However does anyone have a recommendation for a company that will actively try and seek out advertisers for you?

BuySellAds does actively seek out advertisers for you - ping me with your site info at todd@buysellads.com if you would like me to take a look and give you an idea of what we can do for you.

Thanks for the reply Todd. We aren't serving ads quite yet (no ads served during beta) but I will be in touch when the site goes live!

If you already have advertisers then you should look at using a solution such as OpenX or OIOPubisher etc.

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