Ad Format Discussion

[Renegade]

We are looking to move away from popup / popunder advertisements on free SayBox accounts. To do this, we need to find a new way of generating at least as much revenue as the popunders currently do.

We currently have sample versions of two possible new ad placements running. You can find them at www.saybox.co.uk and dhost.info/syth. These would, if we go ahead with them, completely replace the current ads we run on our shoutboxes.

Now we need your feedback. Tell us what you think of the sample placements, and how you feel that type of advertising compares to the current ads we display on free accounts.

You will need a forum account to be able to post; registration is quick and email activation for new accounts is currently not required.

If you have any opinion on the ads either way, or suggestions for other methods of running ads on free accounts, please take the time to post and tell us what you think. We will reply to every point raised.

Paid accounts will remain adfree either way, but we are considering switching out the antispam (ban links) feature from subscribed accounts to free ones, as less spam from bots on free accounts means less work for the server to do.

If you'd like to volunteer your account for test purposes please post your username and server number - in return for being our guinea pig we will give you some free subscription time after testing is finished.

[Shady]

Username is shadygirl, server 1, on the following site - helensbloggy.blogspot.com

It's not that active, but I can play with it myself, and push some other people into posting if it helps.

[sythril]

sythril serverz 3

dhost.info/syth/

I dunno what to say.. I know it can be resized, if necessary atleast.

[Shady]

Hmm...I think I prefer the popups, to be honest. I thought these would be smaller. It was taking up half of my saybox, since I only had the height at 250. Increased to 400, and it still looks pretty big. Maybe it'd look better in between the saybox and the shouting box thing? As it is, I think it's a bit too distracting at the top. I know that's the point of ads, but I'd probably still prefer popups.

[Renegade]

We have a different version on Sythril's SayBox right now - that one isn't so tall, but is wider, and would therefore be better for people who set the width of their SayBox to be bigger.

[Shady]

His does actually look better. I guess I could play with the size a bit.

[Renegade]

We're kind of limited by the ad sizes offered - these two placements are the smallest possible right now. It would be possible to automatically pick whiever ad was best fitted to the width of the SayBox though.

[Shady]

Mine actually looks better now I've changed the colour and it blends in more. It's good that it'll be automatic, since I'm not sure about keeping it at the sizes I've changed to.

[sythril]

I like it, although I think I may have to make meh saybox a lil bit bigger so the ads blend in more..

[ZeKe.]

I like it better. Rather than having a pop under you have the add actually inside your saybox. More discreet.

[~>tobi<~]

the www.saybox.co.uk link does not work for me.

I did check out the one @ syth. and I like that ad system much better then the popunders. They are way less intrusive!

[Renegade]

The ones for narrower SayBoxes take up a bit more space as they have to be taller, you can see an example of that type on our homepage.

[Shady]

I see why they have to be bigger for the narrower SayBoxes, but I prefer the way the wider ones look. They are a definite improvement on popups.

[Greg]

Looks great.
83.7334729% better. I did the math.
All joking aside. This is much better.
You might get a 95.3333% improvement from me if the ad were maybe like between the two most recent posts rather than at the top. But that's probably asking too much and might not set right with google ads.

[Renegade]

The main problem with putting it between posts would be that people could then set their account to be so small the ad wasn't visible without scrolling the iframe. You'd think people wouldn't even bother to do something like that, but they do - when we used to just serve text links under the shoutboxes, I'd see so many accounts where people set it up so that the ad was covered by something else on the page. If the ad goes at the top, then that solves that problem.

The ads take on the font colour and the background colour used in whatever account is displaying them, incidentally, so they'll match with any shoutbox they're used in.