[WEB4LIB] Re: Free Britannica Going Away / Banner ads

[Thomas Dowling]

> Are banner ads truly ineffective?

Yes--or at least (and what's most important) advertising agencies think
so.  The New York Times from Sunday, March 11 had an extensive article on
Yahoo's financial woes.  The realization in the ad industry is apparently
that banner ads "are not as entertaining as TV, not as informative as
print and not as personal as direct mail."
<URL:http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/11/technology/11YAHO.html?pagewanted=3
&searchpv=site08>

An advertising CEO was quoted as saying, "A banner is nothing more than a
highway billboard, a reminder message...We know what outdoor is worth - $2
per thousand [views, or 'impressions']".  Yahoo had been asking for
$16/impression, which is comparable to prime time television spots; they
recently lowered their price to $8/impression, halving their major revenue
stream, but still running at 400% of what that ad exec thinks it's worth.

On top of that, firms that were buying banner ads like crazy two years ago
are increasingly putting that money into their own sites instead of
advertising on other sites.

Bleak, bleak news for sites that need to subsidize content through ad
revenues.


Thomas Dowling
OhioLINK - Ohio Library and Information Network
tdowling at ohiolink.edu