Advertizing

[Ears and Eggs]

Ahhhhhhh! Crap! The forum just changed to the skilltest theme by iteslf and won't change back! My eyes are exploding! O___O


EDIT: Fixed. Just had to log in and out. That was kinda weird though

 

[rhd]

I wasn't saying they weren't necessary. I was just commenting that when they get out of hand and become really annoying, they will generate less revenue due to more people blocking them.

I suspect that this is true.

A lot of people would likely leave one banner ad and some text, but when there are multiple banners that throw off the function of the site (IE, forcing you to scroll down an entire screen on every page before getting to the forum), people probably start looking to block ads entirely.

I'm sure the ad revenue is necessary, but:

1) Somehow, other forums (likely some of them larger and with more bandwidth than LPF) stay viable without as much advertising. Unequivocally, I would say that LPF has more late-90's style obtrusive advertising than absolutely any other site I visit these days.

2) The more advertising you put on a page, the less practical it is to use the site without blocking ads. On my phone, I cannot (literally) load the page properly without blocking adds. It won't work. I've got a dual-core 1.4ghz chip in this phone, with android 2.3, and it freezes trying to load LPF without advertising blocked. I've actually had to load ad blocking software (which is itself hard to find) onto my phone, solely for the purpose of enabling browsing of LPF.

Anyway, there's got to be a better way to monetize LPF. Heck, if it's pay-per-click revenue, then maybe just put a bucket-load of banners on a single splash page that you show everyone once-per-day. If it's pay-per-click, then anyone interested will click when they see the splash page, but at least the banners won't then be in there face on every single successive page. Plus, I doubt people would bother blocking ads on a splash page they only see once a day.

 

[Elektrotechniker]

hey guys , thanks for feedback


the # of ads is actually significantly reduced from what it was before on the top. i added some addition to the javascript to target the ads on lasers more so they should be less annoying.

please remember that advertising is necessary to pay for the costs of LPF such as hosting which is currently $365/month.

if LPF didn't have success in advertising, there would be no way for the site to pay for itself except charging for membership (which i wouldnt ever want to do or plan to do) and/or relying solely on donations


if you put yourself in my shoes i think you will see where i am coming from=)

take care
peace
-ave

Really though, I think you can find a MUCH cheaper provider. That's a lot of money to pay for just hosting...

 

[qumefox]

Really though, I think you can find a MUCH cheaper provider. That's a lot of money to pay for just hosting...

I agree here. If it's really almost $400/mo you should probably shop around. I wouldn't be surprised if you couldn't at least half that, if not even more.

 

[c0ldshadow]

thx for feedback guys. i am using firehost.com , who has an ultra secure setup and impressive network architecture including application layer DDoS protection. you get what you pay for in hosting and i would rather pay a little more to do extra to protect the forum.

i work in the security field so i naturally care quite a bit about having excellent security. kevin mitnick also uses firehost =)

regarding the ads on the top, over time i might be able to remove some of them but i would likely need to increase the monthly donation goal

thanks again for all the feedback..

take care, everyone
peace
-ave

 

[mark-in-dallas]

Avery, I also run a forum, which is far less sucessful tha LPF, yet my affiliate reveunues exceed the cost of my dedicated server and hardware firewall, by a long shot.

AND I DO NOT DISPLY ADS TO MEMBERS!

The ads that are displayed are shown to guests only, and are far fewer in number than those shown on LPF.

I would be willing to bet that if you stopped displaying ads to LPF members and showed them only to guests and members in moderation your affiliate revenues would not decrease, or not by much of a noticable amount anyway.

I believe that most of us that regularly participe in the forum have long since moved beyond buying overspecced lasers out of China and waiting months to receive them.

In fact if covering the cost of the hosting is truly the reason for the ads, If you would be willing to try hiding the ads from showing to members for one month and affiliate revenues didn't still cover the hosting costs, I would be willing to cover the difference.

I would also bet just about anything that if you hid the ads from members, dontations received would increase substantially. I think I speak for many when I say that we truly appreciate the forum and all of the hard work that you guys put into it, but the advertising has really gone overboard, to the point of becoming an irritation and being completely ignored.

You could show ads to guests and new members only, by creating a new membership group and using the vBulletin automatic promotions plugin, move guests into the new membership group upon registration and until they reach 5 or 10 posts, at which time thy are promoted to regular members.

You could also use the plugin to demote members that have not posted in X amount of time.

If you'd be willing to give it a shot, a simple php statement above each area reserved for ad space is all it takes to display ads to only select membership groups, and I'll even provide the statement if you will give me the forum id's used for members and veterrans.

The ads on LPF have become so intrusive that it really borders the obscene, and I completely ignore all of them, as I bet most members do. We are tired of seeing them every time we come to the forum, and then having to scroll past all of the stickied ads as well.

 

[mark-in-dallas]

Really though, I think you can find a MUCH cheaper provider. That's a lot of money to pay for just hosting...

I agree with what everyone is saying about advertising, but on the hosting issue I've got to back Avery.

$400 a month for a dedictated server with a hardware firewall is completely reasonable.

Yes, there is budget hosting you can get for a couple of dollars a month, and Avery could certainly switch hosting companies and go with someone like Godaddy.

BUT, I WOULD BE WILLING TO BET WITH THE BANDWIDTH USED BY LPF THE ACCOUNT WOULD BE TERMINATED WITHIN A DAY OR 2!!!

And, if by some miracle it weren't terminated, it would alomost certainly be hacked within a month or 2.

Unlimited hosting at budget pricing is about the biggest scam in the web business. Think about it: bandwidth, storage and memory all cost money, and they do have limitations! You can only push so much data through a fiber-optic line, and you can only add so many hardrives or GigaBytes of memory to a server.

Legitimate hosting companies state how much bandwidth is included in their hosting plans and charge per Gigabyte if the amount is exceeded, and they charge a lot!

I've used budget hosting in the past, then moved up to reseller accounts which gave me greater flexibility and control, and in each instance the servers were hacked, and on a couple of occasions it cost me losing a website forever.

I priced out a dedicated server on Firehost, and the server that I would have assembled to run the forum would have cost over $800/mo. At $400 per month Avery is getting a good deal, and taking on much of the server responsibility himself.

 

[spyrorocks]

Shared hosts would impose a cpu usage cap so fast.

 

[rhd]

Mark - I agree with you 100%

I'm sure there are FAR more non-signed-in viewers than their are signed-in members, at any given time. Plus, I think there's an argument to be made for the fact that WE are creating the underlying content that drives non-member eyeballs to this site in the fist place.

We generally keep hearing the same reply... that "there are far fewer adds on LPF now, than ever before", etc etc etc. Great, sure, but there way too many |in an absolute present value sense|, and that's the point.

A pool three-quarters full of rotten asparagus is better than a pool entirely full of rotten asparagus, but that's still way more rotten asparagus than I want to have in my pool when trying to throw a decent backyard BBQ.

There are too many adds on LPF. We're not subjectively judging a beauty contest here, or trying to define the meaning of life. It's a pretty straightforward observation. LPF has way more advertising than any other site on the internet. If LPF cannot survive without showing it's members this many adds, then Avery, you're doing something wrong. Every other website in 2011 has figured this one out.

I don't get it, you need about $350 just to cover dedicated hosting. You seem to get at least $150 from donations each month. So what the hell is wrong with these advertisers that between all of them, there's still a deficit? I don't get it. Are these just the cheapest advertisers on the planet?

Rant over.

 

[lasersbee]

Advertising.....:thinking: What advertising...:thinking:

I've been here long enough that I don't even see the
advertising. It is just one click down and I see all that
interests me...

At least we don't have advertising banners between the
Post like I've seen on other Forums...
That's annoying....


Jerry

 

[c0ldshadow]

Nobody likes ads. However, they are a necessary support for LPF. I am currently trying different
ad vendors, and hopefully the ad presentations will stabilize in the near future. Unfortunately, I can't have a two-tiered system where members don't see ads, that would be counter to various ad contracts in place. My
best advice is that if you don't like the ads, just ignore them.

 

[qumefox]

Or use adblock plus like I do. Which I use for more than just ads. I actually block most peoples signatures here that have large gaudy images in them.. And even a few avatars.

 

[bennett326]

you added 2 more ads at the bottom .............

 

[c0ldshadow]

the ads on the bottom should have zero impact to the usability of the site.