Just a quick-heads up; we've joined a new Australian run advert network called EMI, which will display a combination of gaming industry focused and generic Google adverts, in an effort to better monetise the traffic at GU.
Commissions directly through Google AdSense have been dismal as of late unfortunately, and we need to ensure we can continue to cover the costs of running the site.
The GU Premium subscription has been adjusted so that no one in that user-group will see leader-board (top/bottom of site) or in-post advertisements.
I've never really said anything negative about GU's site design or the like. I also understand the need to fund the site.
That said, in-post ads are one of the worst things to ever see on a forum. It's distracting, ugly and frankly turns me away from any forum that uses them.
Edit: Also just discovered that once those movies start, they can't be stopped.
The placements were advised by the agency for maximum return. Soon enough they should all be about games, movies and entertainment so they'll at least be relevant - hopefully enough so for you to click it.
As Chad mentions, any ad-blocker will take care of them.
Although, I'm all for turning off 'adblocker' if the content or advertisement actually translated to some benafit. For example a token based economy or reward based system for 'clicking' on the ad. Yes a token based economy like 'fly by' points is an incentive to get people to come back and use the service again, though its better than just saying 'here have more useless advertisement'.
Over-all, if you want to get a higher turn around for profit for gamers underground you need to give value to the advertisement that is shown to your site and actually give incentives or token based economy for 'checking' out the advertisement.
For example, checking out 'dragon porn' thread that is still the highest google hit of gamers underground. Actually offer a token or badge for saying "ha, I purchased dragon porn'. Or some new fancy incentive to get people to at-least check out the ad's.
You're aiming at might I say above mom and dad computer users who normally do use firefox (this is something checking out on your stats what percentage of users use your site). And a pre-cursor of this is normally they have ad-blocker turn on. So you're going to have to give them a 'reason' or 'incentive' that benafits them to turn the damn thing off so you make advertisement money.
My only grip, with the Premium account, is I see no justification to spend the money on the Premium account when it does nothing for me? For example, having a special offering on the front page about you get "%" percentage off for Premium users at this and this store gives a reason to get it. Or, that you get extra services ontop of the Premium account that normal users don't have. Hell how about a 'free' tshirt with some fancy logo on it :)
Yes, changing advertisement schemes may increase in revenu, though I think it will piss people off more and result in them installing ad-blocker.
There's no way for vBulletin to know that you as a unique user has clicked on an advert. Furthermore, it would be be a breach of contract to do so. No advertising network in the world would allow us to incentivise the clicking of adverts, as it will cost them a fortune and they will get no conversions from those clicks.
Unfortunately the incentive to display or click adverts will be to find out about new games and movies, and be exposed to various sales and discounts in the gaming and entertainment space.
You get little from the Premium subscription, but you only give a little - and its to support the expense of keeping this site running. We make nothing from GU, we're not owned by a network, and we're not paid for all the work we do updating it. If we were to print and deliver a GU t-shirt to you as a part of the subscription, that would immediately half what we see from the annual $48 cost so that's not really feasible.
People are of course welcome to install ad-blockers, I imagine most regulars here already have them installed, however adverts will become very targeted to the interests of this community over the next 4-6 weeks to minimise the irritation for those who don't.
Yeh sure GU's mumble and gaming servers have always been public but when it's been possibly they have had reserve slots for members, so there is that slight incentive to be a premium member. For me I felt it was only fair to give some money back as I always use GU's mumble and to be able to give the deets to any of my friends or gamers from other groups and have them be able to join without even a password, that's a pretty generous on their part...
Quote from Milenko;400388: That said, in-post ads are one of the worst things to ever see on a forum. It's distracting, ugly and frankly turns me away from any forum that uses them.
Recurring paypal payment went through on the 22nd. Maybe it takes time to verify that and if so why not give the benefit of the doubt to Premum members and give a weeks grace to do the checks at your end?
Ok, I've manually pushed your subscription out the additional 6 months. I'd recommend cancelling that PayPal auto-renew and starting a new auto-renew arrangement when it ends next time - I have a feeling it might just charge you without actually working again.
Quote from rec;400391: The placements were advised by the agency for maximum return. Soon enough they should all be about games, movies and entertainment so they'll at least be relevant - hopefully enough so for you to click it.
As Chad mentions, any ad-blocker will take care of them.
As will a Premium account. ;)
Even regionalized (sic), I logged in from Brazil and got local ads