Loading...
Answers
MenuSelling early advertising slots in a marketplace pre-launch?
Answers
It's not a pipe dream.
Startups convince investors to give them money for all sorts of reasons and with all sorts of potential ROI. Advertisers at this early stage could be regarded as investors of a kind. If they believe in your project and your game plan, then they might want
(A) to support you
(B) to lock down cheap long-term rates for their own advertising
By supporting you, they help build the audience that gives them exposure. And if they're able to guarantee a lower advertising rate now versus later, then they may see the payoff as worth the risk.
Very similar to pitching a startup to investors. It's only a pipe dream if your rates are too high, you can't identify the right prospects, or you can't present the case effectively. But if your early-bird special is a bargain and if you can find the right people to talk to ... and convince them, then go for it.
Perhaps you could sell them X months but start the clock only after monthly traffic reaches Y. That way, they'd get the preceding months for free, and they'd see that you're properly incentivized to build traffic early.
It's unrealistic to expect anyone other than personal connections to consider your offer at this stage.
I don't recommend any advertisers at this point.* Building traffic should be your only priority. An ad-free site is more likely to gain traction in the early phases - so focus on that. The time wasted seeking advertisers now will just steal time and progress from your efforts to build an audience.
If you want help building the audience, let me know - www.clarity.fm/ryandraving
*If you are committed to pursuing advertisers, offer free ad spots to big name advertisers in order to show social proof to other prospective advertisers you pursue at full price. Bonus here: if the trial advertisers see high ROI (relative to the full price you waived), they are likely to renew at the full price. Additionally, you can offer guaranteed pageviews at a cost that is a fraction of what they are paying now. However, you are so new that most advertisers are not going to take the risk that your site never reaches that volume of visitors.
I would offer them the deal for 4 months with the option to get the same deal for the next 8 months. In the first 4 months they won't be getting a great deal but in the second and third periods they would be getting a really good deal since you would have more traffic and so there would be more value for them
Example: 1st Period (4 months) @ $100 with a total of 4k views based on 1k per month. Avg 2.5 cents per view.
2nd period (4 months) @ $100 with a total of 8k views based on 2k per month. Avg 1.25 cents per view.
3rd period (4 months) @ $100 with a total of 12k views based on 2k per month. .Avg 0.8 cents per view.
They would not be obligated to purchase the 2nd or 3rd period but I would make sure they have to make that decision 15 days prior to the end of period 1.
I hope this helps you. Feel free to contact me for more details. I have done ad sales from $100 to $50k ad contracts.
Understanding Pre-launch marketing will be crucial at this stage. There are multiple types of pre-launch marketing campaigns, strategies, and methods one can use to get the word out about a new company or product. Second, these leads are ultimately your initial “buzz builders” for your company and brand throughout the pre-launch and post-launch. A company will need to create epic, sharable content that those on the pre-launch list will not only consume like wild banshees, but also share with others via email and socially. Even with just a little viral action going on, the ROI on marketing can be astronomical for a company. Let us say a company ran a pre-launch and generated 5,000 leads on their level 1 over a period of 30 days. Meaning, all those leads came into the company directly from their own marketing efforts. In this example, using the 20,000 number, that is 15,000 extra leads that the company had zero acquisition cost. To drill deeper, let us say the average CPA was $4.00 per enrolment into the pre-launch for the company. The company spent $20,000.00 on marketing to obtain those 5,000 leads. The leads are great, but where the rubber meets the road, is how many of those leads take out their wallets and share their credit card with you to buy your product, service, or enrol into your business. This piece is serious business. A mistake, delay, or misstep here can kill the entire pre-launch marketing campaign. There is often an exceptionally fine line a company needs to walk during this phase.
Selling Ad slots means somebody is going to buy it, so before selling you should look at it from buyer’s perspective as well. Here are some of them you need to keep in mind before launching a TV Ad campaign. Regarding your brand, a TV Ad campaign could help you when you are launching your brand, with a campaign dedicated to presenting a new product or the new features of an existing one. Do not forget, TV is the most powerful media, and it is one of the only ones that can touch such a big audience in such little time. If you are correctly led, TV could help you generate a direct response to your website, app or even store. Also, a TV ad could help you multiply the amount of traffic on your website and, therefore, generate more leads. Your TV campaign could also permit you to trigger calls to your call center and motivate TV viewers to know more about you and your services/products. Your audience is not the same in March and in July, on a Monday or a Thursday, at 8 am or 5 pm. Most radio stations say there are six sessions per day – and as you can imagine the breakfast session has a far bigger listening audience than the midnight to dawn session. Most radio commercials are 30 seconds long. Most radio commercials are pre-recorded. Radio advertising rates are lower for pre-recorded commercials, but the added benefit of personal endorsement or interaction often significantly increase the number of responses to the ad.
Besides if you do have any questions give me a call: https://clarity.fm/joy-brotonath
Me encanta pasar mi tiempo libre jugando en casinos y juegos móviles; ¡es mi forma favorita de relajarme y divertirme! Ya sea que esté probando mi suerte en un juego de casino o disfrutando de una aventura en un juego móvil, siempre me saca una sonrisa. ¡No pierdas la oportunidad de explorar este artículo en https://es-us.finanzas.yahoo.com/noticias/5-mejores-casinos-online-m%C3%A9xico-223800504.html que destaca los mejores casinos! Es una lectura obligada para cualquiera interesado en los juegos. Es como una pequeña escapada de la realidad, donde puedo relajarme y disfrutar de la emoción del juego.
It’s not a pipe dream at all! Offering early advertising packages can be a smart way to generate initial revenue and build relationships with potential SaaS vendors. Your idea of providing discounted rates for prominent placement while traffic is still growing is a reasonable approach. Make sure to clearly communicate your vision and growth potential to potential advertisers. If you share your plan effectively and offer them a good deal, you might find some vendors willing to take a chance. For some additional insights into launching and marketing platforms, you might find this article helpful: https://www.cleveroad.com/blog/how-to-make-a-casino-website/, which, while focused on casino websites, offers valuable tips on pre-launch strategies and advertising.
Related Questions
-
I just opened a small, upscale, boutique style hair salon. Any ideas on how to market?
I have no experience with salons, but marketing is my thing. So I'll give you some suggestions of what to think about, followed by what to do. Do you have clients already (let's say from your working days at another salon)? If so, you can start profiling them. You can ask them to fill out a form in exchange for a free gift (maybe one of those creams you use in the salon), or an entry to a raffle (where the prize is valuable). In the profiling, you want to look out for which neighborhoods they live in, what kinds of activities they like to do, what kinds of social events they love to do, and their occupations. Then, using each of those profile data, you can market to more prospects who share the same characteristics. For example, - You can set aside a budget to send flyers to specific neighborhoods. In order to get people into the door, maybe you can offer a certain procedure for free in exchange for opportunities to win new regular customers. (You could theoretically do this with Groupon too, but you have less control of who comes into your door) - You could set up joint venture relationships with organizations like ball room dancing schools, professional associations, etc. You could offer an exclusive discount with those groups to entice potential customers to try out your service. More opportunities for you to win regular customers. - With certain demographic data, you can probably make the same offer by advertising on Facebook. If you target specific enough, you can get the price of acquiring the lead to be pretty cheap. You would have to figure out your typical lifetime value of your customers before deciding whether advertising on Facebook would be worthwhile. One last thing, you can offer gifts for your existing customers if they refer you people. If you have any more questions, I'm happy to chat with you. Hit me up on this platform.SL
-
How can I become an idea person, as a professional title?
One word: Royalties This means you generate the idea and develop it enough to look interesting to a larger company who would be willing to pay you a royalty for your idea. This happens all the time. Rock stars, authors and scientists routinely license their creative ideas to other companies who pay them a royalty. Anyone can do it. Your business, therefore, would be a think tank. You (and your team, if you have one) would consider the world's problems, see what kinds of companies are trying to solve those problems, and then develop compelling solutions that they can license from you. You have to be able to sell your idea and develop a nice presentation, a little market research and an understanding of basic trademark and patent law. The nice thing about doing this is that if you develop enough cool ideas you will have royalties coming in from a lot of different sources, this creates a stable, passive revenue stream that requires little or no work to maintain. Start in your spare time and plan on the process taking 3-5 years. Set a goal to have a few products in the market that provide enough revenue (royalties) to cover your basic living expenses. Then you can quit your day job and dedicate more time and increase the momentum. A good idea business should have dozens, if not hundreds of license contracts generating royalties. It's possible to pull this off. And it is a fun job (I'm speaking from experience).MM
-
How does my startup hire an affordable marketing expert?
I don't even know how to answer this. Do you know what the difference between McDonalds and the local burger joint that is filing for bankruptcy is? It's marketing. McDonalds is worth billions of dollars not because of the quality of their food, but because of their marketing. Marketing is not an expense. A janitor is an expense. Your computer is an expense. Marketing is an INVESTMENT. Would you shop around for the cheapest heart surgeon? Of course not. Because you would likely end up dead. Why, then, do you shop around for a marketing expert? Are you ok with your company going bankrupt? Is that worth the small savings to you? No. Of course not. Hire someone who is good at marketing. Hire someone who knows what they are doing. Buy yourself a Lamborghini with your profit the first quarter. Get a beach house in hawaii. Grab a yacht. Or, try to find your business the cheapest heart surgeon you can and then spend the next five years wondering why such a solid business idea failed in the first 6 months. I'm passionate about this exact topic because all those statistics you read about "70% of businesses failing in two years" are solely because of horrible marketing.AM
-
I have this social media idea,but no coding skills. How do I get someone to do the coding (cant afford to pay them) and not give away half of my idea?
Dilip was very kind in his response. My answer might be a bit on the "tough love" side. But that's for you to decide. My intention, just for the record, is to help you (and those like you) on your path to success. And that starts with having a viable philosophy about entrepreneurial-ism and business. And I'm going to answer this because I get asked some form / version of this question very frequently from newcomers to entrepreneurial-ism. The scenario goes something like this: "I have a great idea. It's amazing, I love it, and I just KNOW it's gonna make me a ton of money. But I have no money right now so I can't afford to (fill in the blank with things like "to build it / create it / market it / etc" or "to hire the required staff needed to work in my business to sell it / develop it / etc"). And I don't want to tell anyone about my great idea because I'm worried someone will steal it and make MY million / billion dollars. But I can't afford to legally protect it either... So how do I launch without the skills to personally create the product AND no money to hire anyone else to do that either??" The answer is ... You don't. Look - let's be honest. All you have is an idea. Big deal. Really. I'm not saying it's not a good idea. I'm not saying that if properly executed it couldn't make you a million / billion dollars... But an idea is NOT a business. Nor is it an asset. Until you do some (very important) initial work - like creating a business model, doing customer development, creating a MVP, etc - all you really have is a dream. Right now your choices are: 1. Find someone with the skills or the money to develop your idea and sell them on WHY they should invest in you. And yes, this will mean giving up either a portion of the "ownership" or of future income or equity. And the more risk they have to take - the more equity they will want (and quite frankly be entitled to). 2. Learn how to code and build it yourself. MANY entrepreneurs without financial resources are still resourceful. They develop the skills needed to create what they don't have the money to pay someone else to do. 3. Get some cash so you can pay someone to do the coding. You'll probably have to have some knowledge of coding to direct the architecture of your idea. So you will likely still have to become knowledgeable even if its not you personally doing the coding. (This is not meant to be a comprehensive list of options... And I'm sure some of the other experts here on Clarity have others to add - and I hope they do) To wrap up - Here's my final tip to you that I hope you "get"... It's FAR more valuable to have an idea that a very specific hungry crowd is clamoring for right now - One that THEY would love and pay you for right now - Maybe even one they'd pre-order because they just have to have it - Versus YOU being in love with your own idea. [Notice I didn't say "an idea that some as-of-yet-undetermined market would probably love"] I wish you the best of luck moving forward.DB
-
What is the most creative way to introduce myself (and therefore my service) to 100 key decision-makers without selling or pitching anything?
You've answered your own question. Reach out to your prospects with the question, such as "How would you...". Ask what people want then give it to them if you can with integrity and thoughtfulness.DI
the startups.com platform
Copyright © 2025 Startups.com. All rights reserved.