• by Bryan Everett , November 13, 2007

Henry Ford is commonly reputed to have made the statement "Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black."

Though Google AdSense has certainly become the "new black" in the last few years, marketers now have a lot of online advertising alternatives that often generate a comparable, and sometimes stronger ROI. While I am not advocating that marketers drop AdSense of course, I believe marketers would benefit by taking a look at some of the other options now available in the marketplace. Here are some of the key reasons to diversify:

1. Help reduce your overall blended CPC (Cost Per Click) - One of the top concerns among the advertisers I meet is cost per click inflation. Keywords which once cost advertisers $.20-$.30 a few years ago are now approaching $1. Even when advertisers diversify and buy broader terms, competitors who are doing the same challenge them. And a keyword that gives a great ROI at $.30 can cause a company to lose money once the price is driven too high.

The best way to combat cost per click inflation is to diversify online advertising budgets across multiple advertising programs. New advertisers should utilize alternative ad programs to help lower average CPCs while also taking advantage of the strong ROI that in-text delivers.

2. Increased reach through greater distribution - A second benefit of diversifying the online advertising budget is to increase reach. With online publishers working with different and often multiple advertising platforms, running campaigns with five or six ad platforms will increase your reach. And some of the new reach you gain might be better qualified, leading to better conversions. For example, running an ad for a DVD burner on the forums of CD Freaks (www.cdfreaks.com), the leading site for digital storage, is likely to result in a contextually relevant engagement. This is because the users who read the forum posts on CD Freaks have an interest in digital storage. Take it a step further and place that ad within the body of the content, i.e. within the text, instead of alongside, above or over it, and such an engagement is far more likely to result in a conversion than most other forms of online advertising.

3. Utilize rich media and video as part of your pay-per-click advertising campaigns - As effective as sponsored text links are, the addition of rich media and video provide an experience that will support your marketing and branding initiatives in a way that text can't. By creating online video & rich media engagement opportunities for your brand (and not simply repurposing TV ads for online usage), marketers can get the best of both worlds through in-text advertising: an increase in brand association and a strong ROI.

4. Take Advantage of Differentiated Technology - The success of online advertising is a story of technology. Whether it's the rise of Yahoo, Overture or Google, it is the technology which has been the driver for innovation and differentiation in online advertising. In contextual advertising, it will be relevancy-enabling technology that will facilitate a better, more meaningful match between the advertiser's message and the content the user is engaging with. This is achieved by utilizing our real-time understanding of the true context of a page, the keywords that are most relevant to the page, and the ads that are most relevant to the keywords. The high degree of relevancy leads to a strong advertiser ROI and better user experience overall. It is technology which will differentiate and set apart the leading online advertising platforms from the rest of the pack.

5. Users and Publishers must benefit, too - Of course you share your online advertising ecosystem with users - your prospective customers - and publishers. A truly successful online advertising solution must be beneficial to all three in the long-term in order to succeed. I believe that the ad platforms that will survive Web 2.0, Web 3.0 and beyond are the ones that focus on improving user experience by seeking ways to improve the relevancy and optimizing the quantity and placement of ads and related information. This might appear counter-intuitive for a organizations that make money when users click on their ads, but as a ad sales veteran of several media, I truly believe that a successful overall experience will only be achieved by maintaining a balance between users, publishers and advertisers.

Black may always be in, but you have potential customers that also prefer red, green, blue, brown and more. So offer your prospects and existing customers a range of advertising alternatives through which to engage with your brand and ultimately purchase your products and services.

Everett is the Senior Vice President of Sales & Business Development at In-Text Advertising provider Kontera and he can be reached at be@kontera.com