Why I'm In Favor Of Advertising On Steemit 👍 Better Content & Passive Income
A year ago I wrote here on Steemit about how people were bemoaning the (then 4 week) reward cutoff point on Steemit, and how content producers might embrace other forms of revenue generation, such as advertising. Today, as Steemits first unofficial advertising initiative emerges, I want to revisit the subject and get a feel for what kind of sentiment is out there on the matter.
A Tried & Tested Paradigm
Before Steemit ever came along, anyone could set up a blog and become a "content marketer", earning money from banner adverts or (more discreetly) contextual links placed in or around their content. Doing this successfully meant learning your way around web design, SEO and the various affiliate and advert networks. An arms race ensued as more websites sprang up using this model, and Google scrambled to keep spam off the top of their results pages. They did a pretty good job too, and today the best way to make money through a "content website" is by ranking well with Google. To do that, your content needs to have a certain level of freshness, originality, and your site needs to have a certain reputation. The appeal of this model of course, is passive income. Payment comes after the work is done, often in a slow, long-term trickle.
Fast Forward
The Steemit model of course changes things, removing adverts and SEO, and bringing audience and content creator in a unique way. Fantastic as this is, most posts go unread within Steemit after a couple of hours, and we currently have no way to reward content that has long term value. Imagine, Steemit is getting thousands of organic hits every day from Google, and none of that traffic is being monetized. You may love the idea of Steemit being "ad free" as a consumer, but why would a content creator go to the effort of crafting a timeless masterpiece when it only has a window of one week (realistically a couple of hours) to earn them money.
Win Win
The inadequacy of Steemits payout time frame is a controversy that hasn't gone away. Recently it has been a point of great discussion on Steem Speak chat and people have been thrashing out ideas about ways to improve the situation. I was overjoyed to read news of @steemads, the first and likely not the last unofficial Steem advert initiative. How it all comes together, and how it is received remains to be seen, but I commend @inertia and @fyrstikken for their efforts. I imagine these "Steem ads" won't bother most Steemians because cleverly, the adverts will not appear until around the 7 day mark, by which time most traffic on a post will likely come from Google. This benefits both the blogger and the audience. Of course, there are already other ways to earn residual rewards, essentially using the traditional content website model and placing affiliate links within your text. I've already seen some high profile Steemians doing this, often in a wonderfully subtle way. I've read some rather shrill responses to the concept of advertising on Steemit and I wonder if they have even noticed that it's already here. Advertising doesn't have to be spammy, gaudy and conspicuous. It would be in nobodys interest to do it that way.
Why am I in favor of advertising on Steemit?
Incentive. This is why I think the emergence of advertising on Steemit will be a good thing. The promise of longer term reward will encourage far better content to be produced. The promise of rewards originating from outside the Steemit audience will also encourage far more diverse content. There is a reason Crypto News and Photography are so popular on Steemit. We're all geeks. In time, with the emergence of advertising, and indeed new community features, I hope to see Steemit become the content powerhouse it deserves to be - pet keeping, weddings, sailing, careers, interiors, car maintenance, etc .. This will be healthy for Steemit and will allow it to become the portal, the ecosystem, it deserves to be.
Over To You
I would really like to open up some discussion on this subject. While I'm not affiliated with any advertising initiative, I'm really excited by the prospect of residual income through advertising, especially when it can be done in a targeted, but non-obtrusive way. Please let me know your thoughts.
Specifically, I'd like to ask you, as both a consumer and a content creator:
- Are you in generally favor or against advertising/sponsorship/affiliation on Steemit?
- Would it matter to you if it was graphical or based in text?
- Should it be an integral part of the STEEM blockchain, or left to third parties?
- What level of advertising would make you stop following someone?
- What would encourage or discourage you from placing some form of adverts in your own content?
Upvoted at 100% and resteemed. We need advertising to become part of steemit. Let's do it different than spamming banner ads. Let's find a better way and make it uniquely steemian.
STEEM On!!
Thanks Dave. This is exactly it. I believe we can embrace advertising and do it in a way that causes minimal impact to the Steemit experience, especially for members.
You could explore a path that allows ads to be opt-in and the revenue shared:
Show ads on all my posts for anonymous users or those that have opted-in.
Show ads on my posts only after payout,
Would love to extend the payout dates, especially since only a few posts make it to trending and linger there for days.
Brilliant ideas. Thanks for commenting. I imagine we will eventually have a number of networks to choose from. Exciting stuff.
Very interesting to know this. Let me answer your questions below:
Q. Are you in generally favor or against advertising/sponsorship/affiliation on Steemit?
A. Advertising is good if it is not intrusive and complements the content. If the ad pertains to a completely different niche as opposed to the topic of the content the content creator as well as the readers will be put off by it
Q. Would it matter to you if it was graphical or based in text?
A. There is a certain level of "ad blindness" that is prevalent all over the internet so I would say that text ads could work better in the long run.
Q. Should it be an integral part of the STEEM blockchain, or left to third parties?
A. I think making it a part of the Steem blockchain would be a wise decision. Third party software integration without any connection with the blockchain could have serious drawbacks in the long term.
Q. What level of advertising would make you stop following someone?
A. Too many ads will be a put off and will trigger an unfollow.
Q. What would encourage or discourage you from placing some form of adverts in your own content?
A. Pure incentivization would be the encouragement. However, if I feel that readers have an objection to the ads in my content, or if there are too many spammy ads that will make me remove them.
Upvoted and following for more.
Thanks for taking the time to answer so comprehensively.
Putting minimal, non-obtrusive advertising on posts that have already paid out makes so much sense. It will make the value of steem come to a boil. The house takes a cut, the author takes a cut and the community gets a small nugget.
I truly despise websites that have become too clunky to use, due to pop up advertising. It can be done in such a way that everyone profits.
You raise a point that I completely overlooked. The value of STEEM could explode if some clever "official" advertising mechanism was introduced to Steemit.
Right, an actual revenue streem into steem versus investment and inflation. Could work nicely.
An interesting structure might be to opt for a 7 day SP & SBD payout or none and have ongoing ads payout over time.
Would the ad revenue be paid out similar to ththe existing structure or be paid off the Steemit platform?
I imagine we will see third parties getting in on the act long before Steemit creates some official advertising mechanism.
Yep don't mind it, especially if their after 7day mark, as long as their not annoying "one weird trick" ads.
I thought the idea of adverts only appearing after 7 days was genius! Of all the content I consume on Steemit, probably less than 1% are posts older than 7 days. Likewise, I imagine less than 1% of Google visitors have Steemit accounts already. Win-Win!
That's true, I wouldn't mind searching for old content that would interest me if the search was better and knowing someone from this community would benefit.
"We're all geeks here" that made me laugh 😂. You have great points about advertising 😎
Thanks for reading!
Not a problem 💯
as long as I can opt out of advertising I am ok. I came here to avoid advertising
Regardless of whether Steemit introduce an official advertising mechanism or not, I think in time we will see more third party advertising initiatives such as @steemads appear. You won't be able to opt out from that, but I take it you will unfollow anyone who makes use of such schemes?
I understand where you're coming from with this but honestly, I think adverts would be the thing to make me stop using steemit. That seems a bit harsh but seriously, there is almost nowhere in this world either physical or virtual that isn't plastered with annoying advertising. Honestly, I'd rather my posts keep making no money the way things are now than for them to make no money in a steemit that's covered in ads. I mean things are bad enough as they are with all those popular bloggers and vloggers shilling their shite on the hot and trending pages everyday.
I know that makes me sound like a moany whingebag, but I want steemit to become better than the rest of the internet, not a clone of every other site out there.
Thanks for your input. I certainly wouldn't like a Steemit "plastered with annoying advertising" as you put it. I'm in favour of advertising on Steemit under condition that it is targeted and subtle. I don't think your opinion makes you sound like a "moany whingebag". On the contrary, I think it's a very legitimate concern.
That does sound like a better way of putting it but isn't all advertising supposed to be targeted and subtle? I mean, that's how advertising works on a psychological level, you find your target audience and subtly manipulate them into believing they need your product/service. But I get what you mean, you're in favour of unobtrusive advertising, and that does sound like a better option. As long as I'm not inundated with flashing banner ads and things of that nature I won't mind as much.
And I still think I sound like a moany whingebag, even though I know my concerns have some validity. I've just had a couple of complainy comments today, I must be on my meriod or something, haha.
Regarding targeting. It is more efficient for the advertiser, and potentially useful to the audience, when compared to non-targeted advertising. For example, an advert for Tampons on the side of a bus is already losing efficiency because perhaps only around 35% of the general population are females in that age group. On the other hand, online adverts can be targeted based on various factors. An advert on Steemit could be based on tags, so cameras might be advertised on the photography tag, far more efficient for the advertisers, and arguably less obtrusive to the audience.
This can also take the form of a product review which ends with a link to purchase the product. That approach is unobtrusive, highly targeted but the integrity of the blogger needs to be reinforced.
Yeah, I get why it's done, I'm just not much of a fan of advertising in general, haha. Targeted ads have never done anything for me, if/when I want something I find it myself. I don't like people telling me what to do, especially when those people are huge advertising firms who have been sponging up all my data just to try and sell my things I don't want and they don't care about.
very interesting food for thought.. I'm not sure how I feel about advertising on the platform as a free for all but I agree some big fish on here are using their own affiliate links to generate passive income.. they have increased visibility and are using the same links in different posts so it is kind of happening. this is only version 1.uh oh so let's see where steemit is in 6 12 24months time.. damn my facebook account is 10 years old and I only really stopped going there daily when I joined steemit 10 weeks ago.. (And i actually know the people)
I would add though that some of my best work has not even been seen on steemit due to bad post timing ! my fault, but being in the UK means peak traffic US is about 2-3am GMT here
my hand coded visibility improvement tool
Thanks for your comment. Regarding your best work, I think you should repost it, regardless of whether you edit it or not. I've never gotten any pushback for reposting old work, something I do only occasionally.