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Targeting ads using the source parameter by Erik Geurts |
I’m pleased to introduce long time community member Erik Geurts and his first contribution to the OpenX (previously Openads) blog. Erik has prepared a detailed how-to about implementing targeting using source parameters in OpenX. This follows on nicely from another guest blog article, Effective ad management using OpenX by Tobias Schwarz.
The more you know about your readers the more likely you’ll be able to choose an ad that will pique their interest and trigger their clicking finger. If you can do this you can increase your online advertising revenue. The challenge is working out how to identify which reader is which in a way that’s reliable and easy to manage – OpenX is designed to help web publishers do this.
If you are able to effectively segment and target your audience you will benefit in two ways. Firstly, users are more likely to click on ads so click-through-rates will go up. Secondly, you’ll be able to command higher advertising rates for your targeted ad space.
One common and effective way to do this in OpenX is using source parameter targeting. Using source parameter targeting you can segment and target ads based on user data or the section of the website that a viewer is browsing.
Two common examples are:
- Websites, like Amazon, that are divided into sections which attract different readers.
- Websites, like Flickr and Facebook, where user profile data can be used for targeting ads.
In this detailed tutorial, Erik Geurts presents a way to use OpenX to implement source parameter targeting in a way which makes managing targeting easy and reliable.
Erik is a key forum moderator and active OpenX consultant. We are delighted to have his contribution on the OpenX blog. Thanks Erik, keep them coming!
To everyone else in the OpenX Community, we’d love your contributions too. Please get in touch and send us your contributions, ideas or suggestions.
[...] Openads Blog » How to implement easy and effective ad targeting using Openads Erik has prepared a detailed how-to about implementing targeting using source parameters in Openads. (tags: openads targeting users advertising best-practices howto) [...]
Pingback by Federico Feroldi’s blog » Blog Archive » links for 2007-11-14 — November 14, 2007 @ 8:25 pm
Will Open Source AD Networks Have Clout?…
If you want to get familiar with the project, their blog is a good place to start. Once familiar with the concept, may be this tutorial, “targeting Ads using source parameter” announced on this blog post; How to implement easy and effective ad target…
Trackback by MyAdlets — November 15, 2007 @ 4:42 am
Very useful, thank you.
I’m currently running hundreds of zones, representing different sections and the different banner sizes/positions within. This will save no end of work.
Comment by Tim — November 15, 2007 @ 11:19 pm
A follow up question on this paper, plus my reply to it, was posted on the forum recently.
http://forum.openads.org/index.php?showtopic=503417516&hl=
Comment by Erik Geurts — February 6, 2008 @ 7:26 am
Hello,
Erik, thank you for the paper it is very useful.
I have a question concerning this:
“”Websites, like Flickr and Facebook, where user profile data can be used for targeting ads.”"”"”
Why you can do this in Openads? I’ve been reading the paper but for me it’s not clear at all, sorry…
I would like to display banners basing on the user’s profile that is visiting my site. Obviusly, the user has been logged before.
Another question is if in a site where you can have at the same time users logged and not logged, you can display different things to them.
Thank you in advance.
Comment by Carlos — February 7, 2008 @ 9:16 am
no comment
Comment by sangam — March 29, 2008 @ 2:11 pm
I find the source parameter a very inefective way for profile/demografic targeting, like facebook for example.
I would need to create a source for every single combination that could posible exist.
some examples
- male-married
- male-single_age:20-30
- male-single_age:20-30_city:Toronto
- male-single_age:20-30_city:Toronto_studies:university
etc…
I found banmanpro
http://www.banmanpro.com/support2/Demographic_profile_targeting.asp
but the problem with that is that is for windows, not linux.
Comment by Marcelo — April 3, 2008 @ 1:43 pm
Hi Marcelo
We’ve added a new variable targeting feature to the 2.5 beta release.
I think you’ll find this useful:
http://www.openx.org/beta
cheers, Oliver
Comment by Oliver George — April 5, 2008 @ 10:03 am
the link to the pdf is broken
Comment by joe — May 27, 2008 @ 11:34 pm
link worked ok for me if i right click and save as, not try to view in browser with plugin
Comment by Kieran — June 3, 2008 @ 8:05 am
Thanks Kieran, that was a temporary glitch due to an upgrade.
Comment by Oliver George — June 3, 2008 @ 8:22 am
I’m so glad I found this solution for my social network. Once I figure out the geo-gender ad targeting via source parameter, its on like Donkey Kong! lol
Like facebook, I want advertisers to create advertiser accounts via the RevMax plugin for OpenAds. That will be perfect..: )
Comment by caribbean social network — August 10, 2008 @ 6:41 am
Is it possible to list multiple sources in the Single Page Call Header Block as an OR statement:
<!–// –>
I’ve tried:
family OR insurance
family,insurance
family|insurance
and none of them work.
Comment by Steve Bruner — November 20, 2008 @ 2:42 pm
Is it possible to list multiple sources in the Single Page Call Header Block as an OR statement:
<!--// -->
I’ve tried:
family OR insurance
family,insurance
family|insurance
and none of them work.
I essential want to display ads if the ad source is “family” or “insurance”
Thank you in advance,
Steve
Comment by Steve Bruner — November 20, 2008 @ 3:20 pm