I am looking to place some contextual ads on my site (ones where when you hover over a certain word, they show an ad)
Do you think this will put members and potential members off?
And is it worth the money, do you make much off contextual ads?
I am using AdBrite

Can't speak for others but those kind of ads don't bother me at all and I'll occasionally click on one to see what its about. I don't have any clues about your other questions.

They used to do a lot better than they're doing right now, revenue wise. What we do here is allow registered members to disable them if they want.

ahh I see, that will be fun trying to figure out on an invision board :D

I'm not sure, but I think they offer a feature that lets visitors disable them based on a cookie.

Of course, that's different than what we do here.

what would you recommend as a network to display contextual ads?

I use kontera and they are good

I don't mind contextual ads. If the ads are not too obvious or in the way of things. Just don't allow it to take up to much page real estate and try to blend them into the site as much as possible.

Here are some things to avoid,

- Pop up ads, never use these. Ever.

- Ads that are too large.

- Ads that flash, animate or try to attract your attention.


If I like the site I am visiting I have no problem with them making some revenue with advertisements.

yes Ash B is on the same page as me - pop ups are intrusive and make the page slow because there are hardly any people without a blocker
flashing as or "click this its really scary" ads are annoying
and large ads are just plain ridiculous

to be honest, i am not annoyed from contextual ads in any blog or forum i visit... if i like the content i clik on ads, its a kind of tip for the author or the owner of the website :)

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