

Reddit launches self-serve ad tool (buy a sponsored link for as little as $20) - kn0thing
http://blog.reddit.com/2009/11/now-for-as-little-as-20-you-can-buy.html

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patio11
I would be very interested in this if Reddit were chock to the brim of
positive, technically disinclined females who enjoy commercial messages and
spend money on software.

CTRs do not make advertising successful. Conversions make advertising
successful. Your users, when they're in Reddit mode, "consume" links at a
prodigious rate and are primarily engaged in interaction with Reddit rather
than interaction with the links. Conversions from them are, for most
businesses, going to be too low to measure. On the other hand, conversions
from AdWords are fairly predictable, because if you're doing it right you are
guaranteed to be speaking to someone who wants what you're selling.

Advertising is not a magic "pennies fall from heaven" game -- at the end of
the day, somebody actually has to _buy_ something. When you cultivate an
audience of rapidly anti-commercial poor adolescents, you end up with the only
remaining advertisers being the sort of autoplay flash infection vectors,
because scams are the only business model that works profitably.

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tomjen2
Is something wrong with you? You are usually reasonable, intelligent and have
a good point, but this - what on earth gives you the idea that only females by
stuff?

I pay for last.fm to give me recommendations for music that I will properly
like, then I buy the best tracks in iTunes. I would do the same with tv-shows
if Apple would let me (non-us, don't even get me started). I am a male CS
student, so by your comment I shouldn't spend any money at all.

~~~
daniel-cussen
>only females buy stuff?

He's talking about the teachers that are his customers, I think.

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tptacek
The "technologically disinclined females" are his market, but the "pay money
for software" one stings no matter who you sell to.

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jedberg
By the way, if any of you want in on the beta, mention either YCombinator or
Hacker News in your email to betaparty@reddit.com and we'll put you on the top
of the beta list.

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olefoo
I like the open bid, split the pie approach. I suspect that it will go
spectacularly wrong at least a few times before it converges on an optimal
ruleset.

But I'm glad that reddit is continuing to innovate.

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cookiecaper
This is a good idea. I expect that reddit will make a lot of money from it.

