
How I Ran An Ad on Fox News via Google TV Ads - bentlegen
http://slatev.com/video/how-i-ran-ad-fox-news/
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bandhunt
Google tv is easy, but bad for a startup. Converting brand new users from TV
to the web when they don't know who you are is VERY hard.

I spent about $15K with my last company on google tv ads. It was a sports site
and we got on espn etc. I poured over server logs and google analytics and
didn't see any value from these ads - no spikes or noticeable conversions
whatsoever.

CPM was super cheap so we got a TON of impressions.

We had a pretty decent ad too I think:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUfTjtOQ8fM>

It ended up being more of a vanity thing of having our ad on TV - total waste
of time and money for us.

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callmeed
I'm curious—how are you connecting your logs/GA to people who saw your tv ad?
Are you using a special URL in the ad?

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bandhunt
No URL. Just checked the times the ads would air and would look for any spike
at all in traffic.

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donw
People don't usually rush from their TV to their computer when they see an
interesting URL, though, so you really don't know what effects the TV ad had
on your site.

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bandhunt
If they don't go straight to their comp then they usually won't remember -
with a new brand that is. And despite what our habits may be most people don't
have a laptop open while watching TV. It was not scientific, but we saw ZERO
uptick in sign ups while running millions of TV impressions. I would never run
TV ads trying to get traffic for an unknown web startup again.

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vaksel
The 1,000 visits is pretty good at $1.3 CPC, but I bet it'd be a lot smaller
for regular ads. This was the equivalent of a "click here' banner ad...you
might get a click...but it's just people curious about what it is you have to
sell.

Someone should do the same test for a regular ad, i.e. this is our product
come buy it at oursite.com. I bet the number of hits will plummet.

Oh and I bet the production values matter a lot, their ad was actually good,
anything a regular person comes up with, will probably be junk.(i.e. the
equivalent of those dealership ads)

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MichaelApproved
The cost of creating the ad should be included in the CPC calculation. Then,
to limit it's impact on CPC, you have to run the ad a lot more so the
production cost as a percentage of the CPC drops further. You need a lot of
money for a decent TV campaign.

But I guess the point of the video was to show how easy it is to setup a TV
campaign. In that regard it really seemed easy. It was surprising that it
didn't require a large minimum to get air time.

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Qz
Unless I misunderstood, the cost of putting it on TV was $100. $1300 was the
total outlay, covering all related expenses.

~~~
jonbishop
The $100 mentioned is the minimum cost to get an ad on Google TV, not what
Slate spent (though that doesn't mean the $1300 doesn't include the cost of
the ad).

~~~
MichaelApproved
That's a good point. I didn't think the $1,300 could include the production
cost of ad mostly because I figured creating the ad would be much grater. I
can't begin to guess what it would cost to make the ad so maybe $1,300 did
include production costs but I doubt it. I think they would make a point of
mentioning that.

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aditya
Hm. Interesting numbers:

* $1300 total outlay

* 7 times during Glenn Beck episodes (starting at 2:49am)

* 54 times total on 4 networks

* 1.3MM people reached

* 1000+ visitors to ad website

Not sure how it would play out for conversion but cost of acquisition seems
high, of course, the branding you get out of a network TV ad probably has its
own benefits (especially if your core audience is 18-35 males awake at 3am.
uhh.)

~~~
dkokelley
You're paying about $1.30 per visitor at that rate. This could work well
demonstrating an actual product positioned to the paranoid crowd. I think that
the ad might have done better if it was done a little differently. If there
was an implied benefit of action, they might have seen visitor numbers closer
to 1% of viewers.

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ShabbyDoo
A guy I know in the radio business said that, in the dotcom boom years, start-
ups were paying 3x what they should have for airtime simply because they
didn't know better. Google's platforms at least take away the fear that an ad
salesman is quoting you 5x and telling you what a good deal you're getting.

~~~
andrewvc
Really now? I've always found negotiation works better, as long as you're
willing to take some time to do it right.

As an example, AWS's one simple price structure for bandwidth is way above
what you'll get from most other providers given some negotiation. Of course,
your negotiations with other providers will start higher, but you can get em
down substantially.

~~~
ShabbyDoo
I don't claim that Google's TV ad buying system is optimal, but it's likely a
better deal than the one offered-up to an ignorant buyer.

I see a parallel to the fixed-price used car lots. While a good negotiator can
get a better deal elsewhere, an uninformed buyer can be somewhat assured that
he's not getting ripped off.

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ericflo
Interesting. I think this is totally the wrong medium for tech companies, but
what about for a struggling band attempting to stand out from the crowd?

Showing 1.3 million people 30 seconds of your band's music is bound to build
at least a little awareness.

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DanielBMarkham
I've always thought we should have a "best of the week" category for some
stories.

If this isn't the best of the last week, it's easily in the top ten.

Lots of little details and nit-picking that should be done, but bottom line is
that nationally-advertising on TV is not the impossible thing it used to be
for young startups.

Very cool.

~~~
jsonscripter
Maybe I'm jaded, but I like it the way it is.

Too many features and we will soon become reddit :/

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aresant
TV advertising is a completely different animal than the advertising Google is
used to selling.

Ad "frequency" - eg how many times users see a given ad - is the most
important metric for TV.

Without a large budget commitment it's extremely difficult to gauge the
success or failure of a given campaign – even if you get a handful of
visitors. That’s why you see brand advertisers continue to fill up the
majority of TV spots.

Nearly everybody in this space has had a lot of trouble getting traction,
internet advertisers don’t have the headspace for TV, and TV isn’t suited to
small budget / small frequency campaigns.

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Semiapies
I wonder how much of this is due to the diminishing _value_ of TV ads. Could
this have been done 10 years ago at anything like this low a cost?

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ambiate
Is this how those ads with the special urls get posted at the morning hours?
my.dom/tv38 etc. I always wondered how these small sites/affiliate advertisers
managed to afford commercials. I suppose they have decent conversion rates or
I wouldn't see them every night. An interesting service overall though. I
might toss a few hundred dollars at it one of these days.

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mcav
Google TV ads could be useful for local upstart politicians to run for local
city council/state rep positions, etc.

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vinhboy
Oh dang, this is really awesome. I wonder how strict the rules are for what
you are allowed to show.

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mlinsey
Undoubtedly this is a network-by-network thing. Cable vs. over-the-air and
time of day matters a lot too.

