brianvan:

spiers:

So sponsored posts are ostensibly higher value than the standard IAB spots in the margin, but at Gawker they’re “value-add” on top of a standard display buy? The appeal of sponsored posts for publishers is that they aren’t CPM driven (unless you want them to be) and you can charge more than for regular display. So Gawker’s just throwing them in as an add-on?  Why, exactly?

This is a guess at something I know much less about than other things I’d speak boldly about, but:

It’s a cheesy tie-together. It’s not entirely unlike when a supermarket sells frankfuters in packs of 10 and buns in packs of 8. Even if you intend to get 8 hot dogs, you’re going to end up with two cold hot dogs that you didn’t want - the IAB slots - and that benefits everyone in the retail supply chain except the customer. If the IAB slots were the add-ons, they would probably end up as dead inventory and would be phased out of the site design by mid-2010. The way that they’re doing, it, though, they can sell BOTH inventories to people who want only one. If no one complains, it’s a good racket, right?

That’s not what I’m saying. The sponsored posts should go for far more than the $3 CPMs on display.  They’re taking a premium form of advertising and using it as an add-on, when they should be upselling it. (And there’s no inventory for sponsored posts.)

And in that email exchange, there’s no upselling, just throwing it in for free.