AutomotiveForums.com
Case study : AutomotiveForums.com : www.automotiveforums.com
Business
In November of 2000, when he was just 14 years old, Igor Sushko founded AutomotiveForums.com because of his enthusiasm for cars and desire to spread knowledge to others. Today, the site receives about 950,000 unique visitors each month on more than 1,000 forums. There, car buffs can discuss virtually any car make and with more than 150 expert moderators and thousands of other enthusiasts. Membership growth has maintained its steady pace and is nearing 500,000 worldwide.
Approach
"AdSense is a win-win for all entities. It adds value to my website, and not just from a revenue standpoint. The ads are also useful for visitors."
Igor Sushko
Founder
To maximize the value of his site, Sushko wanted to build revenue by running relevant advertising throughout AutomotiveForums.com. But more important, he wanted to maintain a feeling of community on the site’s pages. He needed to ensure that ads were correctly targeted and therefore relevant to the content on his site. "Psychologically, the people who visit AutomotiveForums.com are part of a community," explains Sushko. "They get offended when things change unexpectedly, or when they feel they’re being spammed."
Based on Google’s brand, reputation and targeting technologies, Sushko decided to explore contextual advertising more fully. In August 2003, he began running Google AdSenseTM ads throughout the site. In addition to AdSense ads, Sushko expanded his options by trying other contextual advertising networks.
Results
Sushko reports that Google AdSense "blew other contextual advertising networks out of the water." Google immediately began filling his ad space efficiently, without fail, and without any effort on his part. He was impressed with the revenues that came streaming in, but even more important for Sushko, his users didn’t realize they were looking at advertisements. "AdSense ads are extremely well targeted and non-invasive to my visitors," says Sushko. "They’re more like supplementary content than ads, which makes them useful for visitors."
In addition to running ads on content pages, Sushko runs AdSense ads on his discussion forums, where he notes that the ads are easily visible but do not interfere with the user experience. He optimizes his revenue by ensuring that the ads match the color of the site and by trying out ads in a variety of locations. He notes that adjustments are easy to make and that even small changes can yield a significant increase in daily revenues. He’s now looking forward to running video ads to attract attention and keep users entertained and informed.
Although AdSense is just part of the equation, Sushko gives Google credit for bolstering his success. He’s now expanded his user base substantially and has started an auto racing team to further promote the community to enthusiasts on TV, magazine publications, and a variety of events. "AdSense is a win-win for all entities," he says. "It adds value to my website, and not just from a revenue standpoint. The ads are also useful for visitors."
About Google AdSense
Google AdSense is a program enabling online businesses to earn revenue from serving ads precisely targeted to specific web content and search pages. With service levels ranging from online sign-up to dedicated support management, a broad range of sites profit from AdSense. Thousands of Google advertisers also benefit from AdSense by gaining exposure on sites across the Google Network, which includes many of the Top 100 Media Metrix sites such as AOL, About.com, Amazon, Ask.com, and Lycos.
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