The Different Ways to Monetize Your vBulletin Forum

In my opinion Forums are some of the best ways to make money online. They are fun and provide you, the forum admin, with free, user generated content for search engines to index and others to link to. Whatever your target audience is for your forum there is a way that you can monetize your traffic. This thread will help you determine all the companies that can help you make money online.

Google Adsense
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Google Adsense is by far the most popular way to monetize a vBulletin Forum. It is a Pay Per Click type of advertisement in which users get paid for every click that is registered on their site. The price per click is determined by another Google service, Google Adwords. Google Adsense is contextual so they present ads on your site based on the content of your page. This means if your site is about Ford Mustangs then they will present ads related to Ford Mustangs. Companies can bid on keywords such as Ford Mustangs and based on the price of their bid on the term it determines how much you make on the click. If they bid 1.25 per click for the term Ford Mustang and someone on your site clicks the ad that company will pay Google 1.25 and then Google will give you a percentage of that click. No one knows how much Google takes as a cut.

Google adsense also uses Smart Pricing so even though a company may bid 1.25 per click they may not always pay this. Many things determine how much a click is worth. This could be the time of day that the click is registered to how much of the pages content is releated to the term that the advertiser bids on.

Important Information Concerning Google Adsense
- Please review the Terms of Service thourghly before implementing Google Adsense on your vBulletin Forum. The Terms of Service can be found here: Google Adsense Terms of Service

Yahoo Publisher Network - BETA
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The Yahoo Publisher Network is also Pay Per Click and is also Contextual. Yahoo allows companies to bid on keywords and then Yahoo presents these companies advertisements on sites that run their Yahoo Ads.

Yahoo Publisher Network is currently in Beta and not open to international traffic. Yahoo Ads are generally seen as not as relevant to your targetted audience as their rival Google Adsense. However, Yahoo Publisher Network takes a smaller cut than Google Adsense which passes on more of the earnings to you, the Admin. This can lead to much higher earnings than you would get with Google Adsense if you have content that Yahoo can present decently targetted ads too. From a personal stand point I am making more than double what I made with Google Adsense but I am making it off less clicks as the ads are not as relevant. An example is that Yahoo will show an ad for a car dealership that is based in California to someone that lives in Florida.

Important Information Concerning Yahoo Publisher Network
- Please review the Terms of Service thourghly before implementing Yahoo Ads on your vBulletin Forum. The Terms of Service can be found here: Yahoo! Terms of Service
- The Yahoo Publisher Network is not open to International Traffic.
- The Yahoo Publisher Network is in a Beta state.

Tribal Fusion
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Tribal Fusion is a CPM type advertiser (Cost Per Thousand Impressions) that pays you based on how many impressions that you serve to the Tribal Fusion ads. Many people say Tribal Fusion is the best CPM network in terms of payout and ad configuration. You can elect to server Pop-Under ads, have variable ads (show different size ads in one ad spot such as 160x600 and 120x600) which helps increase revenue. It also gives you a way to run alternate ads when Tribal Fusion would other wise present PSA Ads (Public Service Announcement). The one big downfall to Tribal Fusion is the control panel. It is very sloppy and hard to navigate.

Important Information Concerning Tribal Fusion
- Tribal Fusion requires a minimum of 2,000 uniques per day to be allowed into their network.

Burst Media
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Burst Media is the same type of advertising as Tribal Fusion. They pay out by how many impressions that you serve their ads. They are said to have similiar rates to Tribal Fusion. I can not give feedback on their control panel or their ads as they will not let me into their program due to their adult content guidelines. If you run an Automotive type website and have a gallery of females posing in bikinis in front of the cars then you more than likely will not get accepted. My Gallery contains no nudity. They are very strict on these guidelines.

Important Information Concering Burst Media
- Minimum of 5,000 impressions per month required
- Very strict "Adult Content" guidelines. Read above for example.


Casale Media
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Another CPM type network. Lower CPM rates than the two above and are very strict regarding forums. If you have a content site seperate from your forum where you control the content then you may want to give them apply. They generally do not accept sites that are solely forums... if even at all.

Important Information Concering Casale Media
- Requires 10,000 uniques per month of non forum generated traffic

Value Click
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The last CPM network I will list here. It is generally said to have the lower CPM payout out of the 3 above. I have never attempted to apply to Value Click due to the feedback I have received from it. If you can not get into any of the other CPM networks then you may want to give Value Click a shot.

Important Information Concerning Value Click
- Requires a minimum of 3,000 Impressions per month to apply.

Vibrant Media - IntelliTXT
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Vibrant Media's IntelliTXT pays based on CPM or CPC (I was never asked about CPC, but others have said they have been given the choice) but is a bit different than the rest of the CPM networks listed about. IntelliTXT turns the text on your forum into ads by highlighting certain keywords and then when you hover over these links it will open a box with an ad for that keyword. An example of IntelliTXT can be seen here: SprintUsers.com Message Forum The words that are green and double underlined are IntelliTXT ads. IntelliTXT pays pretty good at 4 dollars per CPM. Be careful how you implement these on your forum since this type of ad can be quite annoying to some people. I only run it for guests.

Important Information Concerning IntelliTXT
- Requires your forum to have 500,000 impressions per month for acceptance.

Kontera In-Text Advertising
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The exact same thing as Vibrant Media's IntelliTXT just a different company. Your text is turned into ads and you are paid by CPM. I prefer Kontera as they have a nicer control panel and pay out more for me. Both companies are solid however so I would try running both to figure out which one will work the best for you.

Important Information Concerning Kontera In-Text Advertising
- Requires the same as Vibrant Media. 500,000 impressions per month.
- Terms of Service page here: Kontera Terms of Service

Azoogle Ads
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Azoogle Ads is an CPA type advertising company. CPA is Cost Per Action. Affiliate type advertisements. You get paid once the user completes an action such as filling out their email or purchasing a product.

Important Information Concerning Azoogle Ads
- Terms of Service: AzoogleAds Terms of Service

Commission Junction
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Much like Azoogle. You get paid everytime someone completes an action. The biggest CPA type network online.

Important Information Concerning Commission Junction
- Please read their Code of Conduct

LinkWorth Text Link Ads
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Linkworth allows you as a vBulletin Owner to sell basic text links on your site by listing your site in their service. You set how much each text link will cost and where the text link will appear. Linkworth takes a 30% cut on whatever price you set if someone purchases a text link through linkworth.

Important Information Concerning Commission Junction
- Learn more about the program here: LinkWorth Solutions - Partner Account - Sell Links - Sell Ads

Text Link Ads
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The latest craze in buying and selling text links on your site. Made popular due to the high referral payouts. Do not have any experience with it so I welcome feedback on it.

Important Information Concerning Text Link Ads
- Check out their FAQ for more info: Frequently Asked Questions - Text Link Ads

* These are the most popular and most used companies. Feel free to leave replies with companies that you use that you do not see listed or even add on to what I have already listed.

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I tried using CJ.com
I have no idea how it works though.
It isn't a simple ad code. I think you have to go through and select which ads you want to be displayed...

Right now I am using Clicksor. But so far the support is slow, and their information has been wrong. I have been sending in tickets left and right. If things don't get straightened today, I will be trying Tribal Fusion AND Kontera. Also, the payout for Clicksor seems really low

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Owner of www.bleepd.com

I've never tried clicksor. I sorta didn't care for how they would pick out words and make links out of them

Has anyone had a good turnaround with clicksor?

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Reply to the Welcome PM for Full Access to the Forums.. Thanks

Have you heard about Crowdgather?
Find it on Forums

anyone use adbrite, and can anyone tell me where to input the script that adds the inline ads into the posts?

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Delaware Forum
New Jersey Forum
Pennsylvania Forum

I have AdSense and Auction Ads on my site.

AdSense is bringing in a good amount in
each month. With Auction Ads that hasn't being
to good so far but i only have had it on less
then a month so members have to get used to it.

With AdSense it has being a success to us
from word go.we continuously check the add
to filter any that we dont want displayed on
the site.

This is something I seriously need to work on more.
How do you determine what sites to filter ?

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Reply to the Welcome PM for Full Access to the Forums.. Thanks

Have you heard about Crowdgather?
Find it on Forums

Ok I am officially done with Clicksor. The payout is the lowest I have ever seen. Somewhere between 2-3cents a click, and I get roughly 2000 impressions a day.
Plus as stated before, their customer service is really poor. I have had the same problem for 3 days now, and they say ok it's fixed now, and it isn't. And my last reply was over 24hrs a go, the 1st 2 were responded within 12hrs. So I don't know. Just know that I am done with them, and will be giving a go on something mentioned above tomorrow.

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Owner of www.bleepd.com

We filter anything we don't want displayed.
We set out some rules from the start for
us owner/admins and we abide by them.
That way members know what to expect from
your site.
It's good to make money but you have to
consider your members too. I dont think
its fair to them to bombbard them with too
many or unsolicited adds.

As we all know its the members that make a site
and members wich bring a site money.

nobody?

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Delaware Forum
New Jersey Forum
Pennsylvania Forum

I had to setup adbrite for a client once. Did you see the area where you pick "vb3.5" from a list of scripts ?

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Reply to the Welcome PM for Full Access to the Forums.. Thanks

Have you heard about Crowdgather?
Find it on Forums