Two Clicks Are Better Than One

I talk to a lot of marketing technology vendors.  Sometimes I come across someone interesting and initiate contact, sometimes the PR or marketing folks at the vendor will approach me.  In this case the PR folks over at AdFusion found me a couple weeks back and encouraged me to learn a little more about what they're doing.

Scott Severson, President of ARAnet/AdFusion provided the dog and pony.  At first glance AdFusion looks pretty similar to most other ad networks, aggregating multiple web sites and providing advertisers various options for getting their message out across network sites.  It became clear pretty early on in my conversation with Scott that AdFusion does some things very differently from the other ad networks. 

AdFusion works with over 2,500 publisher sites including big names like MSNBC, Yahoo, Reuters and an impressive roster of others.  While their roster of sites is impressive, what makes AdFusion unique is their business model.  Where many ad networks are impression-based, AdFusion works on an innovative  cost-per-click model.  CPC in itself is not incredibly revolutionary, but AdFusion takes the basic PPC approach and tweaks it a bit. 

A client scenario might look like this: website visitor sees interesting content (not an advertisement or text ad) on one of AdFusion's publisher partner sites.  Visitor clicks link to content and sees an article which is primarily focused on a key message or idea defined by AdFusion client.  This content is focused on delivering value on its own, not just being thinly-veiled advertorial-style material.  Within the article there is a link to the client's website/jump page.  Clients only pay for visitors who click from the editorial content page or what Scott referred to as the "second click".

I love this approach for two reasons; first, traditional PPC is notorious for driving a lot of junk leads, the AdFusion process provides an additional filter.  Second, the editorial pages function as landing pages of a sort, and likely do a better job of assuring that better quality prospects are making the second click. 

They do both B2B and B2C and provide pricing that ranges from $2 - $25 per click depending on volumes, target and other variables.  Creation of the editorial content is included as part of a campaign.  They have a nice overview on their site that provides more detail.  Amidst the mass of ad networks and PPC consultancies, AdFusion has an offering that seems to provide some of the best qualities of online marketing into a single solution.   

Comments

[kiran]

Good explination about clicks.