Sponsorships Explained
Everything Sponsorships
The primary means of advertising on the NCST platform is through the Sponsorship of one of our five primary coverage topics. Information about what they are and how they came to be is below. You can also find a list of the topics and a description of what they cover further down the page.
How I decided on Sponsorships
Like everyone else, in order to operate the platform we have to have the ability to collect funds to cover the expenses of day to day operation.
Since the early days of operating the platform, I’d been attempting to figure out how to do this. There were two important factors that I wanted to take into consideration. The first was I didn’t want the community to have a negative experience caused by the the advertising. We’ve all seen websites and social accounts that are drowning in ads to the point that the information you are meant to read is lost, making the entire experience annoying. The second is that I wanted to ensure that there was a reasonable and recognizable return on the invest anyone made in helping continue the platform.
By the nature of how we get the information we post, a majority of our coverage can be easily separated into a five primary topics. Separating the coverage in this manner solves two problems. First, it allows me to easily associate what posts should be associated with which advertiser. Secondly, by limiting advertising to only 5 primary topics, it would help in controlling the amount of advertising being pushed to the community, and it would create value in scarcity. To further add value, I decided that competitors should not be allowed to occupy topics at the same time. I later extended this to include advertising of any kind.
After deciding that providing access to advertising on these five primary topics would be the best method of generating the needed funds for operating the platform, I decided that I wanted to make sure that everyone understands the importance these funds represent in allowing me to operate the platform. That’s why I chose to use the term Sponsorship. Yes, it’s essentially advertising, however much like the banners on the fences at the local baseball fields, what these companies are doing is funding a public service.
How I decided on Sealed Bids
I have been many things in my life, none of them are an outside ad sales person or an accountant. The very first time I offered access to a topic for Sponsorship didn’t turn out too amazing, but it was a learning experience. Most importantly I learned that there were more people then I expected that wanted to be Sponsors of the page, followed closely by the fact that I wouldn’t be able to do this on a monthly basis or I’d risk spending more time on this then running the platform itself.
Taking a cue from my past in the corporate arena, I decided that using a Sealed Bid process for the Sponsorships would solve a few of the issues from the first attempt. It would be a fair process in letting a large number of interested parties vie for the limited topics and by allowing each to bid what the Sponsorship is worth to them it set a fair market value, something I had no knowledge of at the time. While using open bids could lead to a higher amount in the end, I prefer using sealed bids for privacy and for letting those that are new to the process feel more comfortable in participating.
The other decision I made after that initial offering was to extend the length of the Sponsorship to 3 months. This provides a better offering for the Sponsor, and ensures that it didn’t take too much time away from my ability to focus on operating the platform.
Final Thoughts
After a few years of using the Sponsorship and Sealed Bid solutions I believe they are they most fair and efficient means of funding the platform. I’ve received great feedback from Sponsors, and with a number of Sponsors deciding to continue their Sponsorships for multiple periods I get the feeling it’s working well for all involved.
I hope this gave you some insight into what Sponsorships are, why they are important, and that you’ll put in a Bid yourself.
NCST News is a publication of Newnan Coweta Scanner Traffic. In tandem with our flagship Facebook page, we use the site to provide more in-depth and contextual information on the crime, traffic, and weather that impact our area.