Investing to Wealth

Last month I mentioned that online advertising spending is supposed to grow to an estimated $19.2 billion dollars this year. The financial services sector in particular will increase by about one third to about $2.4 billion. Since last year I've been experiencing some of this growth by way of google adsense, adbrite, paid text links and posts.

But for the past several months during my daily roams around the pf blogosphere, I would see other sites with a lot more paid text links than my site probably would ever have. I also noticed how eager certain marketing companies are in paying for a text link on a personal finance blog, even my little ol' blog.

I looked into text link advertising networks like linkworth and text link ads. But I figured I'd have to split the profits with them, and I wouldn't wind up with much. Perhaps I could make my own deals and make 100% profit? So I set out on a bold and shameless journey to solicit from some of the companies that were advertising on various blogs.

The first round of e-mails didn't do so well, I didn't receive many responses. After putting together a better sounding sales pitch, and increasing the number of potential advertisers, I finally started to see positive and money making opportunities. I'd estimate I get a response from 30% of the e-mails that are sent out. Most I wind up making agreements with.

I also like the challenge, and the art of negotiating a deal. I'm curious to know if there are any other pf bloggers out there that have done something like this? Have you thought about it, and do you think you will perhaps give it a try? I think the money's there, go for it. I figure I have nothing to lose, and a few extra bucks to gain...