Banner Advertising on FiveCol-Soc.net

Montague WebWorks is offering ad slots on the Five College Social website. Your ad will appear on every page in direct proportion to the number of ads on the site, ie; if there are five advertisers, then each ad will show up 1/5th of the time. The website receives averages betwenn 500 and 4,000 discrete page views per day, depending on the day of the week. Some days peak near 8,000 depending on the time of year and the type of messages being posted that day.

Having a website for your business is not a prerequisite to running an ad. Your advertisement can link to an existing website, or to your free business listing on the FiveCol-Soc.net website.

Who can advertise

Primarily, any person who works at the Five Colleges and has a business of direct interest to people who frequent this site or is within and serving the 5 College area may advertise here. Priority will be given to local "mom and pop" type businesses and residents with a specialty service, store, or occupation.  Other local businesses who want to advertise to this community may do so as well, but must contact the admin directly.

Four steps to advertising on FiveCol-Soc.net -- if you are an existing member on the website (outside businesses may skip steps 1, 2 and 3 and contact the admin directly):

1. Set up a user account
   Everything on this website revolves around users and their assets. Users can own multiple businesses and be a member of multiple groups. You can’t do much on this website unless you’re a member. Membership is free, and simple to set up. If you’re not already a member, set up an account now (link will open a new window).
2. Create a business listing
   All banner ads are based on a business listing. Listings are free too, but you have to set one up. It’s easy. If you don’t already have a business listing, create a business listing now (link will open a new window).
3. Request a banner advertisement
   When editing the directory listing click the "Request Banner Ad" link. Set the start and end dates for the ad, the webpage the banner ad should link to, and the image to use. If you don’t have any images already uploaded to our servers -- as an advertiser you can build a library of images to rotate at will -- and don’t have any on hand to upload, we can create one or more for you pretty quickly and cheaply. At $50/hr it’s pretty cheap considering an ad image doesn’t take more than a half hour to create.
4. Payment
   Payment may be made via check to: Montague WebWorks, 28 Center Street, Montague, MA 01351.  Please make sure to tell us what the check is for!

The Advertising Rates

The FiveCol-Soc.net website receives thousands of page views every day, with the week-day average between 1,000 and 4,000 page views. Each advertising slot receives a portion of all those page views. If there are five current banner ads, taking up five slots total, each ad/slot will average up to 800 views PER WEEK DAY.

Deadlines for new ads is seven calendar days before the start of a new month. Ads run from the 1st to the last day of each month, regardless of how many days there are in a particular month (no discounts for February).

The advert should be 468 pixels wide by 60 pixels tall. We prefer no animations, but if you require it we request that it not be of a garish nature. Subtle and slow.  We accept jpg, gif and png files.

If you are not able to create a 468 x 60 pixel image file, we can create one for you at minimal cost. Mail over a small ad (appx 8 x 1 ratio) and we will do our best to scan it or reproduce it at $50 per hour.

Advertising revenue will pay our Internet and server bill, and allow us to purchase additional online software to enhance our services and advertising space in local newspapers, which in turn will bring additional people to the website, improving your reach and advertisement’s effectiveness.

100% of your advertising dollars will go right back into maintaining and upgrading the website.

If you are interested in advertising, please contact us. (413) 320-5336 or e-mail Michael.