Internet marketer and affiliate guru, Shoemoney, has released his own affiliate program which allows website owners to display targeted ebay auctions to their visitors.  The program is called Auction Ads and it seems to present an additional and viable revenue stream fellow industry members.

Ad implementation is virtually a Google Adsense clone: log in, name your campaign (or channel), select the size and colors of your ad, copy and paste code and slap the javascript into your website code.  Ad serving and tracking begins immediately.  Whereas adsense automatically displays relevant ads based on the content of the current page, Auction Ads allows you to insert relevant keywords yourself.  The script looks up ebay auctions that pertain to those keywords and neatly displays them  in the banner space you’ve designated.  When visitors click through to the product and make a purchase, the publisher receives a percentage of the sale.  You can see the ads in action at my site: ChefClub.net.  I’ll follow up with an account of how the ads perform.  It’s important to point out that Adsense and Auction Ads are running on the same page and this is well within the terms of service for both companies.
Auction Ads could prove to be a tremendous opportunity for several reasons.  I’ve got two huge ones.  First of all, programs such as Commission Junction offer nearly every product under the sun for publishers to promote.  However, changing between products is a tedious task and visitors to your site will often be exposed to the same product over and over, making each additional impression pointless.  Auction Ads delivers a variety of products based on the keywords you choose, constantly updating the offer with every impression.  Copy and paste some code and you’ve essentially got a rotating e-commerce feature built into your website.  Smack a headline like “Featured Product” above the ad and it may even be viewed as a value added benefit for your visitor.

Second of all, the ability to identify keywords will allow website owners the flexibility of promoting an array of related products where Google Adsense is less effective.  For example,  say you’ve got a music related site and adsense is spitting out 5 cent clicks for ringtones.  Tough to overcome.  But with Auction Ads you could specify a targeted keyword that may yield much better revenue.  Perhaps “rock concert tickets” or “ipod”  would perform well.  Of course, if you’ve got a specific page about a Counting Crows concert then your CTR may be much better with Google Adsense.  But testing different keywords in Auction Ads could provide much better ROI.  Instead of helping someone else make a sale, you’re making a sale for yourself.

Of course, every scenario is different and the only way to tell if Auction Ads will work well on your site is to try it out.  Play with ad placement, ad size, colors and of course… keywords!  I’m very excited to begin testing this program out and I’ll let you know how the results are for me.  But like I said, the concept is stellar and Auction Ads allows webmasters of all skill levels to easily implement the program.

This should be fun!  Here goes nothing…