Re: Google Adsense versus Adwords

[Stormy Peters <stormy gnome org>]

So I think GNOME Marketing can come up with Google Adwords programs that make sense. (Probably not "get gnome" but looking at the top google keywords with gnome in them, I think there's opportunity.)

I'm filling out the application and would welcome any help.

> Explain how you expect Google AdWords advertising will contribute to your organization. (Please limit your response to 500 characters.)
The GNOME Foundation provides a free desktop accessible to everyone. Our goal is to make sure everyone can use technology regardless of language, physical ability or ability to pay. We have successfully reached out to developers and to open source fans, but we'd like to reach more of the non-developer public.

> Who is your target audience for online advertising? (Please limit your response to 150 characters.)

 

People looking for technology solutions. They might be people looking for photo editing software like inkscape and gimp.  They might be looking for office like applications like abiword and gnumeric or for small business finance solutions like gnucash.

We also want to be sure people with questions about GNOME technologies can find us.

> Please provide a sample of an ad you might run through Google Grants. Reviewing the Google Grants information sheet will help you submit a strong application by following our Editorial Guidelines, and showing an understanding of the way the AdWords program works.

Line 1: 25 character headline

Line 2: 35 character limit

Line 3: 35 character limit

Line 4: display URL (35 character limit)

FYI, these need to be mission based:

> Example of Mission-Based Ad:
>
> Shop and Fight AIDS
> Our Red Ribbon Collection has
> Unique Gifts for a Great Cause.
> www.yourcharity.org
>
> Example of Ad Not Based on Mission:
>
> Uniquie Gifts for All
> Children's books, tee shirts & more
> Shop online. Save time and money.
> www.yourcharity.org

Here's my take, not sure if it's too product focused. I think we should target products that also run on Windows as many, many of the people doing searches will be Windows users.

Free photo editing software
Use free and open source technology to edit your photos. Supported by a strong community of developers. Open standards. Technology you can use.
www.gimp.org

Free home and small business finance software
Don't get locked in to proprietary formats. Free and open source technology to manage your finances securily. Used by many nonprofit organizations.
www.gnucash.org

We could also do the example one targeted at people looking for accessibility solutions. I need help writing that one though.

> Please provide a list of keyword / keyword combinations that you feel are relevant to your organization. Viewing our keyword matching demo will help you choose appropriate keywords for your campaign by understanding our broad match keyword default and other matching options.

gnome, gimp, adobe, gnucash, quicken, (some kind of alternate keyboard and mice keywords), (languages that Microsoft doesn't support), desktop, linux, finance software, desktop software, gnome merchandise, gnome tshirt, ...

help?

Stormy

On Sun, May 24, 2009 at 11:09 AM, Luis Villa <luis tieguy org> wrote:
>
> I think last time we discussed this (2005, acc. to my archives)
> everyone involved seem to think it was a fine idea, though I seem to
> recall that without a single place to 'get gnome' like you can 'get
> firefox' there wasn't much clarity as to what we should tell people to
> do once they get to us.
>
> (Adwords have also come up in past in the context of google grants-
> did that not happen for some reason?)
>
> Luis
>
> On Sun, May 24, 2009 at 9:10 AM, Stormy Peters <stormy gnome org> wrote:
> > When I asked Google about an adsense account (which enables you to put
> > Google ads on your website and get compensated for them) they mentioned the
> > AdWords grant program to me. AdWords lets you advertise your site via google
> > ads on other people's sites, including Google Search.
> >
> > The AdWords grant program offers free AdWords accounts to nonprofits: (You
> > get a daily budget of $329.)
> > http://www.google.com/grants/
> >
> > However, you can't have an AdSense account too.
> >
> > Since we are conflicted about ads, and much more likely to reach agreement
> > on specific company ads than general google ads, I recommend we apply for a
> > Google AdWords grant.
> >
> > If we get it, is there anyone with experience in AdWords, SEO or advertising
> > that would like to help run it? (The application itself requires just a few
> > things like target audience and sample campaign slogans that we'd need to
> > think about.)
> >
> > Thoughts? All for applying for a free AdWords account?
> >
> > Stormy
> >
> > On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 3:45 AM, Dave Neary <dneary gnome org> wrote:
> >>
> >> Hi,
> >>
> >> Stormy Peters wrote:
> >> > I agree that if it's even a percentage of that, it might be worth it.
> >> >
> >> > What would people think of trying it out for a couple of months? We
> >> > could start with Google ads to see how well ads work and once we have an
> >> > idea of how much to expect, we could solicit ads directly from
> >> > companies.
> >>
> >> One important thing to bear in mind (and I'm digging into second-hand
> >> memory banks here) is whether this would affect our relationship with
> >> the various companies who donate bandwidth & hosting services. I don't
> >> think OSU OSL has any issue with this, but IIRC, hosting in Red Hat's
> >> colo had a "no ads" condition attached.
> >>
> >> Worth investigating, at least - if we end up with $150K advertising
> >> revenues a year and an extra $300K hosting costs to pay, it would be a
> >> bad deal.
> >>
> >> Cheers,
> >> Dave.
> >>
> >> --
> >> Dave Neary
> >> GNOME Foundation member
> >> dneary gnome org
> >
> >
> > --
> > marketing-list mailing list
> > marketing-list gnome org
> > http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/marketing-list
> >
> >