CauseBlast is an experiment. The idea is to replace some of those internet ads you see everywhere on the web with ads that MATTER. So, for example, a teenager on MySpace will see an ad for something important - like not doing drugs - instead of an ad for a video game or a flashing 'click here to win a million dollars.'
Who Are You?
My name is Matt. I'm a web developer and online marketing consultant in Los Angeles. I spend a lot of time strategizing, creating, placing, and tracking online advertisements for my clients. The thought occured to me that I would much rather spend my time placing ads on the internet that carry an important message.
So How Does It Work?
1) You make a donation of any size
2) You tell me what cause you want to advertise (you can even tell me where specifically you would like to advertise it and who exactly you would like to see it)
3) I create your ad, place it in the right ad network, optimize it to get the most bang for the buck, and track what happens with it.
4) You spend very little money and impact thousands to millions of internet users.
5) I send you the results
I've set up this little blog page as a first step to see if my idea might work. If the idea does work, eventually all of this will be more automated and efficient. But for now, I'm doing it all myself.
OTHER QUESTIONS YOU PROBABLY HAVE
Q: How do I know I'm not just throwing my money away?
A: You don't. I will send you tracking information, and let you know where to look for your ad, but no one has complete control over the EXACT pages where an ad runs, so I can't guarantee you'll see your ad. This is also part of the experiment - to see if people will donate a small amount of money for something like this. It's sort of like any other cause asking for money, where you donate but don't truly know exactly where the money is going.
Q: What do the ads look like?
A: Like this:
For now (while I'm doing this all myself), they are going to be simple. From a design standpoint, I actually think simple like this is good - with the internet crammed full of colorful, flashy ads, simple black and white actually stands out.
Q: What do I send you?
A: You send me the cause you would like to advertise, an idea of the message you'd like, and up to two links: one to a place where people can click to read more, another where people can click to donate to the cause (if you're doing that).
Q: How do I donate?
A: Through Paypal
Q: Are you taking any of the money?
Q: Yes. I take 5% of your donation to cover my time. If that sounds like a lot please remember that we're talking about small amounts of money. If you donate $1 I make a nickel.
