Are We Undervaluing the Longevity of Digital Ads?
Imagine if the same commercials that aired during Friends in the early 2000s were still paired with the episode, getting exposure from every re-run.
That’s what’s happening with digital ads.
In the screenshot above, Jon found my newsletter from an ad that I ran in a previous edition of Josh Spector’s For The Interested newsletter. I paid $100 and saw an amazing initial return, but I never thought about the long tail effects of having an ad in a newsletter that gets reposted as an article on a website.
As long as Josh has his website up and running, there’s a chance that someone stumbles across the old newsletter that contains my ad and I get the benefit from it.
Same thing goes for YouTube.
I was watching a video from several years ago and it was sponsored by a company that is still in business and while I’m sure the affiliate link that the creator mentioned was no longer active, the business is still essentially getting free long-term advertising.
Think about all the ads you’ve seen that are embedded in static content across the internet.
While it would be hard to create a pricing model that reflects the potential long-term value, it’s interesting to think about.