We received our first question on OnlineMarketer.co.nz today posed by Mike Kittendaal of Kittendaal Ltd whom I suspect is not a real person and is only an alias.  His asked the following:

“Hi there I am looking for some information on InPageAds in New Zealand and was wondering if you can assist. www.inpage.co.nz do not provide statistical data on the penetration of their ads in specific markets, the information they do provide is limited to Asia Pacific as a whole. I was wondering if you have access to any statistical information for NZ?”

Mike, I would like to ask you a question. Are you the owner of www.inpage.co.nz or do you have insider knowledge? When I did a search for InPage I came across a comment that you had posted on associating you with this advertising product.

When participating in the blogosphere it is highly important to remain transparent, otherwise you can really shoot yourself in the foot. It’s like John Keys of the National party saying different things to different audiences and not realising that journalists will pick up on the anomalies. I recommend in future for you to simply ask for your product to be reviewed or something to that effect. Honesty goes a long way online. It’s all about making friends, turning those friends into customers then into advocates.

The concept of InPage advertising is an interesting one though. On the surface it looks like a good advertising product as it is akin to television ad breaks throughout tv show content. Even though ad agencies and advertisers may go for it, what’s in it for the website visitor? Most people hate advertising on the Internet unless it is highly relevant to what they are searching for or viewing online.

My gut feeling is that InPage may not work for all media websites. A publisher has to consider what affect an advertising product may have on its audience. Will the ads be shown in between every single page? Or are the ads simply displayed once or twice throughout the user session? A product like InPage must be used sparingly otherwise you will experience “ad burnout” rather quickly and people will not visit the site again.

Will the ads be contextual? The more relevant the advertising is, the more likely it will be perceived as content rather than an ad. You will need some pretty smart technology to do this. Perhaps you could partner with DoubleClick rather than reinventing the wheel?

In regards to the penetration of InPage type advertising I am not really sure. I have not seen this type of online advertising in New Zealand at all to date. Mike, or who ever you are, I’d be interested in knowing how advertisers and publishers are responding to InPage if you are keen to share this.