Out of Frustration, Gay Ad Network Grew
MONTREAL – Three adult industry veterans, all with significant experience in affiliate marketing, have founded a new, all-gay advertising network to address the frustration they experienced when attempting to promote their own products.
Rainey Stricklin, Joe Stricklin and Roger McMan launched Gay Ad Shop this week. The network offers pay-per-click advertising designed to address the unique needs of the gay segment of the adult online industry.
“We looked around the marketplace and realized there was a glaring deficit when it came to a dedicated gay advertising network,” said McMan, who operates the affiliate program MyGayCash. “As an advertiser myself, I found it very frustrating to have to weed through dozens of straight networks trying to eke out a bit of quality gay traffic.”
The new network focuses solely on gay traffic, and while advertisers can target by device, country, times of day and other criteria, the company primarily concentrates on desktop traffic. Both publishers and advertisers get the convenience of a self-service bidding platform with the quality of an experienced account management team available to all clients, no matter their monthly spend, according to partner Joe Stricklin.
“Our goal is not primarily quantity to start, but quality,” he said. “We’re not focused on how many impressions we serve daily, but rather that the traffic works for our advertising clientele and therefore creates a profitable situation for all parties.”
For advertisers, Gay Ad Shop provides a real-time cost-per-click bidding platform; banner, text and pop-up or pop-under ad spots; automated creative weighting based on performance; and targeting by domain, device, and/or keyword. Direct buys and run-of-network options are available.
For publishers, the company offers everything from simple invocation codes to invoicing and relationship management coupled with advanced click-fraud protection.
“We want to be more than just another ad network,” Rainey Stricklin said. “We want to be a partner, helping advertisers find the quality gay traffic they need and helping publishers manage their ad inventory efficiently and profitably.”