ISP Advertising Profit Booster

Here's a technology that could revolutionize the economics of the dialup Internet access business.

by Christopher M. Knight [December 8, 1999]

A new company has arrived on the scene, promising to help ISPs turn the 20 to 30 seconds of latency during subscribers' dialup connection—and during the disconnect period after leaving an access session—into an incredible ad revenue opportunity for you.

It's called The DelFin Project, Inc. It filed for U.S. and International patent protection in October of 1997 and has just had all claims allowed by the U.S. Patent Office.

Today, in connecting to the Internet, a user selects the ISP icon from their desktop or toolbar. From that selection, the dial-in dialog box is launched asking for user name and password or other relevant information. Next, a dialing status box is launched indicating the status of the dial connection (dialing, checking network password, etc., connected) and occupying the center of the screen. This screen stays up for the 20 to 30 seconds typically required to connect.

The DelFin difference
With The DelFin Project's PromulGate architecture, dialing status info is presented in a strip at the bottom of the screen, leaving the rest of the screen open for display of a message and/or advertisement. The advertisement is launched concurrently with the dial routine. Upon connection, the advertisement can automatically terminate, giving way to the subscriber's target Home Page, or can stay live until the user clicks through to the Home Page or advertiser's target site.

Stew Sherman, Vice President of Sales & Marketing, said, "There is no advertising being sold yet, but we expect that ISPs will be able to sell local advertising with our technology—as well benefit from national advertising sold through other traditional networks." This means the ISP wouldn't have to actively seek ad sales in order to profit from its existing client base; still, many will undoubtedly take the opportunity to sell local advertising.

How it works
PromulGate is similar to a pop-up in that advertising is downloaded to the user's cache unobtrusively, in the background. When the user logs on to the Internet, the 200K+ PromulGate client software launches the dialer and the default browser, then looks into the cache for an appropriate ad to display, based on tags associated with the ad. These tags can be based on geography, time of day, or time of year. PromulGate ads are full page, last the 20 to 30 seconds of connect time, and are hot-linked once the connection is made. Once the connection is secured, the PromulGate client reports in with the impression and the consumer's follow-on actions. The client also seeks new ad downloads/updates to be presented at the next signon.

ZD Testing and Analysis Group (ZD Tag) test drove the project; its extensive test report is available in PDF format. (Click here to view.) After running PromulGate on 48 different platforms, ZD didn't find any compatibility problems. They did, however, issue three significant findings:
    1) The system is easy to install and use
    2) It supports multiple file formats: HTML, AVI, and Flash
    3) It does not slow connection or degrade the system's performance

The math
While there are no real-world numbers yet to suggest the magnitude of the ad revenues this technology might create ISPs, let's do a little math just for fun. Suppose you have 4,000 subscribers and each of those 4,000 subscribers logs in to your service 25 times per month. That gives you 100,000 login attempts per month or 1.2 million login attempts per year.If you were able to get even a modest $10 CPM (Cost Per Thousand) impressions rate, that would mean you could see an additional $12,000 per year in revenues without a lot of effort.

One downside, of course, is that your users may opt not to receive the advertisements. Further, there is no word yet as to how the system might allow your users to tailor the type of ads they receive—a development that would deliver a higher response rate to the advertiser and put more relevant messages in front of your users.

For more information on The DelFin Project, surf their Web site or call Stew Sherman at (561) 361-7887 Extension 222.

To Your ISPs Success!

Christopher ("Sparky") Knight
Founder & Managing Editor of the ISP-Lists Discussion Community

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DISCLAIMER: Neither Christopher Knight, nor ISP-Planet.com, nor internet.com Corporation have any ownership interest in The DelFin Project, nor are we paid to do ISP profiles. This ISP-Planet ISP Profile was done as a courtesy to ISPs everywhere. We welcome your feedback.

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