1. Overview of Universe Today
   
2. Visitor Demographics
   
3. Media Formats
   
4. Pricing
   
5. Accessing Your Statistics
   
6. Contact Universe Today
   

Do you have a product or service that you'd like to market to space enthusiasts? Why not consider advertising on Universe Today?

1. Overview of Universe Today
Universe Today is a newsletter for space-enthusiasts. Every weekday I (Fraser Cain) gather together space and astronomy stories from around the Internet, package them up into a simple condensed format. I aim for the more mainstream stories, and steer away from the aerospace-industry related news.

The website receives 20,000 pageviews a day, and the various newsletters are delivered to 26,000 people every single weekday.

2. Visitor Demographics
Here are some recent demographic details about Universe Today's readers (survey was done in 2001):

Age :

Under 20 - 6.0%
20-25 - 7.0%
26-35 - 18.5%
35-45 - 27.2%
46-55 - 22.7%
56+ - 18.3%
Declined to answer - 0.3%

Gender:

Male - 79.4%
Female - 20.6%

Annual Household income:

Under $20,000 - 13.9%
$20,000 - $40,000 - 20.3%
$40,001 - $60,000 - 23.1%
$60,001 - $80,000 - 15.4%
$80,001 - $100,000 - 10.1%
$100,001 or more - 11.1%

Education

Some high school - 7.0%
High school graduate - 10.9%
Some post-secondary - 21.8%
Bachelor's Degree - 31.2%
Master's Degree - 17.8%
Doctorate - 10.0%

Country

Top Countries
United States - 59.7%
Canada - 5.4%
United Kingdom - 5.9%
Australia - 7.7%

Remaining Countries by Continent
Africa - 0.6%
Europe - 10.6%
Asia - 6.6%
South America - 1.5%
North America - 1.4%
Other - 0.6%

Primary Language:

English - 84.6%

Member of an astronomical or space society

Yes - 29.7%
No - 68.4%

Hobbies

Astrophotography - 18.5%
Amateur Astronomy - 60.6%
Amateur Telescope Making - 9.3%
SciFi - 53.7%
Watching Movies - 62.2%
Playing Video Games - 27.2%
Chasing Eclipses - 11.2%
Hobby Rocketry - 12.7%
Reading Astronomy Books - 62.4%

3. Media Formats
I can accept any kind of advertising, including GIFs, animated GIFs, text, rich text, Flash, html; however, I won't accept any kind of popup or interstitial advertisements because my readers find them annoying.

Website Ads
As mentioned above, the website receives approximately 20,000 page views a day, and I have two spots available. In fact, you should be able to see them on this page:

• Top banner - This is a standard 468x60 banner that appears in the top right-hand corner of every page throughout the site.
• Sidebar banners - The 600x125 skyscraper ad along the right-hand side of the page.

Newsletter Ads
The daily HTML edition currently has 24,000 active subscribers. I keep the list very clean and remove any bounced addresses within the month. 75% of the subscribers read every issue. Advertising in the newsletter is very effective and typically gets a click-through-rate 10x higher than the website:

• Integrated Ads - The newsletter works differently from the website. I integrate small HTML ads into the sidebar of the newsletter which subscribers can click directly from their email.

Text Links
One of the simpliest and most effective ads you can do is a simple text link. These are the "Sponsored Links" located on the right-hand side of the site. These are displayed at the same location on every page of the site.

4. Pricing
Advertising on Universe Today is effective and reasonable. I accept either cost-per-impression or cost-per-click advertising. I'd even be happy to join your affiliate program if it's fair and an appropriate partner for Universe Today.

Cost-per-impression Ads (CPM)
With CPM ads, you own the space and can put whatever advertising creative you think will be most effective. This is better for branding campaigns, where you're more interested in sticking in people's brains than actually getting them to take some kind of action. The following costs are for 1,000 ads. All prices are in US dollars.

Cost-per-click ads (CPC)
With cost-per-click ads, you only pay when people click an ad and visit your website. For this format, the fee is $.25/click. Compare this to other pay-per-click services, such as Overture and Google Adwords. At the time I wrote this, the number 1 position on Overture for the search term "telescope" cost $2.12/click, while Adwords cost $.75/click. You can purchase clicks in $100 increments.

With the CPC model, we're partners. I'll work to develop ads which send you qualified traffic. I'll try ads on the site, in the newsletter, and even figure out more complex sponsorships if it's a really appropriate fit with Universe Today's content. I only want to send you qualified traffic, so you can approve any promotions before they're put live.

As I mentioned above, I'm also willing to consider joining space-related affiliate programs. Just send me an email with the details of your program and I'll consider it.

5. Accessing Your Statistics
Universe Today uses a high-quality banner management system that lets you log in, see your statistics, receive email reports, and even fine-tune your campaign on the fly.

Click here to log in now if I've already set you up with an account.

6. Contact Universe Today
So, are you convinced yet? Why don't you send me an email explaining your situation, and I'll get right back to you with some ideas and pricing.