Best way of advertising in Vbulletin

[eitai2001]

Hi Guys.

For the last few days since I got vBulletin, I have been searching high and low for a decent way to manage adverts on the forum. But all of them I came accross had one limited feature or another ... I actually prefer the standard built in system more then the mods, but it doesn't allow rotation or set expiration.

And all the mods I found had some sort of limitation that didn't help me. The closest I found was VB Geek or something, and even that didn't offer all the features I needed.

And yesterday I was searching some more and it hit me, why do I need a mod, why can't I use something that is dedicated to ad serving, and so I began searching for ad serving software. I struggled, I'll admit ... and then I had an ingenious idea ... let me go check the softalicious available in my Cpanel of my host.

And there it was ... ad serving open source software. I ended up going for OpenX, but I still have a lot to learn on the best way to use it ... it's got a bit of a learning curve, but I figured out the basics of it and that's all I need for now. (This morning I also got an email from a large South African forum, and the lady said that's what they use).

Anyway, at the end of the day ... I have advanced banner rotation with full on campaign and click/impression tracking support, with the flexibility of using the built in VB advertising system so that I can show banners only to certain members, or on certain forums, etc.

The best part about having a dedicated ad serving platform though, is that now if I open another website or if I want to advertise on the front of the main site (which uses drupal not VB), I can manage all the ads from one place.

Basically what I am doing is creating dedicated ad spots in both drupal and VB and I will manage the ads from OpenX. The only time I will need to edit the settings in Drupal or VB is if I have a specific request i.e. only on x forum or to x members or something, but in general I'm sorted once I complete creating all the general containers

I hope this piece of info helps some of you guys who want proper control of the adverts in your forum, and advanced options. Best of all, the software I'm using is Open Source

Regards

Itai