Sponsored Tags

In a hallway conversation with Joshua Schacter today at ETech, we spoke about del.icio.us and advertising and how it might be done on the site, and I suggested an idea that I really like but I don't think he was too hot on: literal "ad words" -- brand links -- sponsored tags.

One thing Google AdWords has successfully shown is that the web didn't need graphical banner ads in order to deliver effective advertising that people really responded to. Just look at Google's revenues.

What Google proved is you could reduce an ad down to a few words, and a simple link.

What I think del.icio.us should prove is that you can reduce an ad down to a single word and the ad'll still work. I'm thinking brand names as links. Sponsored tags. Whatever you want to call them.

Say you're browing links related to photography. Imagine if there were a list of links, just simple hyperlinks, in some offset box that said "Sponsored Tags", say underneath the "related tags" box:

Prediction: we're going to see this within the next three months on the web. Maybe not on del.icio.us, but on other sites for sure. (Who knows, maybe it's there already.)