A WordPress Sponsor Ad Management Plug-In
September 2nd, 2009 | 
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I wrote the WordPress Sponsor Ad Management Plug-in to use within the WordPress and WordPressµ version 2.8* framework to manage the many sponsor ads associated with numerous blogs. To give you an idea as to why I wrote this plug-in, consider that for one WordPress setup I have ~30 blogs that reference 109 sponsors, each sponsor has 9 program types for each of their six or more sites; 109 * 9 * 6 = 5886 ads. Divide that by 30 blogs equals 196.2 ads per blog. Managing these ads by hand is a complete waste of time. I also wanted to track the performance of the sponsor ads, how many clicks to how many impressions. Granted, I do not promote all 109 sponsors at the same time on any one blog. The cd_ad_sponsor plug-in, however, will let me determine (in conjunction with the sponsor statistics) which sponsor ads are most effective.
Version 1.3.0 is now available from the downloads page.
Note: The cd_ad_sponsor download from WordPress in incorrectly named. The download DOES contain the correctly named cd_ad_sponsor.zip file. Please extract this file before you upload it to your plugins folder. You may also download the correctly named plug-in from here.
One cautionary point I want to stress is that this plug-in requires that you edit the structure of your theme files. If you are not comfortable poking around in your theme files, I would recommend that you skip using this plug-in. The modifications are simple enough, though, and you can read more about using the cd_ad_sponsor in the User Guide.
The cd_ad_sponsor plug-in is targeted for use by site owners only. It is not designed to be operated by your Authors, or other members. Consequently, there is very little error checking. The plug-in may also take some time to configure, as well as modification of theme files, which is not within the usability of non-administrative users.
If you are looking for the cd_ad_sponsor user guide documentation, please see Sponsor Ad User Guide for more information about using the cd_ad_sponsor plug-in.
Introduction
This plug-in accepts graphic- and text-based banner advertisements from sponsors where those ads [should] conform to the IAB Ad Unit Guidelines. There is no restriction, however, on the size of your banner ads. Text-based banner ads contain mostly anchor tags wrapping text links but may contain smaller images, such as icons. They are often presented using JavaScript, such as Google AdSense and those ads obtained from Amazon, Commission Junction, etc.
Sponsor ad sizes should be limited to the current WordPress Theme element dimensions, such as the Header, Footer, and Sidebar dimensions. No validation is performed to prevent you from adding a 468 pixel wide banner in a 200 pixel wide sidebar. You will have to control what ads you accept and make any necessary changes to your theme to accommodate the possible ad sizes, or modify those ads to meet your theme requirements.
The cd_ad_sponsor plug-in does not track the sale of an ad. That is a procedure left entirely to you. There are many shopping cart type plug-ins available to process these purchases. I do not have any one specific e-commerce plug-in that I recommend.
Note to WordPressµ users. The plug-in automatically determines the site while selecting the appropriate ad to display. You can have a sponsor purchase ad placements on one or more sites in one or more zones and the plug-in will manage the ad display for you. I have noted where cd_ad_sponsor definitions apply site-wide, or to a single blog.
Requirements
The cd_ad_sponsor Plug-in requires that your server runs PHP 5.1.x or greater, MySQL 5.x or greater, and WordPress(µ) 2.8.4 or greater.
I have tested this plug-in on two different servers, my development server and my production server, and four WordPress 2.8.4 and 2.8.5 installations, two single instance configurations and two WordPressµ configurations. It is also running on this web site. All ads that you see are presented by the cd_ad_sponsor Plug-in.
Installation
The cd_ad_sponsor Plug-in installation is straight forward. It does not require a special configuration.
- Download the cd_ad_sponsor plug-in file,
- Extract the files locally,
- FTP the files to the WordPress Plugins folder,
- Activate the cd_ad_sponsor plug-in.
- If you are running WordPressµ, ensure the plug-in is activated site-wide.
Compatibility
I have tested this plug-in on my specific WordPress installations, as I noted above. Each WordPress install is running a variety of other plug-ins, such as Viva Thumb-Zoom, WP-PageNavi, EmbedIt, MU Meta Tags, and some others. I have not found any incompatibilities, as this plug-in does not interact with any other plug-in. That does not, however, mean that incompatibilities will not occur. Should you encounter an incompatibility with another plug-in, please post your findings in the comments and I will help you as best I can.
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Hi Datadirt,
Thanks! Glad I could help.
You might want to make sure you have version 1.2. You can either download from my site or wp codex.
Note: The version number is in the readme.txt file. Since I still haven't heard back from the wp codex gurus I have not been able to fix their renaming of '_' to '-', subsequently, the update plugin feature on the plugins page does not work. :-/ Updates are done manually for now.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Have a great weekend too!
thx for the hint - just upgraded to the new version. Nice new feature!!! I'm running all my ad buttons via your plugin now.
Hi Coyote,
Is it possible not to cloak the link generated by this plugin ? since the link generated by this plugin is not xhtml 1.0 compliant
Thanks :)
Hello Anangga,
The 'cloaked' link consists of a parameter list which determines the appropriate banner URI as provided by a sponsor. I may, at some later date, re-work some elements of the plug-in, but I have no immediate plans to do so. I would, however, welcome any suggestions you may have to add to my to-do list.
Thanks
Coyote
Hi Coyote
I'm curious to know if you have tested this in 2.9.x? I've installed it and am running into a few strange things. I think it is 'me', and not the plugin, but I thought I would check just in case.
I'm working on http://m2live.org and have created 2 zones, one for each sponsor ad. The actual sponsor pic displayed for one (1) impression, then never showed again. I tried changing the revenue type code, as well as other settings with no avail.
Thanks, and it really does seem like an awesome plugin.
best,
Sean
Hello Sean,
Yes. I am running both 2.9.x single and mu versions of WP with this plug-in.
Looking at your site source code I see that you are running 'execphpwidget' immediately prior to the location of your sponsor ads within the sidebar. You do not need to execute any php. The user guide explains how to insert the function call in to your theme, and how to configure a multiple-ad zone.
If you are still experiencing difficulty please contact me on Skype or by email and I will assist you as best I can.
Best regards,
Coyote
Hi,
I am using WordPress 2.9.2.
I'm looking for an ad program that can support gif, jpg, and swf files.
Is this the right program for me?
Also, Can I manage multiple zones and campaigns and also view impressions and click-throughs
Also, does it support clicks and also, a small text advertise here so I can refer users to my email that want to advertise on my site.
Thank you.
Hello Larry,
Thank you for your interest. I will answer your questions in the order you submitted them.
The cd_ad_sponsor plug-in does support all standard graphics file formats, such as gif, jpg, png, etc. The swf file script and parameters should be added to the script-based ad section of the Manage Banner page.
I believe this program is right for you, but only you can make that determination.
You can have any number of zones defined within your theme. Impressions and click-through are also tracked. Campaigns would be determined by your configuration with your sponsor. Each campaign would then equate to a Program Type using this plug-in. You can read more about this in the User Guide.
The plug-in supports clicks for non-script-based ads. For example, AdSense is script-based and, therefore, cannot be tracked through the plug-in. Those statistics, however, are available through your sponsor that offers script-based ads.
Yes, you can include a text-link to display with ads that either redirects the user to your advertising page, or to your email address. You would simply add the anchor tag to your theme at the location where you want the link to appear.
I would like to recommend that you read the user guide on my new web site, http://cd-ad-sponsor.com. This is a new site I created specifically for this plug-in. There you will find the User Guide, Tutorials, etc. I will be adding more in the coming weeks.
If you have further questions, please do not hesitate to contact me on Skype or by email. I will be more than happy to help.
Best regards,
Coyote