Passionfruit Ads – Button Swaps

Published August 9, 2012 | By Lindsay

Passionfruit is an awesome site that takes the work out of having Sponsors on your blog. I only signed up a couple of days ago and already am in love.

If you have sponsors on your blog or do button swaps I highly suggest using it!

Today I am going to show you how to add Passionfruit to your blog to do button swaps. Button swaps are such a great thing to add to your blog because it brings you traffic and also connects you to other bloggers.

This is a VERY long tutorial but I PROMISE you it is worth using!

So let’s get started…

1.) Go to Passionfruit Ads. You will asked to create an account.

2.) Create an account and then press Join the Family. Now you should see this

3.) First thing we are going to do is Add a new site. This is your blog site. For the purpose of this tutorial I am going to use the blog I have been using for all of my tutorials. So I am actually creating a new account and adding sponsors right along with you : )

Add your Site name. This is the title of your blog.
Add your blogs URL. This is what people type in to get to your blog. http://www.twomenupdate.blogspot.com
About your site. This is just a description of your site. Remember that you are “selling” your site so make it interesting : )
And your PayPal email. This is how you will get paid for each sponsor spot you sell.

4.) When you are done click on Save site.

5.) Now you will be taken to a page that looks like this. I know it is kinda overwhelming so let’s just take it step by step. When you have ads running you will see them below this section.

This is where you will be able to define your ad spots (set them up), get the codes you need for your blog, edit your profile, import ads, and see about payment information. As you use Passionfruit understanding all of this will become easier.
This is where you will click to Define your ad spots. This is where you will determine the size of your spots, how many you want on your sidebar, how many will show on your blog at a time, the size of the spots, and so on….
Ads Running will just let you know how many ads you have running on our blog and your stats compared to the weeks before.
Traffic is also just like your stats.
This is where you will see how much money you are bringing in. If you only do button swaps this will always be zero.
Another way to Define your ad spots.

6.) So let’s create an ad for our button swap. I am going to click on Add a spot.

7.) Now we need to define the spot …

Spot Label – Is what you are going to call this ad space. It can be anything you want – Free Button Swap!, Medium Ad Space, Small Ad Space, Feature. I use Free Button Swap because I like that people know that this space is free : )
About – This is about the sponsor spot. Describe the spot that your sponsors will buy or swap. You should put the size ad this space is, where it will sit on your sidebar, what comes along with this spot (twitter shout outs, Sponsor Spotlight post), and whatever else you want. You also need to add your promo code here after we create it. People will use that code to get the space for free.
Width/Height – The size of this ad. My swaps are 150×150 because my sidebar is 300px and I like to have two buttons sitting together.

8.) Now lets define our display and availability

Openings – How many buttons do you want displayed on your blog for this spot? This is the number that you would put here.
Shown at a time – You can show as many buttons on your site at a time that you want. If you have more buttons than you want to put on your blog that is okay. Just click the Shuffle and your sponsors will be shuffled around so all are eventually seen.
Duration – How long do you want each button on your blog? A month to month sponsorship or longer?
Shuffle – You can shuffle your buttons so that they all appear on your blog and or get one of the top spots. I love this option.

9.) Now let’s talk about money.

Total Price – The price you set for the ad space. If you are doing a button swap you can set this price for however much you want. I do $1. Passionfruit requires you to enter something. We will create a promo code next.
Passionfruit Fee – The fee Passionfruit charges for the ad.
Your Payout – How much you will be paid after charges are deducted.

10.) Once you are done click on Save Ad Spot.

11.) Now your page will look like this.

12.) Now let’s create a promo code for your button swaps. Button swaps are free so your readers/swappers will need a code to get the free discount.

13.) Click on Site Setup and then Promo codes.

14.) Now you will see this. Click on Add a promo code

15.) Now let’s add our promo code.

Promo code – This is what your readers/swappers will type in to get their discount. I use SWAP because it’s easy to remember and goes along with the button swap.
Description – This is just for you. It helps you remember what each code is to be used for.
Applies to – You can make each code apply to all of your ad spots or just certain ones. You will indicate which ones here.

16.) Now the Usage…

You can determine the discount here. If you are doing a button swap or free ad swap you would put in 100% so your reader/swapper doesn’t pay anything. You can also offer your spots at a 20% (or however much you want) discount if you want to have an ad sale.
Also determine how many times this code can be used.

17.) Now click on Save when you are done.

18.) You will see this next. You can add more promo codes here or go back and edit the ones you have already created.

Now that you have created your promo code you need to add it to your free button swap ad. I guess you could always just give this code out instead of putting it on your description but that is really up to you. I think it’s best to add it to the description. Sometimes you won’t want to give this code out. Like I have spots that are for winners of giveaways only. I will only give that code out once a winner is announced.

19.) Now let’s add Passionfruit to our blog.

20.) Click on Site setup and then Displaying Ads

21.) Each of your ad spaces will have their own code. I am going to copy the code (in yellow) and paste that into my blog where I want to display my buttons. You can place your ad spots wherever you want on your blog. You might want to create “Feature” ad spots that sit on the top of your sidebar while your button swaps sit somewhere underneath.