The past two posts have encompassed monetization programs from some of the biggest names out there – Amazon and Google.  Today we’re going to talk about a program that’s much, much smaller: Project Wonderful.

I will be perfectly blunt when it comes to Project Wonderful – you will most likely not make much money through this site.  But what you will do is feature some fun, likely independent advertisers, and instantly see how much money you’re making.

Step-by-Step, here’s how it works:

1. You sign up for free a Project Wonderful account.

2. You set up an ad box that you would like to put on your site.  Your box can be a big skyscraper {aka a long skinny ad}, or it can be one tiny square, or any number of layout options.  You’ll see a Project Wonderful ad on the sidebar of Fantabulously Frugal that’s two 125 x 125pixel ad boxes side by side.

You could do 10 of these 125 x 125 boxes if you wanted to.  You choose what size advertisements you want to accept, and also let the site know where you’re going to place the ads – for instance, on your sidebar, at the bottom of posts, or in your RSS feed.

3. Wait for advertisers to bid on the space available on your site.  That’s right – bid!  You will get an email when someone is interested in placing an ad on your site and you can either approve or reject the ad.  I think Project Wonderful best describes how the bidding process works:

Let’s say you’re an advertiser, and you want to put your ad on a certain site. To do this, you just place a bid in that site’s auction. Bidding is a fast and easy process where you tell us two important pieces of information: what you want to pay, and when you want to pay it.

Our system examines all bids, every second of every day. If you’re the person willing to pay the most at that moment, your ad is displayed on the site! It’s really as easy as that. You’re only charged for the time in which your ad is the high bidder – and all charging is done to the nearest second.

4. Sit back, watch ads appear on your site, and start making money.

You might notice from my ad above the words in blue that read, “Your ad here, right now: $0.07.”  Remember when I said you wouldn’t make much money from this site?  I wasn’t kidding.  I’ve had this ad box in my sidebar for two weeks and I’ve made exactly 50 cents.  Yes!  At this rate I will clear $12 for the year, or enough for 2.5 drinks at Starbucks.

Here’s why I like Project Wonderful – You have total control over what ads appear on your site.  I’ve only been approving Etsy sellers who I’m guessing have very limited funds set aside for advertising.

Here’s a tip – a smaller advertising box is likely to yield you more money in the Project Wonderful system, because it’s all based on bidding.  A smaller ad space yields more competition.  More available ad slots means less competition to drive the prices up.

Do you use Project Wonderful?  If so, what do you think?  Have you been able to fund more than two trips to Starbucks based on your earnings?