I was browsing another blog a few days ago and noticed they were running “Add Grid Network” adds, so I had a look into it.
Add Grid Network places contextual links, similar to Google Adsense, however, instead of getting paid per click, you get add placements on other sites.
I had originally seen these adds on a blog I would actually have liked to advertise on, so, I thought I would give it a go. 
Although the service is free, Add Grid Network place their own adds, which is how they plan to make money.
After signing up I went about generating the code I required, and hit the first problem. As Google prohibit other contextual adds on the same page as theirs, you have to disable the contextual element within the service, a big disadvantage.
Add Grid Network of course suggest you give adds a good placement to build your credits, and get more traffic back. Needless to say I did not do this as it was an unknown product, and I was not going to give it precedence over paid advertising. However, I was able to use vacant “screen real estate” which I was not able to fill with other adds.
Despite not being contextual, and in a poor spot on the blog in question, I sent 13 clicks back their way in a couple of days.
Upon logging into the site you are presented with the following information:
As can be seen above, for my 13 clicks I only received 2 in return, and one of those was an add I clicked on another site to test it, so things were not looking too good and I removed the adds from my site.
I will wait and see if the balance is redressed, but I do not have much faith in this product now. Also the website itself is very clunky, built with a lot of images, having the feel of something sliced up in photo shop.
The fact that I got so few clicks in return does imply that others are doing well out of this service, perhaps my own add was not appealing enough?
I signed up with them as they came out of beta. I was not impressed and, AdSense pays the bills!
No its a shame really, its a good idea…
The other thing I found is that you could click your own adds, I only did it a couple of times to test them, but they all seemed to register, it wouldnt suprise me if it gets abused….
Jez
Dang! I was getting quite excited until I saw your first problem. It is a good idea though, so if not this one, there’ll be a similar one along soon enough I reckon.
Maybe, but no one will want to disable adsense for it.. and without it being contextual its pretty poor…
I’ve been using something similar for a few months on a site I’ve given up on (but still keep running). Its called ReceiveLinks. Its the same idea, but probably not as robust.
What about just using this product on link pages within a site to boost backlinks? anyone try that approach?
Im not sure what you mean, the network runs on an embedded script so there are no backlinks as such, its a bit like Adsense.
If you mean running the network on obscure pages in you r site, that wont work either because you have to get clicks off your own site to build credit up.
All you can do with it is “trade traffic”, which is worthwhile only if your adds are targetted…
Might make more sense to just run AdSense in place, and use the revenue generated to buy AdWords…
The reason I tried AdGrid was because I had some available whitespace on my site, Adsense only allows 4 blocks per page, and some blocks dont earn anything, I thought it would be something else to try….
I have been thinking of using Adwords too, but think long terms trying to buy reviews would be better than Adwords as, with luck it would get better SEO for the site…..