Pixel Ads - A Million Dollar Idea

Perhaps you have heard of the next 'big thing' sweeping the internet... pixel ads. The phenomena was started by a 21 year old college student named Alex Tew, who lives in the small town of Wiltshire, England. Alex came up with this now, well published and quite brilliant idea, of selling pixel 'real estate' on his website (www.milliondollarhomepage.com)... as a creative way to fund his tuition to the University of England.

His 'Million Dollar Home Page' is comprised of a series of pixels, which are available in 100-pixel 'blocks' (each measuring 10x10 pixels). The page is divided into 10,000 of these 100-pixel blocks, which equates to a total of 1,000,000 pixels.

Alex's goal was to sell all the pixels on the page for a dollar per pixel. One million dollars in total.

Did it work? You bet it did!

As of early Jan. 06, Alex was in the process of auctioning off the last 1000 pixels on eBay. According to his blog... the bidding for that last parcel of internet history had climbed to more than $35,000! And his site is now logging more than 225,000 unique visitors per day. Not too shabby!

But like all great ideas, the copycats have already come out in force... all hoping to capture even a small fraction of this truly 'million dollar' idea. Currently it is estimated that there are more than 700 'Million Dollar Home Page' clones... all seeking to duplicate Alex's success.

But is another 'Million Dollar Homepage' homerun likely? Probably not.

Alex Tew's website became popular because he pioneered a truly one-of-a-kind concept, got people initially interested in visiting (and then advertising), which created a viral swarm of buzz... that set off a torrent of self-generating publicity.

His success was a result of two primary factors:

Uniqueness - Although nothing more than another type of banner ad, tiny pixel ads were different enough to capture people's attention and imagination.

Massive PR - Alex Tew has done a masterful job of promoting his site. The 'Million Dollar Homepage' has had press coverage in more than 25 different countries, including many major media outlets in the United States, such as... CNN, MSNBC, ABC News, G4 TV's 'Attack of the Show' and the Fox News Channel's 'Your World with Neil Cavuto'. Not to mention... countless forum posts, website links and blog entries worldwide. Throw in radio interviews, newspaper clips, magazine stories, newsletter endorsements and TV spots... and you've got an all out marketing blitz.

But is the 'Million Dollar Homepage' a flash in the pan idea, destined to flame out quickly...or will others be able to take this concept and run with it? The answer remains to be seen.