New to banners

My client's service is useful but our prospective clients are not aware that it exists, so they are not searching for it. I found a site full of a highly targeted audience, almost as good as getting them through a search engine.

The webmaster threw out a figure of $5-20 CPM for a banner program.

Can I assume that some SEO's make money acting as retailers for ad placements like this: marking up the cost, acting as middlemen, receiving payment from client, then paying the advertisers? If so, what is a fair markup? How should I handle this?

Should I use Google Adwords to get a ballpark figure of what it would cost my client if he was using CPC?

I couldn't help my self: I quoted the whole thing

Now lets get to business. You sould receive money from the client (your hourly fee), and you should receive a return profit from the site (about 15-20%). The click trough rate even for targeted banners are pretty low, but they do help the branding process. If you like your client insist on a clean link, so the client gets the benefit of the PR.

Here is what you do:
0. Before you start have a talk with the client, agree on a budget, get some banner made (use a design firm, not a 19 year old kid).
1. Call the site in question (no emails), and present yourself.
2. Agree on what return profit you should receive.
3. Place the order.
4. If there are more money left on the budget, select another site and go back to point one.

Thanks requiem,

My client is shying away from banner ads because he feels they too often get passed over, so we want to try using confirm emails that go to our targeted market. The emails won't be html, just a text blurb about us with a link.

Should the price for a blurb in a confirm email be similar to that of a banner?

Is it standard practice for the site to PAY ME a commission, rather than my client?

Thanks for your input.

In regards to the post on banner ads. You should get a commission from the site in question AND your client should pay your for your time. It is pretty normal, often sites have difficulties selling out their advertising space, so 15-20% to the SEO firm is normal.

Requiem,

The website isn't paying a commission for the ads. They said that it doesn't matter to them if the ad buyers come to them direct or through an SEO.

So, I'd rather charge my client a % of his ad budget than a one time charge for my time.

Is this unfair? If not, then how long shall I collect a commission, a year?