Twelve positions: how the GulfThrone board works

A ranked place on gulfthrone.com. It displays one brand's logo, its name, one short line of its own words and one outbound link, for as long as that brand's total keeps it inside the top 12. That is the whole of what is rented: advertising space, not an equity stake, not a partnership, and not a licence to use the GulfThrone name.

There is no term and no expiry date. A placement comes off the board only when other brands have paid more — at which point it moves to the Fallen list below, keeping its name, its total and how long it was displayed.

12, across three bands: position 1 is the Throne, 2–4 the Royal Circle, 5–12 the Court. The number is fixed in the site's configuration and is not adjusted in response to demand. A board that adds a position whenever somebody is willing to pay is a board whose scarcity is a marketing claim rather than a constraint — and on a board where the thirteenth arrival pushes somebody off, that limit is the only thing making a position worth holding.

The bands are places on the page rather than packages. The Throne sits at the top at the largest size on the site, the Royal Circle is three positions beneath it, the Court eight beneath those.

There is no price for a position. Entry to the board is $10,000 and nothing below it is accepted; after that, where a brand sits is decided by its running total and nothing else. Every position, the throne included, goes to the larger total, so passing the brand above you — at any position, position one among them — costs one dollar more than its total.

The board prints both numbers against every position: the total the brand there has contributed, and what it would take to pass it. Totals are quoted in US dollars and payment is by bank transfer only; no card details are collected on this site, and nothing enters a total until the transfer has reached the account and been confirmed.

Nothing, for a few days. We confirm the money, set the moment the brand enters the board, and put that moment to the advertiser in writing. They appear at it, and the day counter starts there.

That gap is the only period on this board where money can come back. Written notice reaching us more than 48 hours before the notified moment returns the full amount received; inside those 48 hours it does not, because by then the placement has been committed to; and once the brand is on the board there is no right of withdrawal at all. Where no moment was ever put in writing the window never started, and a withdrawal is refunded in full however late it arrives.

Submitting the form reserves nothing, and it is worth being plain about that: a position is taken by having paid, not by having asked. We email a proforma invoice with the bank details, and we ask for your logo at that point — the form itself does not collect one.

When the transfer arrives and is confirmed, the amount is added to the brand's total and the board is re-ranked immediately — which is also the moment the placement is published. Submitting the form is a request rather than a concluded contract; the contract to publish forms when the brand is published, and the terms govern the application and the money from acceptance onward.

You move down one position, and we write to you the same day naming the new position and what it would take to hold the throne. If you were the lowest total on a full board, you move to the Fallen list below it.

Nothing is lost when that happens. The total is kept exactly as it stands, it is never reduced and it never expires, and adding to it puts the brand back on the board the moment it passes the lowest total displayed. Falling off is not a refund event, and the terms say so in those words.

The layer directly under the board, carrying every brand that has held a position and been passed out of the top twelve. It states the brand, its total, how many days it was displayed and the day it fell, most recent first.

Publishing it is a choice, and the argument for it is simple: a ranking that shows only its winners is hiding what losing costs. Here it costs the position and nothing else — the name stays, the total stays, and the way back is printed beside it.

The board shows who holds the throne today and nothing about who held it before, which is right for the board and wrong for history.

The Hall of Reign is the other half, and it is the throne's line of succession. One row is opened when the crown changes hands and closed when it changes again: the brand, the total it took the throne on, how long it held it and which brand succeeded it. It stays published afterwards. Contact name, email address and telephone number never appear in it.

Up to 3 changes of logo, message or link per calendar month, at no charge, on request. Further changes in the same month are at our discretion.

The short line is capped at 80 characters — long enough to say one thing, short enough that it cannot become a paragraph on the front page.

It does not auction. There is no bidding, no reserve price, no closing time, no private rate and no volume discount. It is a standing ranking that anybody can move at any moment by paying into it, and every total it sorts on is printed on the page.

It does not target: there is no audience segment to buy, no retargeting pixel and no optimisation. A position is a place on a page, seen by whoever visits the page. It does not measure clicks for you either.

And it publishes no audited traffic figure, which is worth stating in a piece like this. What it publishes instead is every total and what it would take to pass it, every brand that has held the throne, the Fallen list, and the agreement in full before anybody pays. How each placement is checked is set out in how we verify every placement.