Hello everyone. I want to spent 1k in advertising my site and i really need your recommandations. Where to spent them? 1. Adsense? 2. For SEO? 3. Buying Ads in sites? Please recommand me something..
Adsense already has a bigmrket from Ipage. Mostly i see ipage ads everywhere in adsense ads. I will ask you to do seo and spend it in for advertising sites.
Give it to me instead. More seriously, I'd personally be more willing to spend on SEO than I would on ads. The long-term benefits outweigh the quick fix of advertising in my opinion, especially if you get a good SEO and follow what they do (so you can keep doing it in future). Unless, of course, you're doing your own SEO or your site doesn't really fit the profile - advertising is great if you need to spread brand recognition rather than get high search rankings for a specific keyword, for example. AdSense is pretty trustworthy since they're so hot on people not cheating (and catch LOADS of people who do), but almost everything else is pointless unless it's very, very cheap. Of course, that depends on your site content and target market as well - CPM can be a great way to get extraordinarily cheap traffic to a very good landing page, but it's really only going to work on specific combinations of demographic and site. Site ads can work VERY well if you choose your sites well. Don't buy through a third party or you'll end up with your banner stuck on inappropriate, unrelated, crappy sites thrown together to generate ad revenue at your expense. All in all, it depends very much on what your site is, who your target audience is, what results you're looking for from your budget (and don't say "lots of sales" - it's too vague) and what your overall strategy is. Plan, plan, plan. Don't spend until you know exactly what you want and how you intend to get it. My 2c.
Didn't see that before I posted (was typing when you replied). In this case, I'd save the money - hosting's crammed full of people right now and you'll have to spend a stupid amount of cash to rank against the big competitors. IMHO, find a better niche. But that's just my opinion, and I don't know much about the hosting niche beyond the fact that it's overcrowded by a ton of fly-by-night resellers looking for a quick buck!
You could spend a portion on smaller networks as well as work with an affiliate network and let the affiliates do the advertising. On our network, we would recommend CPA campaigns so that you pay for signups vs just clicks. But for hosting, affiliate networks will be a great ROI because you are only paying for signups.
That's very true and an excellent point that I missed. CPA is one of the best returns on "advertising" investment, since it costs virtually nothing to set up ($50 at ClickBank, no idea for ufshane's), is a one-time cost and you then only pay out on actual signups. Throw some money in to get someone(s) on DP to make some pretty banners, articles, emails and stuff for affiliates to use and you're sorted. Teaming up with a reliable CPA provider may be your best bet for a portion of the money. Right on, ufshane!
I’m assuming that your main objective is to acquire new customers than retaining existing customers? I agree with TIEro in that you are in an extremely competitive niche and 1k could soon disappear without too much success. First step would be to decide on who your target market will be. Newbies building their first site or people who have a site that might want to switch hosting? This is very important to ensure your messaging is correct if you do go down the route of display advertising and also it will help you to decide where to place the ads. Useful content that appeals to your target audience could also work. Eg how to set up a website in less than 5 mins (aimed at the newbie), what your existing hosting company is not telling you (aimed at website owners). This could be in the form of youtube videos or articles that you could promote. Blogger outreach is great way to get your content found but it will need to be different and add value. In turn this strategy could help your SEO. CPA models could be another good strategy but as an Affiliate Manager myself it can take a lot of time and effort to start seeing a decent return. I don’t think there is one way that is better than the other. They all have their advantages and disadvantages. Its really a case of trying, testing and analysing.
Web hosting is a hard market to advertise in because if all the businesses already that are in this category trying as hard as you are to resell their services. You may be best purchasing ad space on a certain type of site that's in your niche. For example if you target a lot of gamers then try to get your ad on a gaming blog or anything related to gaming. Also I wouldn't invest in Adsense as you really won't get no where your way better off just purchasing ad space on a friends website or just any regular website that gets a goodamount of traffic. When it comes to advertising you really have to sit down and think brainstorm and plan. If you so happen to do it the right way then in the end it'll pay off and you'll be a happy web hosting business owner. Best of luck hope everything works out well for you and your web hosting business z
For me, I would go for " media buys " - there is a lot to learn and even $500 would do. It takes days to explain.
Don't throw your money into paid advertising unless you really know what your are doing cuz you can lose a lot of moolah
I would spend the money on educating yourself. (Not meant to be a put down). Just saying if you aren't sure where to spend it and are asking on a forum then I'm guessing you are new to Internet Marketing. Before spending any money, I'd think about which area I'd be most comfortable spending it and lay out a solid game plan first. Otherwise, you'll be $1000 lighter with no results to show for it. Whichever you choose, it would be wise to start your campaign small and track it for effectiveness to see what is working and what isn't.
1k is a good amount to play with and get a lot of traffic with the investments. Personally I would invest in SEO and Paid Media/Paid Advertisement. And if you are looking to grow your list with the traffic then I highly recommend good Paid Solo Ads. You can find many Solo Ad Vendors Online. You can use a site like Safe-Swaps.com and buy clicks from there. When it comes to investing in SEO there is not much you can invest on here. The most important things to invest on for SEO needs would be SEO Tools, Plugins, Services and Outsourcing. I would not recommend to buy Backlinks because that has a risk to hurt your site. You want to get natural links that are linking back to your content because of the Value and not on the Price you paid to get that backlink. It is really all about the Value you provide to the Market. I would also recommend to really consider in investing in specific knowledge to help you increase the traffic to your sites in many other simple ways. There is a lot to learn when it comes to driving traffic and there is so much information because there are so many ways to get free traffic. Another great investment would be Outsourcing most of the work from a great Internet Marketing Strategy. Like Article Marketing + with SEO for example. You can pay a ghost writer to publish articles in as many article directories as possible and link back to different pages on your main site. You can also come up with a Tiered Backlink Strategy to follow, then you outsource all of the hard work so you can have more time to do what you really enjoy doing for your main site and get the most production out of your time working online. Plus when you outsource, it really is like owning your own company/business. You are basically paying to work for you and work for you when you are not even awake. It is all about leverage and how much productive action you can put in to grow the traffic to your sites, which ultimately will be what will earn you the money online. There is a lot to talk about when it comes to Investing. You definitely want to learn how you can put your money to work for you and actually make you more money in the long run. It is also a lot about Financial Literacy. Hope this helps! I wish you all of the success possible in your journey online!!
Same as most from above, better save the dough, you will definitely need it later Also well-known fact, you are in a sea of sharks, and a lot of them! But I tend to disagree that it is SUPER hard to make yourself seen, its just a little lengthier process. Most new hosts are often referred also as "kiddie hosts" because of the age of most start-ups. The hosting business is easy to enter, about $2-3k for a reasonable server and off you go. And because the youngbloods are so impatient to get a quick revenue, most of them give up in about 1-2 years, before the real work starts. And its a good and healthy process because they do not acquire so many customers for that short time, the few they get become more educated in the whole process when picking their new company. So what you need is to make sure you have an excellent, quality product and you can then spread the word. Build a unique brand, make a flawless website, fill it with quality content, useful for every visitor, invest time and money in training and improving your staff and do not fill yourself with expectations of an overnight glory. Competitors might be many but so are the tools you have at your disposal, depending on the target audience you are going for. From word of mouth to social networks, from SEO techniques to forums and blogs, you really have a vast choice of weapons to survive.
I can personally disagree here. In the hosting business especially this might hurt you more than it can help. Why? Well, for starters, outsourcing for marketing is a bad idea, because there are as many overnight marketers, as there are startup hosts, maybe even more. One of my favorite quotes on the subject - "Marketing is like sex, everyone thinks they're good at it". The point is that the chance you bump into such an "expert" should not be overlooked. And given the limited budget you are more than likely to end up empty-handed. Outsourcing for company staff is even worse. 9/10 potential clients will run away, as soon as they even suspect that reps are hired to robotically repeat your company policies. In fact one of the biggest weapons for a successful webhost is a good, home-grown staff. In order for any employee to really apply polite, kind attitude, combined with product knowledgeability and flexibility in facing various problems you HAVE TO constantly train, monitor and look for ways to improve them. Some hired people on the other side of the globe, who see you in person about twice an year can never embrace the company image, style and values and put some effort in pleasing your clients. Loyalty? Yeah sure, dream on... Be unique in your own way and stand out from the crowd
I'd like to add a note of caution on this particular suggestion: NEVER pay a random writer to produce content and post it on article directories for you. You're inviting someone to plug their spinner in and generate thirty tons of crap, which will then become associated with your site. If you go the article marketing route, pay a reliable writer for content delivered to you for checking. And actually check it. Then get the content guest-posted on appropriate blogs or, if you must, go for article directories which have a decent reputation and are hard to get into. Avoid the easy ones unless they at least have human moderation: you do NOT want your content and links appearing next to junk content. Just an additional 2c.
If it's hosting, you should use this cash to advertise locally in your area. Advertising hosting services on internet is pretty hard and you need a much bigger budget. Good luck