How do I make sure they aren't editing the stats?

I'm thinking of making a big advertising investment and I was wondering how I know they don't edit the stats in paint or something?

 

Well that's one way to cheat the system, but another is to hit refresh a lot through different proxy servers. The question isn't really how many hits they get, but how many they send you; what's your ROI?

 

Roi????????????

 

Well my advice is if you do not know what ROI is leave your money in the bank and study the industry.

Otherwise you'll lose your money...

 

Wow thanks for so much help Sem-Advance.

Or you could have just told me what ROI is. I don't think not knowing what an acronym stands for is grounds for not advertising.

 

Return on Investment. Basically how much you much the advertising makes you versus the cost of it.

 

And how do I find out what my ROI is?

 

ROI = Return On Investment

Advertising ROI is measured as such for many businesses.

For each $1.00 invested

you should earn

$1.25

or 25% Return on your investment.

ROI is one of the simpler acronyms in business and advertising, not knowing it's meaning would suggest to most that the learning level is below what is needed to ensure success.

Not trying to be a smart ass.....

trying to save you the $1,000.00s I have lost in advertising till I understood it all...

 

why not make them give you direct access to the stats

 

Gryffin would you let a total stranger log into your cpanel?

Thanks sem for clearing that up. But how do I know what my ROI is if I haven't invested yet?

 

That is the great question...no easy answer.

I am not sure of your business so I'll give a general breakdown

Product Cost - Expenses = Profit

So lets say you earn $10.00 for widget sale

Widget cost = $1.00

Minus fixed operating expenses $3.00

This means you are left with $6.00

Out of that you need to figure in your variable expenses such as monthly advertising.

So if you want to make $3.00 profit per widget you can spend no more than $3.00 in advertising to make a sale. But you would need to factor in other variable expenses which may reduce the amount you can spend per sale to $1.00

Hope this makes sense.

 

Sem good advice. Taylor, sem wasn't being rude, but trust me if you don't know the basics of advertising, then you'll more money thank you think you gonna be earning.

If you are planning to use adwords, perry marshals eBooks are great. Or better hire a middle man who knows how to handle your investments, again with utmost care. As you start learning the tricks of the game, work towards getting the business in your hand instead of the middle man.

~G

 

I guess there's more to advertising than I first thought. I thought it was simply pay people to give your website some exposure and bada bing bada boom.

In my case I don't have a product. I just want my general discussion forum to get more popular (the one in my sig).

 

Then you definitely want to slam the brakes on cause its not like that at all.

And Forums are probably one of the hardest to advertise and earn money that would make a profit!!!!!!!!!!

There are people here at DP who can drive free traffic to forums and still do not earn money or cannot get people to post.

Look for posts by my friend Randy aka Tearabite here at DP.... he runs http://www.grownupgeek.com

He can tell you how he went from nothing to over $3,000.00 a month with Adsense plus I believe hes knocking down another grand a month or so with others now.

Take your time and save your money...or just send your money to me if you still are bent on wasting it lol

 

My site is a lot more popular than that so I don't get how it could be making more than mine.

 

Unfortunately and as much as this won't make sense being in business is not a popularity contest.

Business is about finding the USP or Unique Selling Proposition

Randy seems to have found it

http://www.shoemoney.com/gallery/v/misc/Grown-up-geek.jpg.html

You just need to find yours it seems,

Good luck!

 

Take a small investment in the beginning. Tell that you want one-month "test run", and if it seems good to you - tell them you are ready to invest more on their site.

Because... in the end it's the revenue you create from those hits that count - not the hits alone.

 

So there really is no way to tell if they are editing their stats in paint or something though?

 

Nope... but you could try seomoz.org website to find out the pagestrength. That will give you a clue how popular the site is. Also, check out their Alexa ranking (while it's not the best thing in the world... it might be still worth checking).

I'd warmly suggest that "30 day test period". Also ask testimonials or guidance from other people regarding "where they advertise"

 

Alright thanks for all the very good advice!