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My View On Signature Selling

Discussion in 'General Chat' started by RichUser, Sep 16, 2007.

  1. #1
    On the forum I have noticed many members selling link spots on their signature. By the looks of it, the going rate at the moment is $10 per 1,000 posts. Now what I disagree with is how the rate is formed. Let's say that you are buying a link spot on a member that has 5,000 posts and has been here for lets say about 3 years or so. You would have to pay $50 monthly for a link spot. But how many posts does this member make daily? About 5 posts per day as an estimate, how much traffic would you get from that? You won't be getting any traffic from the previous 5,000 posts that he made, because those threads are old and no one visits them. Your traffic will only be coming from his/her daily 5 posts, which is very little for a price of $50 monthly.
    This is what I think should decide the monthly price:

    1) How many daily posts they have. This number should be decided depending the average number of posts per day for a months time.
    2) How informative his/her posts are. If him/her are posting long informative posts frequently, then they will be looked up to as a forum member and many will trust the links in his signature.
    3) How many reps they have, this again has to do on their popularity statues on the forum, if they help around frequently, many will pay attention to the signature links
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  2. buffalo

    buffalo Illustrious Member

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    #2
    All good ideas and valid points but there isn't really a set price to pay for sig links. Most sig links are auctioned off. Whatever the bidders are willing to pay is the "set price".

    As for this, there's no easy way to guage it. The only way to determine that would be to manually look at a person's posts and count how many they have made in the last month. There is an average post per day on each persons profile, but it doesn't really tell you much. Mine is much lower than what I actually post because I rarely posted durning my first few months here. Now I am posting much more often, but my average daily posts is still quite a bit lower.
     
    buffalo, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  3. RichUser

    RichUser Banned

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    #3
    "Whatever the bidders are willing to pay is the "set price"."

    That actually is a good line and should be followed.

    Hmm..yes checking out their post counts for a months time is tiring, but it would be worthwhile.
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  4. Colleen

    Colleen Illustrious Member

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    #4
    Old threads are cached in search engines and are visited by a lot of people doing searches in the search engines. I run a forum, I would know just from viewing the stats.
     
    Colleen, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  5. RichUser

    RichUser Banned

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    #5
    Doesn't happen to all threads. Some threads do actually get good search positioning, but 95% of the the threads don't get a good position for searched terms on here.
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  6. Colleen

    Colleen Illustrious Member

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    #6
    You said no one visits them, I was correcting you. I didn't say anything about how much or how often or even where they rank.
     
    Colleen, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  7. bogart

    bogart Notable Member

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    #7
    That would be the bad part of selling a sig link. It would be a job and posting on the dp would be work.
     
    bogart, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  8. buffalo

    buffalo Illustrious Member

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    #8
    More than tiring. Nearly impossible! I just checked mine. (Used a short cut. I remembered a post I made 3 weeks ago that mentioned how many posts I had at the time, and calculated from there.) I've made approximately 700 posts in the last 3 weeks :eek: (Yes, I know. I need to get a life.) I don't think anybody is going to take the time to look at the posting history of every person with a link sale auction running to go through and count that many posts!

    I know I wouldn't! :cool:
     
    buffalo, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  9. RichUser

    RichUser Banned

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    #9
    Holy, how much time do you spend on here?
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  10. PHPGator

    PHPGator Banned

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    #10
    Personally, I go for quality above quantity. Someone can post 100 5-word comments that will not hold near as much weight as someone who has been here a while and tries to provide helpful posts. The helpful posts will be much more beneficial in terms of traffic.
     
    PHPGator, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  11. RichUser

    RichUser Banned

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    #11
    What you just noted is actually one of the factors that I posted that should be taken into consideration when buying link spots.
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  12. buffalo

    buffalo Illustrious Member

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    #12
    Way too much, apparently! :D
     
    buffalo, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  13. RichUser

    RichUser Banned

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    #13
    What are you into, you make any money from internet marketing?
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  14. ForgottenCreature

    ForgottenCreature Notable Member

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    #14
    How do you know? DP ranks high for a ton of keywords throughout the search engines = good for buyers on signatures.
     
    ForgottenCreature, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  15. RichUser

    RichUser Banned

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    #15
    I've been a lurker here for a long time, and I search on Google for many many webmaster search terms daily for my projects, and only 1/50 of my keywords bring up a dp thread in the top 20 results. Unless the thread gets over 10 pages long and the keyword density on the first page is good, then it may hit a fine position for a searched term.
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  16. buffalo

    buffalo Illustrious Member

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    #16
    Well, I'm just getting started, so I'm just starting to see results that make me happy. I think my marketing techniques are going to start becoming more lucrative than what I even expected. ;)
     
    buffalo, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  17. sarahk

    sarahk iTamer Staff

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    #17
    There are lots of threads here promoting sites, or selling sites where dp ends up ranking higher than the site being discussed. We know this because the site owner comes and asks for the thread to be deleted. You'd have to think the sigs on those pages would be working well.

    I also search for technical information and frequently end up with old forum posts appearing in the SERPs - the sigs will be working for those posters on those forums.

    As for the appearance of a set price, a first rule of economics is that the right price is what the buyer will accept and the seller will give. A signature has value to the seller - it could be used to promote his or her own sites, to forgo that opportunity the buyer must pay the right price, and beat other potential buyers either in $ or in the terms (time, flexibility etc).
     
    sarahk, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  18. RichUser

    RichUser Banned

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    #18
    Ah I see, well good luck then.

    I see. Well what my view is that sig spots are ONLY based on the amount of posts you have. I believe that it should also involve the three points that I listed.
     
    RichUser, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  19. chant

    chant Well-Known Member

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    #19
    I seem to remember reading that back links are also important to the signature links. If your signature is in someone with 10,000 posts that is supposed to improve your backlink status if you are indexed.

    I do see the OP's point of view that the frequency of posts per day can be important but if you start splitting hairs there why not count the number of characters/words in each post? The people that debate in the politics and religion forum would be making a killing selling their sig links.
     
    chant, Sep 16, 2007 IP
  20. sarahk

    sarahk iTamer Staff

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    #20
    Isn't it up to the buyer to decide what is most important based upon
    • reputation
    • total number of posts
    • rate of posting
    • type of posts - I wouldn't give you tuppence for someone who only ever bashes in politics and religion
    • whether you're after traffic or SERPs advantage
    • likelihood of the user being banned while the sig is meant to be displayed - does this user bump? etc
    • types of trades the user participates in - do you want the sig being associated with money exchanges? warez downloads? adult site sales?
    There's probably more ...
     
    sarahk, Sep 16, 2007 IP
    maldives likes this.