Hi there, I run a number of sites, one of which is very popular (c300,000 uniques per month). I don't feel that the money I am making from this site is in proportion to the traffic and I need to get an overall view of the situation. Question: Are there reputable companies or individuals who offer a service to review the existing advertising streams on a website and then suggest better ways (placement, companies etc) to earn more money?
ZubZub, Just PM me your URL and I will take a look at the site and give you some thoughts. I am not GURU, but I do alright!
First of all how much do you expect to be making from your largest site? Secondly what is the site about you have no sig line. It would be very hard to throw you any advice based on the info you have given.
Try to contact companies that sell relevant products/services directly and ask them if they are willing to do a sponsorship on your site. For example Google some of your keywords and see which companies have PPC Adwords ads on those keywords and contact them. I have found this strategy to work very well.
For better conversion rate,you can't find it with current ads provider. What i suggest you is use multiple ads network to increase your ads earning. And if you want,you can use pop up ads to further earn more. Try CPX,they pay better than adsense
Thanks for taking the time to reply guys, I will answer your posts in turn. Thank you, I will send you the URL. Again, URL coming your way... Fantastic advice, not an area I have explored..thank you! I will check that out, thanks. Pop-ups are out of the question but thank you for the other advice
Well I dont know if I can offer any more advice but what I can tell you is that its about tracking and tweaking. You need to have an understanding of what is already working for you on your page, who is clicking where and why? So track your conversations which can be done for free with Google Analytics. You could also PM me your website so I could take a look at it and see what you are working with, I am no GURU either but I know a little bit. But essentially you just need to use a couple of ad publishers and ensure that they are placed in good spots on your page and try to maximize conversation. Send me that page and I will get back to you with more information though. I dont know of any companies that do what you are talking about because I try to do it all by myself which isnt hard and I think you can do it too once you learn.
I have been looking at your site now and here are a few recommendations I have come up with: 1.) Site Design – There is quite a bit of space used up on the front page of your forum by the Google/Yahoo/ASK.com ect images. These images are confusing and look like advertisements themselves. An overload of advertisements normally will cause users to not click on any ads. Stream line the graphics on the first page, maybe even remove them. It is important not to saturate your users with ads! 2.) Ad types – While I was visiting your site, I was served a few ads for pizza? Pizza is not really targeted to your demographics. The more targeted the ads are, the more effective they are! If you are going to keep using what ever ad server shows these ads, check and see if they have a filtering system! 3.) Direct Ad Sales – With monthly traffic around 300,000 uniques a month there should be no problem finding advertisers who would be willing to rent ad space for a weekly/monthly rate. I would suggest selling ad space on the top right (468 banner) where the banner is now, put a 125x125 banners on the top of your left hand navigation column, and a few ads in the footer (maybe a banner or two and a few text link type ads). Another idea would be to have advertisers sponsor categories. For example when a person clicks on the Downloads section, that forum (and all sub forums) would have an advertisement at the top (right above “Threads in this forumâ€) for a company like Download.com. One website I run is about aquatic pets, many of the profiles of the pets on my site are sponsored by companies that sell that type of pet! The next logical questions would be, how do I find advertisers and how much do I charge them? Finding the advertiser can be difficult at times, but with a bit of work it can be done. The first thing you should do is start to look for websites that sell products that fit into your niche. When you build a list of these websites check on Google to see if they are advertising heavily (look at the Adsense ads on Google when searching for keywords that you think would be their target). The ones that you find advertising heavily write an email to them that explains what you have to offer them (IE amount of traffic, your demographics, ect.). They are already advertising heavily so they know the benefits of doing so. The companies that you can not find any advertisements for I would write a different type of email to them. Not only tell them what you have to offer, but explain (not to much, cause you don’t want to seem like you are talking down to them) the benefits of advertising on a site such as yours (IE branding, traffic, awareness). How much do you charge? That is a much more difficult question to answer. I would look at what the ads you already have are producing a month, double that, and start from there. All my websites are micro niche and have extremely responsive readers so I charge a lot for the amount of traffic I have, so I cant give a good number! This is a place to start!
...and that, my friend is a whole wealth of information that I will study carefully and use! Your answer was very well constructed and must have taken time. I really appreciate you doing this Thank you again.