What worked for me ... with actual results

I hear lots of suggestions to grow a site... but very little actual data... just terms like "it worked great" "tons of clicks" "do this & do that".... well, I have collected some of my stats over the past year.
Presented to help you make a more "informed" decision and hopefully, NOT make the same mistakes I did!

Press Release: Done thru “Professionals” = $600.00 = ( 0 ) new members.

Banner ad on a forum with 225,000 members. The Forum limits the number of ads run each month so that your ad is shown over 1,000,000 times in a month. = $500/month = (10 ) new members.
Banner ad on a forum with 32,000 members. = $450/month = ( 15 ) - new members.
Banner ad on a forum with 25,000 members. = $450/year = ( 22 ) new members.
After spending the $$$, I found this article: Headline of article printed in USA Today… 3/26/2006 = “Screaming banner ads get little notice” Conclusion at end of article = “The study presented echoes the findings of an earlier study that reported “Consumers are Blind to Banner Ads”

Google ad words: $200.00 for ppc program…ran about a month = ( 0 ) new members.

Started and ran my own email program (SPAM). I sent a very honest offer, letting the recipient know a little about the site and a link to it. I complied with all of the CAN-SPAM regulations. Results = Total emails sent ( 101,366 )
Returned/improper address ( 43,135 )
Request to “remove” from future mailings ( 316 )
Complaints sent to ISP ( 10 )
New Members signed: ( 1,696 )… AOL had my site cancelled because of 3 complaints, I had to move to another Registrar and Hosting company.
As the results were so good and I did not want my site shut down again, I decided to spend the money and pay the list brokers on the internet to send a mailing to their “Opt-In” list.
Results:
Purchased opt-in email list (sent by the Seller) $100.00 for 50,000 = ( 0 ) new members. I was able to get my money back.
Purchased opt-in email list (sent by the Seller) $100.00 for 25,000 = ( 0 ) new members. I was able to get my money back.
Purchased opt-in email list (sent by the Seller) $650.00 for 500,000 = ( 0 ) new members. I was able to get my money back.
Purchased a pop-under program… $50.00 for 25,00 pop-under ads = ( 0 ) new members.
Contacted three of the top rated opt-in email list brokers…. (Sit down for this one) Quotes for mailing were: $4,000, $4,500 & $6,000 to mail to 50,000!!! (Each list comes with a toll-free number to the nearest bankruptcy attorney at no additional charge!)

Started a program to list on the Free Classified Ad sites. Listed on the following sites and results after 30 days of run time.
www.domesticsale.com ( 0 ) site views
http://superads.com/ ( 0 ) site views
www.livedeal.com ( 2 ) site views
http://www.inetgiant.com/ ( 0 ) site views
http://www.olx.com/index.php ( 0 ) site views
http://www.pricelookup.com/ ( 0 ) site views

 

so you're saying that SPAM was the only thing that worked for you?

 

No, he's saying that his banner didn't draw attention and he didn't optimize his adwords ad, leaving him the crappy option of spamming.

 

Wow those don't look like good odds man, keep us posted with your progress, this helped alot

 

Firstly what website was this for? Was it to sign up to a forum? Can you provide the url please. Also how did you get hold of the 100K+ list of emails?

Thanks

 

Looks like you've tried a variety of things and none worked.

What is the site you are promoting?

You universal "unsuccess" would lead me to believe that the marketing technique may not be the problem.

 

At google adwords, you pay per click, not per 1000 impressions. Those 200 dollars you spend have brought visitors to your website, but none of them clicked. To me, that says more about your landingpage than adwords itself.

And spamming probably got you more signups since it is just an increase of scale.

101 366 - 43 135 = 58 231
(1 696 * 100) / 58 231 = 2.912538

2.9% of your spamreceivers signed up. If only 6 people signed up through adwords you would have gotten the same percentage. But since 200usd is about 400 clicks the signups aren't that stable compared to a massive spam where 60 000 people receive your ad. Scaling, that's all it is.

m2c

 

You only seem to be talking about members. What about how many visitors each tactic brought? Most sites aren't membership based, so if you have those numbers, it might be nice to know.

Jenn

 

He's not saying he didn't get traffic through adwords, just no registrations.

 

But what they're saying is that adwords really has very little to do with them getting new members. All the promotional methods mentioned do is bring traffic to your site, w/ the exception of they're spam email campaign, where the message can more easily be tailored towards memberships. Once they're there, it's your own responsibility to convince them to sign up for memberships of any kind. So they're saying it's quite possibly the fault of a poorly designed landing page, and not of any of the promotional methods tried. For instance...

1. Press releases aren't about getting registrations. They're about announcing news, and hoping to get media coverage. Spending $600 to misuse a tool isn't smart any way you cut it, and it's not going to get you your desired results.

2. Adwords campaigns are to drive traffic, again, not specifically membership registrations. The idea is to use it to drive targeted traffic to your page, where you can then convince them through marketing copy or incentives to sign up as a member.

3. Classified ad sites are meant for classified ads... people there generally aren't looking for membership sites to join.

The basic lesson to be learned here is don't waste your money on marketing tactics that you haven't thoroughly researched and evaluated first.

Jenn

 

Couldn't agree more

 

So what is the best way to gain members?

 

Thats exactly why people keep doing it unfortunately, because it does work. Of course theres a price to pay as we have seen...but its pretty marginal unless your a serious spammer, sending out hundreds of thousands of emails.

 

Outbackpro Is this the site you experimented in your profile?
http://www.sportsonlyauction.com/
Mabe you show work more on the homepage to make it more attractive,

 

In the US you can be fined up to a million dollars for spamming and it can be a federal violation. Not exactly "pretty marginal" stuff. It's just not worth it to try to make a few bucks.

 

interesting test you did , most people are now deleting emails that look like spam i get 100's of spam each day and i dont even look at them , it is really interesting that you got 1000 just by spamming.

 

Yes, this is my site.... I will attempt to clarify the points everyone has made.
1.) Yes, SPAM has worked the very best for my site.
2.) Casper, if you are just here to throw darts, please refrain... you are making accusations based on (0) knowledge... take the info and learn... if you have nothing to add to the discussion = don't.
3.) I am afraid I did not keep track of the visitors to the site... but will keep these records for a future update to you.
4.) I do not believe that the AdWords response was due to a poor opening page... it is the same opening page that was used with all forms of promotions and the sign up was much better with the other programs. "Maybe" a person with a "different" attitude clicks on the adwords link? I do obtain Members from Google searches, just didn't have any success using AdWords.
5.) As "Webmasters", you should all know that SPAM was NOT banned by the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 =
“Contrary to widespread belief: The CAN-SPAM Act does Not Ban spam = it Regulates spam. It places restrictions upon commercial email.”
Above excerpt taken from Effectiveness and Enforcement of the CAN-SPAM Act: A Report to Congress Prepared and presented by Matthew Bishop, Ph.D. 12/20/2005

I would be happy to give you the URL for this info if you need it. ALL of the SPAM that I sent was fully in compliance with the Act's guidelines... therefore, I have no fear of any fines or actions. Nerz was right on with his answer... it works and that is why people keep using it!
I have contacted my Senator and Representatives to hopefully have some laws changed so the ISPs can't simply shut you down when sending email that is in compliance with the Act. Let me know if you want a copy of the letter I sent.

6.) My results from Banner Ads was right in line with the two (2) surveys reported on by USA Today. This gives added merit to my assumption that Banner Ads are a very large waste of money... but that is what every site wants you to spend your money on... Conclusion = Don't fall for it!
7.) I thought I might get some heated replys here and am pleasantly surprised at the very honest and upbeat attitudes of all that posted. Thank you, and I will work to improve my opening page.
Last thought... I only presented this info for many of the Junior Webmasters because I read a lot of advice from others that never back anything up with facts. I thought presenting some actual results may save someone time and money.
I am not saying that results would be typical of every site.... just to mine... let them serve as a caution when you make a decision on what to pursue.
Jenn said it best... research the system thoroughly before jumping in... I used the Classified sites because they were "Free" and I had nothing to lose.
Lastly, I have posted this information on (4) webmaster forums.... DP has the best group of members and response of all the forums!

 

Just keep in mind that "free" rarely actually means free. It might not cost you anything out of pocket, but your time is often more valuable than people give it credit for. If a client will pay you X number of dollars per hour for what you do, then that's how much it's costing you for every hour you spend on "free" promotional tactics that don't work.

Research, research, research! Put a solid 10 hours or so into doing nothing but researching your competitors and how they're successfully driving traffic to their sites in the same niche (doesn't have to be "ten"; just giving an example). By finding out what works in your niche and for the target market you're trying to reach, you'll save yourself enormously more time, and get faster results by only focusing on proven methods. Good and solid marketing isn't about having to come up with completely new ideas to promote something... it's about finding what already works and using it in a creative or new way.

Jenn

 

The title of this thread should be "What Didn't Work for Me"

 

OutBackPro3 :

Thanks for sharing your mktg info-
Dunno why anyone would slam you- you are simply sharing marketing info for free..any marketer who is interested in building traffic/income et al should be thankful for people like you who share experiences.

I think alot of the people that read your initial post are surprised your ppc didnt work...and alot of them dont WANT to believe that spam/emailing works (still).

Keep testing...there are yet more ways to market..