Hi guys, following on from my last post (if its time to advertise) I'm a bit stumped on how much to put into my site. From my last post, submitting to directories didn’t sound like it would have much effect on generating traffic – I think I’ll still submit to all of them over pr4 I’m also planning on article submission. But I want to get my site rolling quickly – so after spending all the damn time working on it, I’m willing to invest cash. My click don’t earn very much, always below the 0.60 usually below the 0.10 But im hoping those prices will either go up – or I’ll get enough traffic to make them pay. (has anyone ever made $100 a month from a low paying site like mine?) Anyways, judging from the low click prices, what would be the best way to invest some money and how much? I only have adsense, and just read on here, that maybe using Adwords to make money with adsense isn’t the best idea. Any suggestions on how to spend / how much to spend --- and if it will make any difference to uniques would be great. Is there anywhere you can actually pay to have someone look at your site and have them tell you what to do, where to spend and everything? Sorry for the long post. Regards.
"Hi guys, following on from my last post (if its time to advertise)" Hi. "I'm a bit stumped on how much to put into my site." Many are. Its usually a simple economics problem though, so look at numbers. "From my last post, submitting to directories didn’t sound like it would have much effect on generating traffic – I think I’ll still submit to all of them over pr4" In general, directories do not produce much traffic. I own 3 directories: one paid and two recip. The paid directory has generated 72 visitors in the last 4 months for my most clicked listing. The reciprocal directories have only produced 3 visitors for my most clicked listing in the same time period. While not scientific, these results do show a general trend. "I’m also planning on article submission." Article submission is good and quick at generating traffic if you distribute it widely enough. "But I want to get my site rolling quickly – so after spending all the damn time working on it, I’m willing to invest cash." Bold step and bravo for you! Very few site owners put their money where their mouth is so to speak. "My click don’t earn very much, always below the 0.60 usually below the 0.10 But im hoping those prices will either go up – or I’ll get enough traffic to make them pay. (has anyone ever made $100 a month from a low paying site like mine?)" Ok, finally we have some numbers to work with. If you get $.10 per click on average, and you have a click through percentage of 4%, you earn about 4/10ths of a penny from each visitor on average. If your advertising campaign costs $10 per day and brings in an extra 2000 visitors per day, you're losing money because you're only making an extra $8 a day from the additional visitors. However, you should expect your click through percentage (for the ads on your site) to drop due to click fraud and other bogus clicks if you use a PPC advertising campaign. "Anyways, judging from the low click prices, what would be the best way to invest some money and how much?" To start with, invest what ever you can afford to lose. Pay attention to how much you spend and how much return you get. If you have some coding skills, add a tracking code to each ad's link (e.g example.com/ad=adsense03312006) and write a script to tabulate the number of times you get a visitor from each campaign. Then you can see if the campaign is paying off. If it isn't, cancel it. "I only have adsense, and just read on here, that maybe using Adwords to make money with adsense isn’t the best idea." Typically, no. "Any suggestions on how to spend / how much to spend --- and if it will make any difference to uniques would be great." I would advise buying a banner placement on sites/forums that are specific to your niche. "Is there anywhere you can actually pay to have someone look at your site and have them tell you what to do, where to spend and everything?" Yes, SEO companies and Marketing companies would love your business, but if you're only dealing with adsense ads, it will likely not be worth your money to hire an outside firm. You can probably find some forum memebers to do it cheaper, but then again, you can simply post about your site in the forums, and you'll probably get 10 opinions. "Sorry for the long post." Sorry for the long reply!
IMO you should break even or willing to loose some money for the first couple of months. Remember, it takes money to make money. If you keep worring about how much to spend and keep trying to do everything yourself, it'll take long before you get far. If you KNOW your idea works then don't be afraid to spend some money, take a loss but in the long run you'll be better off. Not to say that you should spend it wildly, use common sense.
Yeh my games site makes $300 (as well as another $400 for selling games) with CPCs of about 0.05 - 0.30. But I guess I have more traffic. What sort of CTR you getting? After reading the advice on these forums I got mine up from 0.5% to 7% in a matter of days. I think you should probably do what I've done, and start on some other small websites in areas where the click payout is > $1, where there is also a lot of traffic and not too much competition. As for how to spend your money I would go for paid ads but make sure you track your ROI (return on investment) with some tracking script and drop ads on sites that don't do well for you. Making a small loss isn't too bad as it will still be good for future growth.
I have very different eCPMs. I got some niche sites that gets 120$ ECPM and some sites that has only 2-3$ ecpm. as well as everything in between.
I am in the travel business. I spend over $xxxx per month and the return is $xxxxx. It is not from Adsense but from our products. Finding the right keywords is the most important thing in my openion. You must do it before you even think of paying.
One of my niche sites (with adsense) averages $120/mth - and it's keywords are only about $0.15 - $0.35 a click, or less. Ad placement has a lot to do with it. So does traffic - obviously... -Chris
Most of my clicks are worth .10 or less (over 90%) and we make about 300$ at the moment. We have quite some traffic though I am going to start selling advertising directly after we made our relaunch of our new version. HipHop is a low paying niche when it comes to adsense and because we offer audio files and not much content it is even lower. And before anyone says anything about the ToS .... a) we are 100% legal and b) I personaly contacted google and got it approved About the spending part: We only pay our dedicated server and all the domains we own. So not much per month at the moment. But we are going to print flyers soon for a big hiphop event which will cost about 100$ for 5000 StarBuG