Hi All, I think I need some help. I have a file sharing site for a few years already. It's consistently on the first page in Google, and it receives decent traffic. Really good traffic. The problem is that I just don't know how to make money on a service like that. All my competitors make decent dough on similar sites and services, however they invested into heavy development. I have a permanent job which supports me well, and I just don't have too much free time right now for this site. The whole thing works just fine, it handles its traffic relatively well, and I hate changing anything that really works. I know there is a lot of people on this forum who make thousands of dollars a month or even a week (!) on simple file download services. So... I just need some friendly advice or may be some critics - what should I do? Currently, my choices are - - close the service altogether, since the hosting drains money out of my pocket, - sell it for some money, or maybe - change it to a profitable business with some minimal efforts. I would prefer the 3rd choice, but what is considered a minimal effort in this case? Is the service really worth investing in it at all?? I don't mind sharing income if you have working ideas that can fetch some money into this. Heck, I don't even mind to get a partner on this. Or should I sell it? Thanks for all your suggestions! I don't want to put the URL in the open text here, just don't want another irrelevant link - so take a look and let me know what you guys think... http://noad.us/f (Please don't send me any SEO offers - I don't need more traffic until I learn how to use what I already have.)
No, really. I think I got most of the hard work done. I just need to find out how to turn traffic into some cash :\
have you tried a PPC network? All the other file sharing sites usually monetize their websites this way. Also it's very minimal effort on you behalf. Try google adsense. If all works out in your favour a link exchange would be nice cheers
vbrocks - profit into cash - why not use adwords - its free money ... monetize youre keywords and target them with html pages off domain .... be savvy and the spiders will crawl youre site..... otherwise - they have no reason to - show youre stuff - the pr thing is damm myth ......
Adsense is the way to go if you have the traffic, good trick is to put ads where people might accidentally click. I use to run a photography site where I had the banner right up against the side. People would click that thing by mistake all the time. Also good to note if you using adwords that people do this purposely lol
I agree that adsense would be the easiest way right now. That would hopefully cover your costs of the site, unless your site is so full of useful content they have no need to click on the ads. Give it a month or two and see if people are clicking. If they are, you could watch and see what kind of ads are showing up, find a similar affiliate product to promote from any number of sites like CJ, Shareasale, Clickbank, the list goes on and on, and make a bit more money from each click. List building? More time, more effort...
@OP Some numbers and data would be nice . It's one thing to monetize on 100k views from Africa , India or S-E Asia it's a different thing to monetize on traffic from US , EU , Japan or a tiger like South Korea .
The traffic comes mostly from US, AU, CA, and Indonesia. A few gigs a day of file uploads.... Just checked - about 5Gb yesterday, 6Gb Friday. About 2x downloads in average. Not too many unique pageviews though. Thanks to all for the Adsense suggestion - I think I can try that. Let's hope Google search won't kick me out from where I am right now...
Why you are not monetizing your site with PPC advertising & survey company advertising. There are so many company waiting to advertise your site if site is rank well. Give a try. Otherwise you can sell this site at flippa & start a new profitable business.
I would certainly recommend you to use Epom Market. From my personal experience with it, I can say that it works more,than well for monetizing my Japanese traffic at the site (I have around 1M page views). In fact, I manage to generally earn about 0.3 – 0.5 on display ads. Anyway, hopefully, my advice helps
Hi vbrocks, I have some ideas that I would implement. You can sell advertising space, or create a PPC platform. Otherwise, you can sell on Flippa. If you present yourself well, you can supply several thousand dollars for that traffic. Also see the site would have to think to some other idea. But I think it would be best to sell advertising or use certain CPA offers. Greetings
I would argue that all CPA offers are worth taking. What's the pricing on Flippa, btw? It's just too vague to state that "presenting yourself well" should promise you high payoffs. I'd still offer you to check Epom Market, at least they are transparent in what is paid for what
I have been using Adsense on my forum since the beginning of December. The Dec11 and Jan12 revenues were what I would consider great. However, in Feb12 the Adsense revenue is way down. I will be overjoyed if I manage to get 1/4 of the Jan12 revenue. I will be looking for different ways to monetize, or perhaps sell the site as I really don't have the time to spend hours and hours to look for sponsors/advertisers. I think Adsense is great, but I also think that it can and will eventually wear off if your target audience doesn't change all that much (as is the case for many forums).
It's good to vary your monetizing methods, that is work with some other international ad networks. I'm accustomed to Epom Market, and the results are pretty satisfactory, so this is the option I'd advice you to try out
I would just choose a network like someone mentioned, with the whole survey thing. Another tip, just go to another well known video website, and see how they are making money.
You're not the first one who's not fully satisfied with adsense... try some international network. As being said, Epom market could be nice option, along with Neverblue.
If you feel that your website has a strong niche, the best place you'd get lots of revenue is buysellads.com. Try it, and share your reviews here.
I would try Adsense and get some money coming in from that if you have really good traffic. Then down the road when it's bringing in quite a bit of money, you could decide to sell it at that point and make quite a profit off of it.