Hi all, I need some serious help, Well let me give you guys a little background information (hope I’m not boring anybody) Two month ago I started a video sharing webpage primarily around combat and military clips. I was always sure that things would pick up fairly soon and I was right, in a month time I had the first users move in and I could see a small community buildup. My initial plan was always to keep the page on semi dedicated server as long as possible, I wanted a slow but steady increase in numbers, but things didn’t work out that way. A couple of day ago I was in lucky by attracting a member who since then has uploaded a lot of very unique and until then unseen movies, obviously they spread around the internet And the page became so busy that I my hoster contacted me asking what was going on and that I will have to move to a dedicated server. The strange as this may sound I was hoping for the numbers to return to normal but I have now constant high number of users and had to finally bite the bullet and rented a dedicated server. This obviously blew my budget completely, the server cost $295 so that’s quite a step up from my initial $80 a month. So I am more or less forced to look into monetizing the page and this is where you guys come in. I need some serious help guys, I have been around the webmaster scene for quite some time but never ever seriously looked into the possibility of having to finanze the page over Web income, don’t get me wrong I be more than able to pay for the page myself, but my wife will simply cruzify me upside down. So please help me out, have a look at the page and tell me what I can do to generate $295 a month. You guys think it would be a good idea to contact possible companies to agree on a banner spot for a fixed price a month? Domain is: www.apacheclips.com Stats are as follows: Google stats: Numbers are not around 1500-2000 absolute unique visitors, Around: 10.000 + page views a day • Referring Sites (67.05%) • Direct Traffic (27.56%) • Search Engines (5.39%)
Well right now, it looks like it can only go up, since you don't have any ads there at all. One of the problems is that once you install Google Adsense (right now the highest paying PPC model), probably most of the ads are going to be relevant to the military...and you're not going to make a whole lot. And of course the PPA networks probably won't do much good either, since most people will just want to go there and watch free videos. I think your best bet right now, would be to go and try to find a sponsor. You could try LOCAL businesses, but I would think you'd have more luck with national companies, since it has a national audience. But then you could always look for a local businessman who sells online and is able to take on national orders. Perhaps an outdoor sporting goods store or even a gun shop. Another way would be to look for an actual charity to sponsor you. It would be kind of wierd, asking for money from a charity, but hey...they have to do SOMETHING with all the money they get. OR--you could start your OWN sporting goods store and REALLY monetize the traffic. That would be difficult, and you'd have a LOT of work on your hands, but let me tell you: advertising a sporting goods site is NOT cheap. So you'll be one step ahead of everyone else since you already have a good audience, and that audience probably already consists of sports enthusiasts. Hope this helps.
i think you need to do more SEO to increase search engine traffic, then you can think about using adsense, well it doesn't hurt to try now, put one or two text links and see what happens. You can also look for pay per 1k impression ads, not that they pay alot but they still help with your increasing UV and PVs. Also look for affiliates that sell military related stuff like ....vintage clothing, dog tags etc.
I'm a little curious on where the traffic is coming in from the referring sites? Anyways, I think I replied to another post like yours but you could sign up for a CPM company that pays you for impressions. That way you can fully take advantage of the traffic you're getting, especially since you're getting thousands of impressions each day. Of course, like Project suggested, if you can increase your search engine traffic then you could make more money because that's the key to converting.
Since there is some traffic there.. you should try some affiliate programs, choose related programs such as video and mp3 download sites, you should be better off than placing adsense..
Thank you all for you input so far I have worked hard today to get an acceptable email template ready. I will use this to write to mostly military outlet stores and gunshops/airsoft shops. Just for laughs and giggles i will write the US army to see what I get back Anyways I will keep you guys updated I think this is something were many could learn from (noobs like me )