I have been pondering the idea of creating a niche site targeted to a geographic region (the Tampa Bay Area in Florida). This site would be loaded with content specific to this niche, hopefully have an active forum base, etc. I was wondering if anyone has had success using AdSense on such a site, and if they could provide any hints, tips, etc. I plan on integrating AdSense with the forums (as seen here on DP, maybe a little different), event calendars, member profiles, etc. Any comments would be very appreciated.
I think you would do better with a specific niche within the location. Like a community for people who like eating out at different restaurants, car enthusiasts, etc.
Thats exactly what it is. It's a specific market of people that all enjoy a certain thing that is in the local market. You think I'd do well with this type of site? I can't get passed the feeling that there won't be many ads that will match my sites's content, and the ones that do will most likely not be very high paying. What are you thoughts?
In our area there is a site that does pretty well: www.dcpages.com ... so if you mean something like that then I think it's possible. They've been around forever and I know it has taken a TON of energy. But, the end result can be rewarding.
http://www.google.com/search?source...GGLD,GGLD:2005-19,GGLD:en&q=tampa+bay+florida I like this one http://www.tampaguide.com/ Have you got the time and skills to make something like this?Give it a try if you think you can do it. But remember if you make a site for a targeted community ..your visitor base gets restricted to the locals and potential tourists. Maybe you can contact people who have similar sites as a potential advertiser.. one or two may give you a hint about the traffic they get
Easiest way to check if anybody is bidding for your keywords is to do a search on google. Searching for "Tampa Bay " yields only 4-5 sponsered ads. Most probably they are all low paying ads. It is not neccesary that you will have all pages dedicated to "Tampa Bay". How high paying the ads are will depend on individual pages too. Try overture's bid tool. It will also give you a rough idea of what to expect from different keywords. http://uv.bidtool.overture.com/d/search/tools/bidtool/
I'm not very fond of that site, but it is actually not like what I was going for. Not only would the site I have in mind be dedicated to the local geographic area, it would also be specific to a group of people that enjoy a certain aspect of the local geographic area. If you PM me I'll provide more details. Just do not want anything posted publicly in case I decide to move forward. Would you mind PMing me the URL? Good point. PM me and I'll share my idea with you and hopefully get a better opinion.
i just started building a VERY LOCAL business and community directory at > http://www.sackville.biz it's based on my community of around 45,000 people g seems to always have relevant ads to feed EACH PAGE note: site is BRAND NEW and building up every day i don't have any stats to report yet however, to answer your original question... i say YES, mainly because of the "endless" offline opps. to advertise and build traffic in your own community, combined with all the online opps. i agree with henny too - that's my next challenge we should "chat" again in a few months to see if we were "right." cheers and good luck,
I'd be curious to hear your where you are advertising offline and how it is working for you, and also interested in your sites stats as you continue to advertise. Have you considered adding a forum?
in a weekly "mini-community newspaper" - cheap and i am going to have them do a "write up / profile" on me /site. there is another mini-publication in town with trivia, facts, figures and fun stuff... cheap ad space. might put my URL on a new van/car i'm looking into buying soon. i'm always around town, so a lot of local people will see my car/ad. HOWEVER > i think my greatest success will come from my "category sponsor" on EVERY CATEGORY PAGE - top right area. It should not be difficult at all to find ONE sponsor per category! Right now, the sponsors are there FREE / as fillers until i'm ready to promote the site. let's say you have 50 pages/sponsors @ $100 per year per sponsor + adsense... it starts to add up, plus you've built an excellent, long term, targeted site, valuable site mike
I myself have just opened a local community site.This has news,information,forums and a whole lot of other stuff.The population of my town is about 300,000.I am hoping that the site content will be built up by the members themselves via the forums and news postings. I have a free classified section but charging £1/week per ad in the future wouldn't seem too steep.I also have a business directory in place ready to open but need more traffic first.As you say "it all builds up". The thing I like about localised sites is the ad ops.I have just finished printing postcard ads which I intend to put in shops,workplaces and anywhere else I can pin them up!I am also looking for someone to print some car stickers (the inside the rear window type) which I can give away to my members and some larger ones for my,and my family's car doors.The local paper too will be getting a couple of ads. I say go for it!You're never going to get very rich but a comfortable income is not beyond the bounds of possibility IMHO. As for Googleads my site has been turned down 3 times.......but I'm still trying.
that reminds me http://www.vistaprint.com <<<< awesome business cards, postcards etc... CHEAP!!! NICE QUALITY!!! i have business cards & fridge magnets for sackville.biz too all from vistaprint.com mike
I've heard about a guy who does the local scene sort of site, but also has a daily news blog for around his town.. and it does really well-- I'll try to find his link again.
My niche is a local site, and it does fairly well. When I first started it, there wasn't as many local advertisers on it, but the site has created an adsense market.