I am planning to finally start advertising on my new project www.InterestingFacts.org I am not going to cramp my visitors with million ugly Google ads. I want them to still feel relaxed while reading the facts. I am thinking of ads by impressions or maybe some kind of affiliate promotions or payments on monthly basis. I am not completely sure so please help me decide best advertising option or advertising company that suits my needs. Large majority of my visitors are from United States. Site is constantly growing and new facts are added regularly. Thank You!
I guess you'll just have to experiment with different options and see which works the best for this type of website. You can look at what are your competitors doing and you can try using their model... BTW, I really like your website, I just couldn't stop myself from reading different articles. Good luck
1. Go to your competitors sites, and hit up their advertisers. 2. Type in the keywords that match the kind of advertisers you would like, and contact the advertisers using Adwords. To sweeten the deal, tell them that you will give them twice as much space, and thumbnail pic.
Uhm, do you actually have quality control on your website? That "Fact" about eating appricots to prevent cancer sounds mighty fishy to me (something at the back of my head links it to creationist propaganda, meaning it's actually a dangerous thing to do). Don't get me wrong, I like the idea, but if such things are in the database, your whole site looses trustworthiness.
Yes, I need to do something about that particular fact. Lots people are complaining about it. I did research about it and it seemed that lots of doctors support this theory. However I will change it from "cure" to "prevent". I am still thinking not to even advertise yet. My competitors have horrible ads. Usually Smiley Central or shaking banners...horrible. I need to find the perfect solution for my visitors and good looking banners too. Thanks everyone!
Even, though it is semi off-topic (but I have a bone to pick with creationists): I did some research about it. It appears to me, that Kent Hovind populized that "fact". He is a creationist and not ashamed to peddle whatever missinformation he can to a gullable audience for a quick buck. For him, pretty much anything goes, as long as he can give a lecture about it. Since he also offers his material free of copyright (but sends DMCA take down notices, if used against him), it's literally shit hitting the fan, when it comes to spreading missinformation. This apricot thing was something about, that before the original sin, everyone was a vegetarian (don't even ask, it is completely ridiculous) and apricot seeds are a natural cancer prophylaxis, which is why they lived so long back then. The thing, "Dr." Hovind forget to mention in his cancer prevention tips is, that besides the ever so healthy B17, apricot kernels also contain cyanide (which is the reason, why they taste that bitter). So, someone being extremely afraid of dying from cancer might find an even sooner death by poisoning himself, after eating a good portion of those kernels (see wikipedia for "Apricot_kernel"). The problem of course is, that creationists foster their stories. It's a big word of mouth thing, where everything one "creditable" source said is absorbed without questioning and relayed further without naming sources. If anyone with a science degree tells a creationist, that, where and why they are wrong, it is immediatly seen as an attack on religion by evil atheists and therefore as a proof, that the story must be true. Hence it is voiced even stronger. The result is, what you saw: A lot of support for a "fact", that is actually fiction. And (to get back to topic) this is a core problem of your project: If you list urban myths (and even dangerous ones!), your credibility goes down the gutters. After I read that "fact" about apricot kernels, my reaction was: "If that can make it to the front page, how trustworthy can the rest of the database be?" Afterwards the browserwindow went shut and I had no intent to ever visit again. You might want to ask yourelf two things: a) Only one in typically thousands gives feedback to a site. How many customers have you been loosing silently? b) If your only response to QA issues is to manually tweak the wording after getting lots of complaints, do you really think, you can build a reputation, that will drive (targetted) traffic?
heh I hear ya, but did I say to contact the advertisers of those hidious things? Keep looking. There are some nice-looking, or reasonably nice-looking ads out there. And don't forget about the advertisers using Adwords, Yahoo, MSN....
@blackonyx I am still not convinced of either of two claims. I will definitely have to find someone that actually used B17 or certain doctor who did extensive research based on the topic. I marked the fact as debatable for fact or fiction. I am currently finishing 2 projects and as soon as I am done I will make this Interesting Facts site much better when it comes to proving facts as fiction or fact (and many other useful tools). Someone posted very useful comment at the bottom of the B17 page: http://www.interestingfacts.org/index.php?page=fact&id=321
Well, that is a very curious and also pointless statement, someone posted in that comment (actually, it reads a bit as if quoted from Kent Hovind). Here's the ticker: If you have cancer, then you also have Beta-Glucosidase enzymes. While you might not poison yourself eating apricot kernels for prevention, you will, if you use it as a cure (and we all know, what irrational things people do out of fear). We could now also ask about benign growth releasing the enzyme, but I think that goes way to far off topic. The point is and was quality control. I think before going gold with your site, you should have a look at how wikipedia addresses the issue. They have exactly the same problem as you and already developed methods to deal with it.
Ahh Wikipedia is not valuable source for many topics. In my university it was never allowed to cite Wikipedia in our essays. What is the good source today for these loose topics? Who to trust? I do intend to turn Interesting Facts site into something similar to Wikipedia where people will have option to edit existing facts. In any case thank you blackonyx for helping me help my own conscious. I guess in the future I have to avoid touchy topics like this one, but they do bring the good traffic (an probably lose some).
Yes, for the same reason and problem you are facing . It's all about quality control and with wikipedia articles it is hard to hold anyone accountable. They loose you more in the long run. If it turns out, that your facts are actually factoids, you loose credibility. In order to build trust in your site, you need to cite sources for every fact.
I think facts besides maybe one or two are completely positively 100% true. We marked facts that are questionable. All other facts are proven to be correct. I mean it is not that hard to find if the fact is false.