I have a software related website that has earned me $200. I would like some advice about how I should invest that money back into online advertising. Please let me know what has worked best for you.
How are you making your sales? Is it your product(s) or are you promoting affiliate progs? Most common/effective: *PPC *Article writing/submissions *SEO work *JV deals *Duplicate your site with a similar one/link them *Create/get an affiliate program attached to it *Get an aWeber account to keep in touch/follow up/aggregate data=money. $200 isn't much but it's enough to either try to flip quick with ppc or invest in tools/long term campaigns on a small-mid level. Best of luck. NC.
Thanks NCMedia. The product is mine and my sales have come from organic SEO. Would you say that PPC is the best idea right now?
Don't spend a big chunk of it in one place. Try it in little bits and pieces to see what works, I learned that the difficult way. Shop around for cpc rates, look beyond adwords at other startups. Advertise for free until you drop, such as writing articles, reviews, helping others etc.
I agree with the advice that you should not put it all in one place. PPC works but you really need to know what you are doing. $200 can get eaten up very, very quickly. You have to really pay attention to what does work and what does not work or else your next $200 will go just as fast. Good luck.
I suggest learning how to build links naturally. Once you can do that you can be successful for years.
I would say PPC is your best bet, but since you are getting organic search results you may be able to boost your PR a bit by getting bloggers at reviewme.com to write a review of your site (giving you a permenant link). I only do this a little bit but it does seem to give me that extra edge in the SERPs. For $30 you can usually find bloggers with a PR4. Two or three of these links could potentially bump you up a few notches when people search for your keywords.
What i suggest is first of all invest this 200$ in PPC set up an adword campaign then test and track these ads and come up with a conversion rate of your product. Get this data and take it to potential JV partners and then crack JV deals with them. This is the best way to promote your product free of cost i mean it does cost you but thats out of profits so doesnt make difference(when you give 50% to JV) this way you can make a lot of sales...
Keep doing what you are already doing, building up your savings along the way. Repeat, build. Repeat, build, Repeat, build... Once you have enough built up, concentrate on the more expensive ads that reach far more people. Then repeat and build again. More.... http://www.thelist.fm/marketing-advertising.shtml