It has now been a month since I purchased a Text Link Ads from 2 websites, for testing purposes. To me I do not think it was worth the purchase. I only purchased 2 TLA from pretty favorable websites. I wanted to see for the month of September if anything increased, RSS, Loyal Readers, Income, etc. To my surprise nothing, I have gained some income maybe a little growth in RSS but nothing substantial.
So here are some stats below, a screenshot of a months worth data by Google Analytics. This should be a good read for others wanting to buy or purchase blog real estate.
I know I am writing this and I am contradicting myself here, since I am selling some of my blog space for text link ads spots. Popular blogs make income that way and I will want to proceed in doing the same. But my results may differ from others and if so let me know. I know mine was not that great, I received more traffic from search engines and other blogs that linked to me than a direct purchase link.
The two websites I decided to gather text link ads from are CarlOcab.com and GatherSuccess.com. Carlocab is a blog I read via RSS and GatherSuccess was my first time visiting and reading the blog. With GatherSuccess I read some good articles about the website, the stats via TLA, and Alvin came out with his own product. To my thinking I thought this guy must be a great marketer. Both these sites were not the high traffic sources that I thought they would be, but they appeared in my top 20 atleast (Carlocab at 10 and GatherSuccess at 20).
So I bought the TLA from these websites, it is my first time purchasing space and I wanted to see how effective it really is. Here are the first things I checked on both websites before purchasing:
- Text Link Ads Space Location - is it viewable on page load and posts
- Alexa Rankings
- Google and Technorati Ranks
- Comments on Posts - how active is his blog
These were the first things I looked for before attempting to purchase a TLA spot. Here the breakdown as to why.
Text Link Ads Space Location
Location is very important for a blog, especially ad space location. I wanted to make sure my link was viewable with out me having to scroll at all. It should be the first thing on the page on load. I did not want it to be in a grey area as well that it will be overlooked. The reason why bloggers put ad space near the very top, its easily exposed and viewable.
If I thought the space area was in a poor location I went on to another blog and did my mini review. If there were too many links within an ad spot I also left. There is no point in mixing in with a blog that has 10 test links in their ad spot, my link will just look like trash.
Alexa Rankings
I understand you should not base a website by Alexa rankings because not everyone has it installed, it should be a default download for IE and FireFox. But in any case, a lot of bloggers have it so that means a lot of readers have it and recommend it for their readers. To me Alexa rankings is good to a blogger because it targets other internet marketer or niche builders. A majority of Alexa owners are probably newbies and want to find new ways to earn money.
When I first started to purchase TLA from the above sites, my Alexa ranking was around 124000+, it is currently at 94000+. It may be TLA or it may not but I know it can not since the stats I received were pretty poor. I wanted to target blogs that were in the 35-45000+ rank. I did this for a reason, I wanted to first test TLA and I wanted to progressively increase to high ranks once I have an attention of others.
Attacking a high rank I think in my mind is not that optimistic, especially for a no name brand blog. I simply wanted to climb to the top slowly, even though I want rapid growth I feel slow and accurate wins the race.
Google and Technorati Ranks
Google Page Rank and Techonrati ranks are very similar. The ranks are base on the amount of pages that link back to you. Technorati are base on blogs and Google PR are base on the overall world wide web. Currently I am at PR 2 and I do not think I should care about my ranking any more since there has been no Google Page Rank update in months! In any case I paid more attention to the Technorati rankings, how many other blogs link to this (TLA site I am going to purchase space) particular blog? If there is a good amount then I would want to see there sites, I randomly chose about 5 and see their sites stats.
Stats are important when deciding what you want to do with your money. I bought 2 ads space where I thought I would get a good conversion. I did make a good amount with some affiliates like ClickBank and 7DollarOffers, but I wanted a steady stream of traffic more so. Also again I am not sure if those came from the traffic of the text link ads.
Comments on Posts
Is a blog interactive. Comments on a blog shows returning users and interest in a post. Is your posts interesting enough for others to comment on it. Comments are usually done by new users or returning visitors, I looked for returning visitors. They maybe interested in a new website and might want to comment on them as well.
