Summer is just around the corner which means that we are moving into that time of the year when surfers will spend less time in front of their computers. Traffic will probably thin out a bit which will force us to work our traffic harder and harder in order to make a sale.
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"Traffic is just too hard to come by to waste it on a one shot deal when it is easy to show each surfer alternatives..." |
What am I waffling about? How can we work our traffic harder? We get a surfer to our site, we show him some advertising and he either goes to our sponsor or he leaves; right?
Well . yes that's right if all you want to have is just one shot at selling that surfer something. Who says that we are only allowed one shot at each surfer?
If you were to walk into your local computer store and tell the salesman that you want to buy a desktop machine, is he going to show you just one computer? With rows and rows of computers sitting there on display will he just show you one? If you don't take it, will the salesman let you leave without showing you something else?
Of course not! Same goes for a surfer that comes to our site. Unfortunately, most webmasters display their sponsor's site on their free site or gallery and if the surfer doesn't take it then they boot them out the door without a second thought.
What if the surfer actually does click over to your sponsor but when he gets there he decides that the site is not for him? That happens all the time - surfers get interested in a paysite from the sales hype that we put on our sites but when they get there they find that it isn't quite what they wanted. Unless you're working with a sponsor who will return your surfer to you - and there are a few - you have lost that surfer and wasted your efforts.
Traffic is just too hard to come by to waste it on a one shot deal when it is easy to show each surfer alternatives that he may find more appealing. I'm certainly not talking about giving a surfer more free porn although sometimes a little extra bait does not go astray. What I am talking about is marketing other sites to your surfer if he does not find your original sponsor attractive to the point of whipping out his credit card.
To explain that, let's go back to the analogy of the computer salesman. Even if you are savvy enough to go into the store with a set list of requirements for your computer he will show you the most expensive machine that fits your list because that will give him the greatest return. However, if you don't take the bait he will show you some alternatives that may or may not be cheaper and he will continue showing you alternatives until he is sure that he can't sell you anything.
That's exactly the way it should be with our free sites and galleries. The surfer comes to us looking for porn in some niche and we show him some advertising. It is almost impossible to show him everything about the sponsor's site on that one free site or gallery but we do encourage him to "Click Here" to see it all.
At that point, some webmasters lose their surfer because the "Click Here" link will take the surfer straight to the sponsor's site. The smart salesman might want to try another option for the "Click Here" link. Instead of sending the surfer directly to the sponsor he sends them to a quick loading full page ad for the sponsor.
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It is on that page that the surfer is informed of all the perks that he will find at the sponsor's site. You can even mention the price point just to ensure that the surfer is aware that it requires money to get in. It's a bit like the computer salesman telling you of all the features that are included in the computer he is recommending.
Now by doing that you have just pre-qualified the surfer and you are far more likely to make a sale if the surfer decides to click over to the full tour. At the same time, you are left with surfers who have decided that they don't want to go on to that sponsor. You are now in the same position as the computer salesman that would be showing you alternative machines.
How can we offer alternatives to our surfer?
A simple unobtrusive series of text links is all it takes. Personally, at the bottom of my full page ad I place five text links. I place four in a single row table - each cell consists of the text link and a very short description, nothing more than one or two lines, of what they will find on each respective site. Three of those links go to full page ads in the same niche as my original site. Those full page ads point to different sponsors and their sites in the same niche.
The fourth text link will go to a different niche but one that is often associated with the sort of niche that they have just come from. For example if my original site had been promoting a mature sponsor then three of those text links in the table would point to other mature sponsors while the fourth might point to a BBW or a Busty Niche site because those are often associated with the mature niche.
Let's use the computer salesman analogy again. You might have gone into the shop thinking that a desktop computer is probably what you need but a notebook just might give you some flexibility. So if the salesman sees that he is not going to sell you a desktop then he may suggest the notebook and end up making a sale. The surfer may be big on mature sites but also has an interest in one of the associated niches and for whatever reason, it might be that site that attracts him at that very moment.
All that accounts for four of the links but what about the fifth?
Well that is the very common "no thanks I want to see something different" type link and I sit it below the table and link it to another full page ad for a different sponsor within the same niche. If you think about it for a moment you will realise that I (and many others) have set up a rotation of niche specific full page ads that the surfer will find himself locked into because I don't want to let him go without making a sale.
Of course there comes a point where I know I'm not going to make a sale and decide it would be best to send the surfer on his way - off to a top list in exchange for fresh traffic.