I meant to reply here the other day but I got busy and thought I posted this already.
Hi again Emma - Thanks for confirming what I was seeing at some traffic broker sites. They say they want to know the page where they're sending the traffic, and they want that page to meet certain criteria. I'm guessing that the better the traffic, the tighter they may want to control things...but that's only a guess at this point.
Hiya LB - Thanks for joining in on this thread.
You mentioned some very good points in your post. We've bought banners and links at times, and have used cpm and cpc programs. We've been offered traffic from brokers many, many times. One of the reasons I started this thread is that I believe there is a difference, in general, between the folks who actively try to sell traffic to you and those you need to search out to find at all.
There definitely are more sources for traffic, sources that haven't been mentioned specifically in this thread, and I appreciate all the information that's been passed to me privately since I opened this thread. There are some folks out there I might think of trying to ply with drinks, hookers, or whatever else it took to learn what they knew about these things. But my guess is they'd save the best information for those they called 'friend' anyway.
That said, I'm interested in the mechanics of making a profit on purchased traffic after you're done filtering it. I understand that make be something you won't want to post to the world, but if you're willing to say anything privately, please let me know. I'm really not adverse to the liquor and broads approach if that works for you.
I think the same way as you do about general brokered traffic, which is why we've always said no when brokers have approached us (or worse, spammed us) with "great" black box traffic. The kind of purchased traffic that really interests me at this point is the type you mentioned, where you can actually know the exact site sending the traffic (and the link generating the click).
I'm not sure if we'll do this in a big way, but even if we do, we'll most likely grow into it slowly. I'd like to know more about using purchased traffic, and I don't mind buying some to learn more than I can learn just talking about it. If what I learn can be used to manage a system that creates 'free' bookmarkers for new projects, while running at or near breakeven, I'd be happy with that.
Excellent advise on running the numbers on what you expect. Another reason for this thread is to get feedback on what reasonable expectations we might want to use for projections before we test anything. From what I've read here (and been told) so far, running at or near breakeven would be doing pretty damn good.
Thanks again for the input you posted, LB, most appreciated.
One thing about this thread is noticeable by its absence. I understand why those who don't have enough "good" traffic now for their existing clients wouldn't have any need to post here. But anyone else find it strange that no traffic brokers/sellers have stopped by to talk with us about any of this?
Oh well, their loss if they don't want to.
I think this has been a great thread so far, and I want to say thanks again to everyone who's taken time to offer their opinions. I'm still looking to learn more, so I'd be glad to hear more from anyone willing to keep it going.