Using Un-Targeted Traffic

It has been a topic of some debate over the years – what value can be put on untargeted traffic? These are often the ‘left over’ visitors from other peoples’ campaigns, which will include exit page pop-ups and so forth, banner exchanges etc.

Companies acquire these via a number of different channels, sometimes for free, sometimes as part of other schemes that they themselves run, and sell them on in batches to other web masters.

Arguably, in themselves, these web page views are practically worthless. The visitor did not ask to be there, probably has little or no interest in what the site is attempting to sell to them, and will be irritated enough by the presence of a pop-under window that they will simply close it as soon as it appears.

We can try to ensure that we attract as much interest as possible by making the title enticing, and the content attention-catching, but at the end of the day, most visitors will spend less that 5 seconds on the page.

Thus, the retail value of these page views is very, very low. Of course, the companies providing the traffic know this, and set their prices accordingly – usually around $1,95 per 1,000 page views.

They do, however, have a use, albeit a slightly esoteric one. The trick lies in converting the untargeted page views into targeted ones.

A targeted page view is one which is aimed at a specific visitor, or potential visitor, in such a way that they run a higher chance of being interested in the product or service being offered than one chosen entirely by chance.

Placement has always been well understood in the retail industry. Shops, businesses and places of refreshment have always been at pains to make the best possible use of the passing trade; including elaborate window dressing and other advertising ploys.

Web placement is the same, except that the passing trade is the untargeted traffic purchased at such a low price, and the window dressing is a banner.

Banners are reasonably well understood by the general public, and banner exchanges remain an affective way to catch targeted traffic. Put another way, if a web master agrees to put a banner on their site, they can earn the right to have their banner displayed on another web site.

The bonus is that most exchanges offer webmasters the possibility to accurately categorize their site, and also target their banners for a given audience. So, by placing a banner on the page visited by the untargeted traffic, the right is earned to display a banner advertising the site in question on other pages, targeted to a specific audience.

Of course, the ratio is not 1:1 but usually 4:3. This means that 3 page views are earned for every 4. If one buys 1,000 page views, then the advertising banner will probably be displayed, via the exchange, 750 times, to 750 visitors who actually have a passing interest in what is on offer.

Article written by Startup.

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