Site Building Question

[Lee]

In todays adult industry how many sites or rather, how many different types of traffic sources do you think newer webmasters need to have before they start making sales?

I know many moons ago you literally could just throw one site up and within days make a sale but the industry has changed so much over th years.

Has it become more difficult in your eyes to make money from porn surfers an, if so, what do you think the reasons for the difficulties are?

Regards,

Lee

[Scorpio]

Hi Lee... well i'm just a designer so i can't say too much about traffic and stuff... but i'm trying to put myself as a regular surfer with a credit card in my hand... what would make me sign up right now:

I'd ONLY sign up to a reality site. If i wanted to look at regular sets of pictures of naked guys well there are plenty of that on the web for free... what i''d look for is original content. Content that i know that only that site makes. I'd sign up for that. I would NEVER sign up for the regular paysite look. Because i know, being a designer, that most of the times the sets are bought from content provider (oftenly overused content), videos are crappy and chats are just shit. So yeah i'd happily sign up for real content.

:goof:

[RainGurl]

i don't really think it's a question of the number of traffic sources, it's the quality of the traffic.

I can buy traffic all day long that just doesn't convert.

my suggestion would be to allocate a small budget to a few different sources, track them heavily, and find out what works for you. make sure you maximize each visitor to the fullest. once you find a formula that works, buy as much as you can!

[Lee]

Originally posted by RainGurl
i don't really think it's a question of the number of traffic sources, it's the quality of the traffic.

I can buy traffic all day long that just doesn't convert.

my suggestion would be to allocate a small budget to a few different sources, track them heavily, and find out what works for you. make sure you maximize each visitor to the fullest. once you find a formula that works, buy as much as you can!

A good point but () what about those webmasters who perhaps cant afford to start buying traffic as yet? Newbies and the likes who perhaps are still perplexed as to how the whole 'traffic' generation system works?

Regards,

Lee

[RainGurl]

hmmm.....as the old saying goes, it takes money to make money.
i would say start studying search engine optimization...

[Chilihost]

Originally posted by RainGurl
hmmm.....as the old saying goes, it takes money to make money.
i would say start studying search engine optimization...

I totally agree with this, I am always shocked with people that complain about not making money and when you try to help them out you see they are using overused sponsor content on a free host with massive headers/footers and they refuse to buy any automation tools or scripts since they can do it for free!

I guess that is a bit off topic, so Lee my answer to you is you need lots of traffic


cheers,

Luke

[Lee]

Originally posted by Chilihost
my answer to you is you need lots of traffic

So how do new webmasters go about getting lots of traffic if they dont have any $$$ to invest?

See what i mean? They need to invest money to make money yes. However if they dont have any money to invest, how can they make money that money for the investment for free? LOL

Regards,

Lee

[RainGurl]

get a day job?

[Lee]

LOL

Other than that? im sure there are ways to make money in the adult industry without the need for any initial outlays other than a domain name

Regards,

Lee

[RainGurl]

i think SEO is the key. it's good traffic if you can get it. and you can, but there is a lot to learn and a lot to stay on top of. the se world changes daily.

other than that, there are link trades, tgps, etc.

[basschick]

it IS possible to generate sales building galleries or avs's off the bat - IF you've honestly understood what you read on the boards. anyone's gallery can start making money the day it is posted.

what i've observed is that it's marketing that keep new webmasters from making money. their galleries, free sites, and avs sites usually lack focus - badly - are often hard to navigate, and use terrible text to sell. they're also given to cutesy concepts that don't seem to work, and they often try the same approach over and over before finally admitting what they are doing doesn't work and moving on. some never admit it. they get attached to their idea.

if you're new, you can make money immediately IF you really studied a couple good gallery or avs tutorials and let some webmasters critique your galleries or avs's - and then truly considered their advice.

[Lee]

Originally posted by basschick
what i've observed is that it's marketing that keep new webmasters from making money. their galleries, free sites, and avs sites usually lack focus - badly - are often hard to navigate, and use terrible text to sell.

Hmm that is interesting, so far as the actual 'marketing' goes where do you think that newbies tend to go wrong more often than any other place? Do you think it is beause they dont know their target audience or because they have been given mis-information from other webmasters who dont know their marketing skills needed to be fine tuned a bit more?

On the other hand.. could it be to do with the 'lazyness' factor in that they think they see all these other webmasters making money on the boards wen in reality all they see are a group of people trying to prove to one another who makes the most money?

Regards,

Lee

[Lee]

Oh i also agree with you basschick that it is possible to mak money from day one well at least it was 2 or 3 years ago i guess when we have the community project started up in a week or two we will find out if that is still true to form

Regards,

Lee

[basschick]

i don't think it's laziness - i try to help a lot of people who (for some reason) get pointed to me for gallery help. it's amazing how hard they work and how ineffective the average newbie marketer is!

one guy has been struggling over a gallery for two weeks. he can NOT focus on the sponsor site's niche. he can talk about the model on the page, although never in terms of the niche. he can talk about the sponsor site - although usually in very general terms (number of pics and movies, etc). he can't seem to focus on the combination of things.

a lot of new webmasters - and non new webmasters who can't break $500 a month - seem to have this problem. they can't understand there are several things you need to do to market anything:

1. keep the ad in a central location that the eyes are naturally drawn to

2. describe what is good AND different about the product you're selling. to me, it's obvious that there is NOTHING different about having thousands of pics in a paysite. what about that paysite stands out from the herd? what niche is it? boys? what is different about those boys?

3. make sure your content represents what you are marketing. don't put up an ugly 30 year old dude and say he's a twink or a hunk. if you want to use him, make an avs site about "average dudes" and use him to market that.

4. use keywords and trigger phrases. don't be afraid to use a strong keyword twice on a page. if your gallery is uncut cocks, you can say "UNCUT" in both the top and bottom links.

5. don't make the links to your sponsor subtle!!! a lot of us our trained to be subtle, but in advertising you have to be obvious. you can tell your surfer to click, make the text fairly large, make it a bright color. as long as it doesn't fuck up your gallery's appearance, let the surfer notice the sponsor links as soon as he notices the thumbs.

6. don't rely on banners. always use some text to sell a site, and pick the banner with the most of whatever the site is about on it.

these are a few of the VERY common newbie mistakes. almost everyone makes 'em, and they work very hard to make those mistakes ;-)

[Lee]

Damn thats a great list and i think we can all benefit from trying to remember even one of the items in it for life

I especially liked the part about the 'Average Dudes'

Regards,

Lee