I've been thinking about investing money to promote my site in newsletters, goto.com, etc... But then, I have doubts that it's worth it. Do you think that I should invest a few hundred dollars? (I'm only 16 so a few hundred dollars is a lot to me).
I think the first thing you should do is move to a faster server. Your site took too long to load up, about 6 seconds on my high speed cable connection. If I wasn't so curous about what your site was about, then I would've clicked off a long time before it loaded up.
You may want to consider other means first. I looked through your directory for stuff that would interest me, and I couldn't find anything listed. If you're looking to get people to list in your directory, then the money may be worth it. I'm sure there are other options available first. I'd consider swapping some ads with you for the sites in my signature, and I'ms sure that a lot of the other posters in this forum (some who have some heavliy trafficked sites) would too. I'd reccommend posting in the traders' post about that one.
DynaMike I would consider changing your cable provider, on my 56k modem (connected about 42k) it loaded in about 14s fully and had something on screen in about 1-2s.
I would invest in content first, filling your directory up, then I would use goto.com. I know Matt has had good results with them.
As for the speed, it loaded almost instantaneously for me on a 26.4 (slow I know...DSL is down!) connection while downloading a total of around 2.5k/sec.
------------------
Who the heck is Gen. Failure and why does he want to read my hard drive?
Soon to come: Aspology.com
I think DynaMike and Owen meant for you to create content. There are plenty of good places to get content but if you want to get awesome amounts of traffic then you've got to create it for yourself.
------------------
Who the heck is Gen. Failure and why does he want to read my hard drive?
Soon to come: Aspology.com
Yes! I mentioned that in my first post. What kind of traffic do you want? Do you want people to add their sites to your directory, or thumb through your directory looking for stuff?
If it's the former, I'd recommend spending some quality time, visiting sites, adding them to your directory and asking them for a reciprocal link. Since you've decided that you want people to add to your directory, why don't you try cheaper options before spending money to get people to visit your site and hope that they have something to add vice looking for something, finding nothing, and never coming back.
People need a motivation to go--they could always just jump over to Yahoo or Altavista to find the site they're looking for. Give them a reason and expect them to come knocking at your port 80 (HTTP).
Yes, people could just go to yahoo or altavista to search for a site on the internet. But my site isn't just a directory of sites, it is a directory of sites willing to exchange reciprocal links. My site offers those webmasters many tools to find and manage their links, so I just can't add sites myself, it wouldn't work.
What I need to to, is find webmasters who are willing to exchange reciprocal links, and have them sign up. For that, I guess I should advertise, otherwise how will they find me?
Carl
------------------
Lerca Link Exchange
Promote your site using reciprocal links!
http://www.lerca.com
Click now and win 25,000 banner impressions
Carl, you've got a nice looking site. I don't think that advertising is the way you should go at this point. I think that the best way to fill your directories is for you to go to the companies listed in the other major directories. Send them a short email message explaining your concept and asking if they would like a link on your site. If they respond positively, put a link and trak their clicks. After a period of time, send them another email telling them how many visitors have clicked through to their site and try to sell them an ad. I would take a targeted approach, one directory group at a time, and try to build some depth in specific areas of your directory.
As to whether your site is worth it, I think definitely it is. You are just getting started and will learn valuable lessons whether the site succeeds or fails. Although the Internet is still a wide open frontier for young (and older) entrepeneurs, there is no substitute for legwork, quick thinking, persistence and experience. You will learn about all of this. Good luck.
Add the companies yourself. Most people are just going to delete the emails. Just go ahead and add their sites. They won't mind the added traffic, you won't have to wait 6 months for them to reply, if at all, and your visitors will be happy with content.
Personally, if I'm browsing the net and I see a directory that's mostly empty, I won't bother to add my site - if there's nothing there and there is no traffic. It's simple as that.
Owen
[ See my post below ]
[This message has been edited by Owen (edited May 25, 2000).]
One more thing: I take back what I said earlier. I didn't realize that it was a webmaster exchange. This is bad. Try making it more obvious to people in a hurry (like me.)
A few things:
1. make it more obvious what it is. especially on the signup page.
2. you ask for too much personal information. WHY DO YOU NEED MY ZIP, ADDRESS, PASSWORD, ETC?
3. have a web subscribe form for your mailing list. you'll get many more subscribers.
You've got a PNG logo. Usually those take longer for the browser to display (not load) because they don't load the PNG library at startup.
This time, your site took about 3 minutes to load on a 28.8 modem...even though I'm on a slow modem it shouldn't take that long. That's 1/20th of an hour.
You use Javascript to change the status bar text. This is baaaad as many experienced web surfers _always_ look at the statusbar to see where they're going. Friends don't let friends use Javascript .statusbar alternative texts
------------------
Who the heck is Gen. Failure and why does he want to read my hard drive?
Soon to come: Aspology.com
.png is graphical format developed to replace .jpg (as you can selectiveley compress it) and .gif (as it will also support transparent backgrounds). I don't use it, because I'm still concerned about browser compatibility.
PNG files are almost always smaller than their exported GIF or JPG files. It's amazing, really. Too bad the current browsers don't like em that much.......
I have not reviewed your site but, assuming you have good content, you will find GoTo.com to be a very cost effective way to promote your site.
I have over 2,000 terms and phrases bid on at GoTo.com and it is a primary source of high quality visitors. There are other pay-per-click search engines that you might want to consider also but GoTo.com is the cream-of-the-crop today.
------------------
E-Commerce 2001(tm)Conference. March 8-10th, 2001, Big Island of Hawaii. http://www.seminar2000.com
Bookmarks