Internet marketing and traffic monetization

I just finished my presentation regarding click fraud and click quality to the Click Quality Council (try saying that 3 times fast.)

I was pretty nervous, not because I don’t feel confident in my knowledge about the subject matter, but because I know how fired up I can get about this stuff. So, to the audience who have checked out this site as a result, welcome. I encourage any and all questions about click fraud.

As Tom Cuthbert mentioned, my presentation was based on a blog post I wrote a few weeks ago.

You can find it here… 10 Ways to Reduce Your Exposure to Click Fraud

One of the benefits of working at home is that I get to catch up on a little bit of TV over lunch while I step out of the ‘office’. I’ll usually check out Sports Center or Law & Order. I get all my news and stock info from the web so I don’t check the tv for it.

As we all know, the ad spots on cable during the day are filled with direct marketing spots. Lawyers, Life Alert, dieting, trade schools, etc…

Today I saw an ad for CashCall.com. I’ve seen this ad before, but today I took the time to read the disclaimer. Say what you will about that. It’s your basic “Turned down for a loan? Call us now and get money fast!” deal.

The disclaimer is what completely shocked me. Here’s what you get if you borrow $2,600 from CashCall.com…

99.25% APR
42 payments of $216.55
$75 origination fee.

If you borrow $2,600 you will pay them back $9,095.10! That’s insane! Doesn’t that cross the line of predatory lending somehow? I feel like I could get a better rate if I borrowed from Bruno down the block!

If you use Google Analytics to track your site’s performance, there’s a little graphical display pie chart called Traffic Sources Overview that gives a breakdown of where your site’s traffic is coming from. I use it to provide an indicator of where I need to focus my traffic generation energy.

There are three sources:
1. Direct Traffic
2. Referring Sites
3. Search Engines

You know how all those financial wizards tell you that you need to diversify your investments? It’s the same concept here. Most people will see search engines as the majority of the pie, and that can be a bit dangerous. If you see search engines representing more than 75% of your traffic, you’re completely vulnerable to shifts in ranking algorithms. Remember the Florida update back in late ‘03? That algorithm change ruined the holidays for many that were totally dependent upon natural rankings.

The lesson learned? Don’t let search engine traffic represent too much of your overall traffic mix. Publicize your site through articles, links, press releases, social media. Heck, take your publicity offline and find ways to raise awareness to your site through other media.

And here’s the funny little side effect… as traffic increases through referring sites and direct traffic, it becomes a real battle to keep the search engine traffic down. Remember, search engines (Google in particular) are completely devoted to giving a good user experience and if they see that you’re getting so much traffic from other sources…. well, they want in on that.