oliverjack
New Arrival
I think free advertising is only a waste of time.what is your opinion about these topics?
Is Free Advertising a waste of time?
- Thread starter oliverjack
- Start date
Maria Jonas
Familiar Face
what do you mean by free? can you be more specific?
D
Deleted member 50656
Surely free advertising is still advertising 😛
I've actually always been fond of traded advertising via sites (like the services offered here at FP via the marketplace)
I've actually always been fond of traded advertising via sites (like the services offered here at FP via the marketplace)
Joshua Farrell
FP's Housekeeper
Define free, as there are some types of free advertising that is beneficial, if used correctly. If you just go around posting ad topics everywhere, then it can be pretty hard to get traffic from that. For example, taking advantages of free banner exchanges , based on pageviews (you show a banner on your site, to get your banner shown on another) can be pretty good, if your own site traffic is half decent.
WadeOndricka
New Arrival
No, free advertising is not a waste of time.
Having clever & straight-forward strategies for a free advertising campaign is important. But also knowing what, when and where to advertise the idea is even more important in today’s digital world.
Having clever & straight-forward strategies for a free advertising campaign is important. But also knowing what, when and where to advertise the idea is even more important in today’s digital world.
Excommunicado
Paragon
If done right, free advertising is not a waste of time at all. In fact, if you know what you're doing, you may even be able to solely rely on free advertising. But ofcourse, you have to put the work in; you can't just expect to post an advert somewhere and gain tons of traffic and users. It's about consistency, commitment and really selling the idea of your website to potential clickers and users.
I think that advertising whether paid or free rarely works effectively.
With paid advertising, you are paying money for views. This money could be used elsewhere for more important matters like buying food, paying rent, saving money for the future, etc. Most of the time people use adblocks on the internet, so there is a chance that the user will not see the ad. Even if the user sees the ad the chances of the user joining your forum is low as the popularity of forums is very low right now and forums do not fit the taste of many people.
Free advertising is slightly better because you are not paying anything. It is as simple as posting a message in the ad thread. But this also rarely works effectively because there will be many ad threads in free advertising, the competition will be very high.
The best strategy is that if you do not have a pool of 50 people who will join your forum when it will be made and be active, you are better off not making a forum. It is much better to make a small group on social media or instant messaging services.
With paid advertising, you are paying money for views. This money could be used elsewhere for more important matters like buying food, paying rent, saving money for the future, etc. Most of the time people use adblocks on the internet, so there is a chance that the user will not see the ad. Even if the user sees the ad the chances of the user joining your forum is low as the popularity of forums is very low right now and forums do not fit the taste of many people.
Free advertising is slightly better because you are not paying anything. It is as simple as posting a message in the ad thread. But this also rarely works effectively because there will be many ad threads in free advertising, the competition will be very high.
The best strategy is that if you do not have a pool of 50 people who will join your forum when it will be made and be active, you are better off not making a forum. It is much better to make a small group on social media or instant messaging services.
Excommunicado
Paragon
So your solution to growing a forum is not to make one at all. A pessimistic way of looking at it if you ask me. Sure, forums are a dying breed but there are still instances of them succeeding in current times without having a pool of 50 people.
Also, I don't think the question is targeted solely at forums.
If a person does not have a large of of users then he/she should not make a forum. With a low amount of users, most of the workload will fall on one or two people who have to post content. While there are people who are determined, most people are not like that. They will abandon the forum once they realize that their efforts are not going anywhere. I have given options, if a person has a small pool of users, it is better to make a Discord group. Discord groups tend to fit the taste of more people so they have a higher chance of success. Even Discord social servers rarely become active because of oversaturation of servers. Most of the people there only chat a while and then go back to gaming. So the mileage may vary there.
Yes it is sad, but it is the reality of the present time. Unless a forum has brand power or a huge amount of users it will not succeed. Sure there are forums which remain active even with low amount of users but they require huge amounts of effort to sustain. Not many people can keep their willpower for that long. Now in general advertising rarely works properly unless the person's social site has brand power or huge amount of users. There is too much competition and most ads just blow over each other. A very good example is the ad section on this forum. Most of the people who post ads there are only doing it for their own social site, they will not join other social sites unless they can advertise there. Point to note, I am not saying that this is a bad thing, I understand them and I also do the same. The way I perceive it with my limited knowledge, only social site owners advertise and if a normal user does come, they will be overwhelmed and will only join those social sites which have a high amount of users or brand power. If I take myself as an example, then I did not join Clairyovant's forum because there are very few users there, but I instantly joined Catsmother's forum because her forum has many users.
This is how I perceive it. Exceptions will always exist and there will be very good forums out there with low amount of users. I respect their hard work. But coming back to the topic of advertising, I do not think it is very effective.
D
Deleted member 7467
Probably. Most users on this site likely don’t research their markets, identify needs within their markets, and adapt their advertising in regards to their research. Best case scenario, FP is giving you free links and some artificial activity. This is good until you look at how much time you spend gaining these perks. Even then, one really needs to conduct research and monitor how much of their traffic actually comes from FP.
Yes I've still been meaning to give your suggestion a try for that. I might get started on it soon. I have been focusing on trying to get content going and haven't tried it yet. Our traffic actually is half-way decent. Though there aren't tons of people signing up yet, I will say we do see 12,000 visits a month ruffly.
Getting back on topic, to trade an advertisement with someone has it's ups and downs but a lot of times can be beneficial in my opinion.
Free would obviously be like posting my forum in the Promotion Directory. I don't have to pay for anything, just register on the forum.
In my opinion I've never had any luck with free advertising. I've posted my site where I can in relevant forums but had way more success with paid ads because you can actually capture a big target audience if you do it correctly.
Time would better be spent working on SEO than posting your website links on free directories. What I really like about FP is the option for people to exchange activity on each others' sites and be held accountable for the quality of what they deliver with a reputation on the forum.
veeprho123
Familiar Face
It may not make a big impact on your advertising but it will definitely the spread the word about your brand.
Akinwale701
New Arrival
No, permit me to tell you that free advertising is not a waste of time. First of all, I currently run a Facebook page about cosmetics. Initially, I started running free Adverts and I indeed got some positive turn outs. Although paid advertising brings more success, yet, free advertising is also useful.
saoussen5765
Reputable
If we are talking about traffic exchange it is really a waste of time because you spend a lot of time and effort on manual traffic exchange for get generic visitors that stays a little at website and leave by end of time and resolve captcha. However if there is an ad with text like admailer it can bring some referral or members because reader may read quickly site description before going to reward link.
I think the benefits of free advertising are dependent on several factors, as it requires time and effort instead of financial investment. Methods for free advertising comprise social media marketing, content creation, search engine optimization (SEO), and word-of-mouth referrals. Although the results may take longer to surface compared to paid advertising, this form of promotion can be worthwhile in creating brand recognition, interacting with a specific audience, and generating organic traffic.
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