I didn't find a catorgory for promoting/advertising so I put it here, hope it's ok.

HI:

I've worked with Allen here for some time developing my site. But, I'm having trouble getting good advertising for visitors. So far, I've sunk (litterly) $2K in banner ads which have netted just a few users, many of which don't ever post that much.

Since we are not that far advanced yet, we don't have thousands to spend on promotion. I spoke with some about advertising on some movie sites and they want at least $5-20K to open an account. That's WAY out of our league. Also, taking out ads in national publications related to our site (theater) costs nearly as much at $4-12K per page/per issue.

My questions are this, how the heck to you build a site when the costs are that high? We are VERY SERIOUS about what we do, where we are going and our direction. But, I've found "banner ads" yeild little if any good traffic and are basically ignored. Given the costs for the big ticket stuff, it doesn't seem likely we can advertise there yet, if ever.

What works for you? What banner ad service actually works and doesn't just take your money? What other methods of promotion do you use?

Thanks, please let me know I'm very courious.

Jeff
webmaster/owner
audiovideoforum.com

linksexchange.... Doesn't cost anything, but you have to trade banners, but so what, it's good exposure, find some free submit sites for search engines, use good meta tags, find a site that runs newsletters like.... www.joke-a-day.com or any of the newsletter sites, the advertisment is cheap and you can get to a lot of users if your site is a user type site..... Good luck

Andrew

Lil tip.. check your main page in IE, it's out of alignment. The bars etc..

Next, to make it you gotta spend it, but online advertising is tough. They are starving but they won't give an inch. and the worst is Ad companies like Engage, Doubleclick, etc will NOT allow their ads on forums. So how do you make money when your site is up and running and busy?

Sorry to sound gloomy, but you are getting in it during a rough period. I suggest limited ad runs. I oofer space on my card site at reasonable rates. But I'm not sure how your site would be received. If you like visit cyber-cards.com and see what you think, then click contact us when you're there. The site enjoys 550,000 to 750,000 pageviews monthly. Holidays bring more traffic.

I have a friend who owns a break dance site..... he easily gets 800,000 hits a month and he is open for advertisers... i dont believe his rates are off the roof....

i think he'd advertise for around 50 or so US month.... if you are interested, let me know and i can get an exact quote....

well... maybe your ads are not eye catching enough(no offense intended) seriously though i personally ignore most ads i see, cause they're not really worth my time to check out. Try some talent showcase or something and try to win so u can promote there... thats about it.

Just get Stile to link you haha