For a business that only serves local clientele, but has a website that gets visitors from all over the country, advertising revenue can be a legitimate source of revenue that only compliments your local business.
In talking to a prospective client about creative ways to monetize his website’s traffic, we discussed how he could make money from the significant traffic his site is receiving from parts of the country he doesn’t serve – by selling ad space on a page of the site dedicated to visitors from outside of his service area.
His helicopter tour company is based in Texas, and he’s only selling tours to people who are in, or who plan to visit Texas. But nearly 70% of the traffic to his website is delivered by search engines for non-geographic terms like “helicopter tours” and “helicopter sightseeing.” The majority of people searching those terms are not looking for Tours in Texas, but they visit his website anyway. In other words, the vast majority of the visitors to the website aren’t even looking for what this company has to offer. Seems a shame to just to ignore all those consumers, doesn’t it?
Well you don’t have to limit yourself to selling only your own products and services on your website – especially when there are a lot of other visitors looking for something similar in a different location. Other businesses like yours may be willing to pay you to advertise on a new page of your site.
Why Would I List Competitors On My Website?
Remember, since it’s your website you have no obligation to list any direct competitors.
Do you consider a helicopter tour company in Florida a competitor of this Texas heli tour company? This particular business owner doesn’t…so, in his case there’s nothing to be lost by referring visitors who are interested in Florida heli-tours to a Florida-based comany…especially if that FL company is going to pay him for the referral.
If the Texas company decided to start offering tours in Florida as well, then at any time he could discontinue any ads from competing geographies on his website. It’s always up to you who advertises on your site.
Why Would I Distract My Website Visitors by Referring Them to Other Providers?
You definitely don’t need to ‘distract’ your visitors by adding a big button to the home page that says ‘Looking for Something Else?’ The page you create for advertisements just needs to be accessible to search engines…a simple link to that page from the footer of your website will do. Maybe this heli tour company might put a link in the footer of their website that says ‘Other US Helicopter Tours’. Visitors will find the page if they search Google, but it won’t be obvious to people browsing your website.
I’m Not in the Business of Selling Website Advertising. Should I Bother?
Should you quit your day job to try to sell ad space on your website? Well, that depends on how busy your website is, but the answer is probably no. You don’t need to start off “selling” any ad space. The easiest way initially may be to use Google AdWords, or join an affiliate marketing network like Commission Junction or LinkShare to find advertisers. In affiliate marketing lingo, when selling ad space on your website, you’re referred to as a “publisher”.
If you meet the following criteria, however, working directly with advertisers may be worth your time:
- Your website domain is related to your broader industry (ie: helicopter-tours.net), and is not geography specific (ie: helicopter-tours-texas.net).
- You get at least 5,000 website visitors per month who are looking for services like yours, but are in geographies you don’t serve. If you don’t know where your website visitors are located, check your site analytics.
- You have had related business(es) express interest in, or offer to pay you for, advertising on your site.
If you have the right domain, and if you have enough visitors to justify the effort, then it may make sense to monetize that traffic. Of course, if you already have advertisers knocking on your door, then it makes the decision that much easier.
Well, I Don’t Fly Helicopters – Will This Still Work for Me?
This strategy is particularly suitable for geographically targeted service businesses (helicopter tour guides, dentists, accountants, lawyers, etc.) but could also work for specialty retail shops as well. A few examples:
Case 1: Los Angeles criminal law attorney (a domain like fightforyourrights.com)
Opportunity: Create a page on the site on which other criminal law attorneys can be listed for a fee, or a single nation-wide lead aggregator ad, or Google AdWords ads can be displayed.
Case 2: New York orthopedic surgery center (a domain like jointsurgery.com)
Opportunity: Create a page on the site that allows other surgery centers and surgeons outside of New York to be listed for a fee, or a nation-wide lead aggregator’s ad can be displayed, or Google AdWords ads can be displayed.
Case 3: Arizona insurance brokerage (a domain like yourinsuranceagent.com)
Opportunity: Create a page on the site that promotes non-competing insurance agents in the same geography (ie: if you sell auto insurance, perhaps you promote a commercial insurance broker), or similar agencies to yours who sell insurance in other states
When all is said and done, you can boost your bottom line by a few percent by simply monetizing an asset you already have (website visitors).
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