Need To Drive Massive Traffic Per Day To An Ecommerce Site (13)
Hey STMers, how are we doing today?
I need some help/suggestions on this. I have undertaken a project wherein I need to drive massive traffic (to the tune of 1,00,000 visitors a day) to a new eCommerce site. The site is mainly into electronic goods (mobile phones, TVs, game consoles etc).
Could you suggest some sources to get started with? I am planning to start one source at a time and build up the volume over a period of 30 days, optimizing each source as I go. I can't use Social Media since they are going to be handing it themselves, so FB is out.
Also, conversion is not an issue, since they are only looking at the volume right now. Although, personally I would like to send traffic that is at least somewhat targeted so I can look for a long term association with them.
I am planning on starting with AdWords (am fairly experienced with this) although this can be a bit expensive. Also plan on using PPV traffic (is Lead Impact the best choice?) for getting some cheap traffic.
Any other recommendation? Something that can send a lot of volume for a decent price, and perhaps not entirely shitty traffic?
Oh, and the target geo is the middle east (Dubai, UAE, Saudi etc).
Thanks!
Driving traffic is easy.
Driving conversions is much harder.
We've got quite a few local clients that run web stores/shops that we do what you were tasked to do for, but these guys operate with budgets of $3-10k spend a day.
We tried a ton of stuff, and the most effective has always been search, and highly targeted display with specific placements their demo hangs out at.
cmdeal: I did mention conversion is not really the focus here, traffic is. So what sources do you recommend?
iAmAtilla: The budget isn't really too big a concern either. I have some leeway there. So you suggest AdWords (both Search and Display)?
I am also curious if PPV will work for an eCom site? I am planning on using mix of multiple sources of traffic, some good ones, and some cheap ones. My first target will be to get the desired volumes, and then work on conversions later (the clients haven't even talked about conversions yet, all they are looking forward to, is traffic).
Originally Posted by chandan
Clients who pay just for page views are folks we ungenerously call "dumb money". We've pretty much stopped working with such clients, as they tend not to be long term sustainable clients. However plenty of agencies love doing so and getting their 15% cut.
Really really cheap traffic is either fraudulent traffic or bot traffic. These will have pretty much 0 purchase intent, and they can be "bought" for very low prices, either through "black hat" channels or through exchanges or RTB channels who tend to "look the other way". Slightly more expensive will be unintentional traffic. These will have close to 0 purchase intent, but not quite. With large enough volumes, yes a small number will convert from just coincidence. This includes a large number of mobile sources as well.
If you want targeted, high purchase intent traffic, then search is definitely hard to beat. But this will not be cheap. If the client is measure by total page views instead of unique visitors, then you should definitely retarget as well.
Originally Posted by chandan
Second, if you're going for traffic because you think it will create "brand awareness" or some other intangible metric, then please, I beg of you, at least tie it to some measurable action. Other than cold hard conversions, the best thing you can do in my humble opinion is create an email newsletter for this ecom site and make people sign up. You can also buy Facebook likes, though that is far less effective. After you've burned through the couple million that they gave you, you'll at least have a tangible asset you can work with: You can email people special deals and make them come back to the site and eventually convert a good number of them. Same with Facebook, post highly shareable deals and pay some money to be able to reach all your likes, and grow your reach.
Additionally, giveaways can be a highly effective tool for driving traffic. Facebook has a few apps that use giveaways to create a viral effect. (thanks Mr. Green for the invaluable tip!)
As for traffic sources, for your particular situation, I would recommend Google and Facebook, and the reason is that they will save you from yourself and prevent you from burning through a lot of cash on bogus traffic. When you get the hang of things and know how to optimize and know what you're looking for, you can work your way into other sources if necessary.
Just my 2 cents.
Really... I mean, really? I know you're coming here asking a traffic question, and help.. But why waste money? Even if it's not yours. Take the time to invest in traffic that is going to convert. PPV is a good idea ONLY if you target ecom sites and build a list from it. As others have said, the very best will be PPC. I would recommend highly targeted PPV using Traffic Vance and as far as PPC, use Adwords and Bing..
Good one _mcr_.... I can assure you, I had that very same expression when I landed this project and the client told me they are looking for traffic only. No conversion. And if someone is willing to pay me money for that, why shouldn't I take it up? All I need to do give them is numbers, and if I am paid handsomely for it, I don't see why I shouldn't go for it.
However, I am still not looking to send them crap traffic alone. As I said, I am going to be using AdWords to send them good quality, targeted traffic. I just need to have other sources handy to make sure I meet the numbers, in case PPC alone doesn't cut it. I would have loved to use Facebook (I manage to get 1 cent clicks on FB for most of my projects), but unfortunately can't use Social Media for this one.
I hope you guys see my point here.
Why not drive the best quality traffic you can that converts, then you add value to their business. This could lead to you be an invaluable business partner.
I haven't used the source, but I've seen ads on amazon that aren't google ads, not sure if they have much traffic from the geo you need, but worth looking into. I like to check Alexa's top sites by country to find relevant sites and see what network has the inventory.
Dude, you cant think of ecommerce in the same way you think of affiliate marketing. Ecommerce is what I do in real life. I have taken several ecom startups from $0 in revenue to $1,000,000 in less than 10 months.
I usually charge very large consulting fees for ecoms, but maybe karma will favor me in some strange way, so here it goes:
There are so many traffic sources that are open to you as an ecom versus affiliate. Even if you done care about conversions, you will not help but to be able to get conversions.
Lets start with the odd traffic sources for you non-ecom guys -Comparison Shopping. There are a few that will drive 100,000's of thousands a month pretty cheaply. And, they convert better than PPC for the most part. Here is a short list of the most popular ones.
Shopzilla
Pricegrabber
Nextag
Shop.com
Amazon Product Ads
These sites have massive traffic available in your niche. And the traffic is buyer traffic. Lets talk about Amazon Product Ads. The bids are cheap as crap. You are getting the credibility of being on Amazon. You are taking part in Amazon's high conversion rate. This is a win all day long.
Next, kinda in the same boat is Google Shopping or Product Ads or whatever they feel like calling it. For ecom, this is a must. There is NO keyword bidding here (only in the negative sense), so you can set bids and kill the traffic in electronics. Again, this will drive massive amounts of money and the bids are still pretty cheap. Musch cheaper than traditional PPC.
Google Display Network - If they want traffic, I am going to assume they either want the branding or they think they will be able to tell an investor, "Look, we got one million visits this month." If it is branding, there is no shortage of display inventory and if you have any inbound marketing sense, you can create a content flow that flows from the banner into some sort of lead capture where you can start building an email marketing list. Regardless, why not just hit Display advertising if they want traffic?
Retargeting - If they dont care about unique views, retarget and get people to come back to the site. Use adroll to get inventory with the most exchanges possible in a short amount of time.
Im sure Dubai and SA have their own versions of high traffic comparison shopping networks and things like that so just take what I told you above and look for those sources available in those areas.
Dubai is a buyers market. Look for advertising opportunities on Alibaba or aliexpress for that geo.
Ah! now we are talking.. that's some excellent stuff right there fishinseo.... thanks!
oh, and by the way, and this for personal campaigns, which of TV or LI do you think is better for PPV. I am looking to get into some PPV traffic for my personal CPA campaigns and wondering which of these is the better option.
Thanks!
@fishinseo I started doing affiliate marketing in my niche now I've moved to having my own clothing brand. So I got two ways to go about things. So you recommend setting up on google shopping and Amazon and getting traffic/sales from there or trying to get direct traffic to website to buy from there or land on a landing page for an affiliate offer? I'm very confused on what to do as I need more growth in either department. The demand for the apparel is there I just need funds to get large enough quantities and pay for paid advertising.
Sorry if this doesn't make sense!
Website: RugbyWarfare.com + RugbyWarfare.com/store for reference
Home > Paid Traffic Sources > eCommerce