Thoughts on monetizing a news website

[Pandrom]

Hey guys,

I'm finalizing an AI that can drive traffic to whatever website I want, I was planning on making a news website and monetizing it as the platform the traffic is coming from doesn't respond well to landing pages.

My monetization focus is to collect emails, and then use those emails to market CPC or CPA offers through articles containing referral links. Essentially replacing the landing page with an article.


Other monetization that I had planned are:
2-3 Banner ads per page
A survey button popup
Reaching out to companies once I have traffic results
Referral links in articles


The survey button is what i'm the most curious about. The network that I was accepted to has short 10 question surveys that you can complete on the page, they pay $0.30 USD each. I don't expect a high conversion rate, but testing it on websites that I own have seen conversions.

Does anyone have any advice?

 

[davids355]

Thread moved.

 

[Degen]

News readers hate pop-ups

 

[Stencil]

Perhaps CPA would be a good option.
Lets say you have an article on a topic related to Obesity in America
You can stuff a banner somewhere in the page which could drive traffic to your weight loss campaign.
Something in Technology, like launch of a new iphone model,Launch dates, specs, Top industry trends blah blah.. stick a link or a banner beside the article for buying iphone via your amazon aff account.
That could work better. Going for surveys may not be a good idea.
If I reached a news website, I am there to read the article only. So long as its relevant and provides more information compared to other sources. But If I am greeted with a popup window that asks me to fill a survey form or even submit my email id, I'd click on the Back button or the exit button.
Its better to display the ad alongside the article or stuff the aff link(s) somewhere smoothly so it doesn't irritate the user and it chances of conversion is much more. Looking out for cheap survey conversion and loosing the reader forever for that 0.30 bucks is actually a loss I'd say!

 

[safeSEOboost]

I'm finalizing an AI that can drive traffic to whatever website I want, I was planning on making a news website and monetizing it as the platform the traffic is coming from doesn't respond well to landing pages.

Sorry for my ignorance, what do you mean exactly AI that can drive traffic, could you be more specific?
In general I would think your monetization method will depend on the traffic source, and you want targeted traffic sources to monetize best.

 

[Surgation]

Hey guys,

I'm finalizing an AI that can drive traffic to whatever website I want, I was planning on making a news website and monetizing it as the platform the traffic is coming from doesn't respond well to landing pages.

My monetization focus is to collect emails, and then use those emails to market CPC or CPA offers through articles containing referral links. Essentially replacing the landing page with an article.


Other monetization that I had planned are:
2-3 Banner ads per page
A survey button popup
Reaching out to companies once I have traffic results
Referral links in articles


The survey button is what i'm the most curious about. The network that I was accepted to has short 10 question surveys that you can complete on the page, they pay $0.30 USD each. I don't expect a high conversion rate, but testing it on websites that I own have seen conversions.

Does anyone have any advice?

99% of people fuck off of a website related to news if it's got pop ups, ads etc. Not worth it unfortunately, CPA is good I guess.
Thought about Browser Mining for revenue? No add, just an optin form!

 

[Pandrom]

99% of people fuck off of a website related to news if it's got pop ups, ads etc. Not worth it unfortunately, CPA is good I guess.
Thought about Browser Mining for revenue? No add, just an optin form!

News readers hate pop-ups

I should have clarified the pop up, that's my bad. It doesn't hijack the screen but rather is a small unintrusive button that appears in the bottom right corner. It doesn't block pages and only appears on larger browsers when there's suitable white-space.

Edit: The browser mining is interesting but i've done tests on it and haven't seen good results. Do you have experience with it?

 

[Pandrom]

Perhaps CPA would be a good option.
Lets say you have an article on a topic related to Obesity in America
You can stuff a banner somewhere in the page which could drive traffic to your weight loss campaign.
Something in Technology, like launch of a new iphone model,Launch dates, specs, Top industry trends blah blah.. stick a link or a banner beside the article for buying iphone via your amazon aff account.
That could work better. Going for surveys may not be a good idea.
If I reached a news website, I am there to read the article only. So long as its relevant and provides more information compared to other sources. But If I am greeted with a popup window that asks me to fill a survey form or even submit my email id, I'd click on the Back button or the exit button.
Its better to display the ad alongside the article or stuff the aff link(s) somewhere smoothly so it doesn't irritate the user and it chances of conversion is much more. Looking out for cheap survey conversion and loosing the reader forever for that 0.30 bucks is actually a loss I'd say!

Hey thanks for the reply, I was planning on linking referral links in the post. Creating a campaign landing page and linking to it is something that I was considering but I wanted to see what type of content people responded too before creating a landing page for a niche.

The surveys are just a tiny optional button in the bottom right corner of the screen on larger browsers with suitable white-space. It's more of a "if they for some reason complete it I make $0.3" and has surprisingly good conversion rates for a non view blocking element. I think most people go through with it because they're curious what happens.

You're right though about focusing on CPA, i'm opting for less banner ads and more referral links and email marketing. Do you have any suggestions for CPA networks? I know it depends on the niche but i'm always looking for more

 

[bizo]

what about video ads ? there are few ways to add Video ads (instream or outstream ) the ecpms are great - and you get paid no matter what, if the AI also get the user engaged and you have a decent volume than you're in a good place

 

[GringoMonkey]

I have run similar websites to what your looking at doing, but used native ads to drive traffic.

If your technology can replace the need for paying for native ads, you could be on to a bit of a winner.

Checkout how those sort of sites make their money and duplicate for yours.

 

[Pandrom]

Sorry for my ignorance, what do you mean exactly AI that can drive traffic, could you be more specific?
In general I would think your monetization method will depend on the traffic source, and you want targeted traffic sources to monetize best.

Sorry that's my fault, there's no ignorance on your part. I was being intentionally vague. It's nothing special in terms of traffic driving, it just uses a certain social media platform and allows me to force my articles to get very targeted traffic. The AI uses a headless browser rather than python or a similar language so it's a lot less detectable than other sources. I haven't had a single ban so far with 50 accounts and will be scaling it to 200 accounts next week.

I'll be selling it as a service soon where i'll go more into detail It's been done before though, I just specialize in browser automation and wanted my own AI, I tend to have lower ban rates because my bots don't follow the patterns of popular botting programs on the market.

 

[moonshine7000]

Sorry that's my fault, there's no ignorance on your part. I was being intentionally vague. It's nothing special in terms of traffic driving, it just uses a certain social media platform and allows me to force my articles to get very targeted traffic. The AI uses a headless browser rather than python or a similar language so it's a lot less detectable than other sources. I haven't had a single ban so far with 50 accounts and will be scaling it to 200 accounts next week.

I'll be selling it as a service soon where i'll go more into detail It's been done before though, I just specialize in browser automation and wanted my own AI, I tend to have lower ban rates because my bots don't follow the patterns of popular botting programs on the market.

Is this a bot for instagram or facebook or both ?

 

[Pandrom]

what about video ads ? there are few ways to add Video ads (instream or outstream ) the ecpms are great - and you get paid no matter what, if the AI also get the user engaged and you have a decent volume than you're in a good place

Ahh thank you! I knew I was overlooking monetization streams. I was planning on having a section of the site be more clickbaity, targeting traffic that is more used to that. Video ads would fit right in for articles about youtubers doing stupid things or similar topics.

Thanks! Definitely will be implementing this.

Is this a bot for instagram or facebook or both ?

I can't confirm the source but i'll be selling it soon. It really is nothing special, I just don't want to disclose anything until i've scaled a bit. I do believe my AI is better than anything on the market, and just want to wait until I start selling the service before talking more about it.

 

[bizo]

Ahh thank you! I knew I was overlooking monetization streams. I was planning on having a section of the site be more clickbaity, targeting traffic that is more used to that. Video ads would fit right in for articles about youtubers doing stupid things or similar topics.

Thanks! Definitely will be implementing this.

happy to help in any way, LMK if you need any additional info / hookups on this area

 

[Stencil]

Hey thanks for the reply, I was planning on linking referral links in the post. Creating a campaign landing page and linking to it is something that I was considering but I wanted to see what type of content people responded too before creating a landing page for a niche.

The surveys are just a tiny optional button in the bottom right corner of the screen on larger browsers with suitable white-space. It's more of a "if they for some reason complete it I make $0.3" and has surprisingly good conversion rates for a non view blocking element. I think most people go through with it because they're curious what happens.

You're right though about focusing on CPA, i'm opting for less banner ads and more referral links and email marketing. Do you have any suggestions for CPA networks? I know it depends on the niche but i'm always looking for more

I am no Expert in CPA mate, My whole knowledge kitty comes from my own experience and reading things from BHW.
For offers I'd say go for Crakrevenue, Ogads, Clickbank & Maxbounty.
Out of these, I have worked with Ogads and Crakrevenue so far but have seen others making a lot of money from Maxbounty and Clickbank too.
It really all depends on the niche and the channel you choose to promote with.
For us marketers, we also look out for the payment cycle, method of payment and HOLD amount. So you'll have to look out for those things as well.
I am pretty sure, there are other guys who could advise you better coz I am a guy who just started CPA and I am still experimenting with various offers and niche ideas. (Pretty successful in some avenues )
You have a pretty decent chance of running most offers since News niche has several categories and several sub categories. Possibilities are endless if you put your mind to it. You can actually make it big with right people and right resources.

 

[Surgation]

I should have clarified the pop up, that's my bad. It doesn't hijack the screen but rather is a small unintrusive button that appears in the bottom right corner. It doesn't block pages and only appears on larger browsers when there's suitable white-space.

Edit: The browser mining is interesting but i've done tests on it and haven't seen good results. Do you have experience with it?

I make around $5 a month from XMR on one site I haven't used in MONTHS, just organic traffic.
A site I manage a lot earns around $50/month.

I use something called Coin Have. Not Hive.

It's alright, needs good SEO, and the opt in! - Great system to use,

 

[Yaaas Queen]

I think CPA would work best for your niche, or maybe email marketing. If I were you, I would avoid popup ads.

 

[Pandrom]

I make around $5 a month from XMR on one site I haven't used in MONTHS, just organic traffic.
A site I manage a lot earns around $50/month.

I use something called Coin Have. Not Hive.

It's alright, needs good SEO, and the opt in! - Great system to use,

Ah I had only looked at coinhive which takes 10% more commission than coinhave. You might want to check out surveys, for my survey button I have a custom script that pulls from a few different survey sources, but i'm fairly certain pollfish supports a similar button natively.

You install it on your site and if there's a survey a little icon will popup and you can specify where it pops up. Maybe it only works well in the niches that i've used these buttons in, but people are surprisingly curious. It doesn't block the screen or anything.

 

[Surgation]

Ah I had only looked at coinhive which takes 10% more commission than coinhave. You might want to check out surveys, for my survey button I have a custom script that pulls from a few different survey sources, but i'm fairly certain pollfish supports a similar button natively.

You install it on your site and if there's a survey a little icon will popup and you can specify where it pops up. Maybe it only works well in the niches that i've used these buttons in, but people are surprisingly curious. It doesn't block the screen or anything.

Coin Hive is blocked, Coin Have isn't xD

 

[bizo]

if you into monetizing with mining there are much better (and smarter) services than coinhive