Local Online Advertising: When Free is Bad

Writing by Brick Marketing on Tuesday, 19 of February , 2008 at 10:42 pm

When you are looking into local advertising, it is pretty easy to get sucked into all these free offers for publicity . . . but they aren´t always worth it. In fact, you may even find that the so-called free advertising that you have signed up for is really a trick to get you to hand over your email. Sure, your ad will go up, but no one will ever see it! Here are a few common, local online advertising schemes to avoid.

Traffic Exchanges. We´ve all seen these “you click, you get clicks” deals. They aren´t as great as they sound. First of all, you usually have to click on something like ten ads to get yours up to the top of the list. However, it will quickly be moved down, so you won´t really gain a lot of traffic from this method. Meanwhile, you´ll be getting dozens of emails to the address you signed up with . . . from the PAYING clients.

Link Farms. These aren´t as common anymore, but they do still exist. Basically, you put your link on a page along with dozens of other links . . . not only does this make your business pretty much invisible, it also causes problems with search engines who tend to punish those who use this tactic.

Too Good to be True. You know the ones I´m talking about. The ads that say something like “10,000 visitors for FREE!” Depending on the scam, there will be various requirements. You may need to “sign up” with a credit card, or buy a certain amount of advertising for a higher price in order to receive the free visitors . . . or it may just be a ploy to get your email.

Free is not always a good thing. While it´s nice not to have to pay for local online advertising, you will find that it is not a good idea to just go with free stuff. As the old saying goes, “there´s no such thing as a free lunch!”

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Category: Local Online Advertising

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