2011 A Year In Review
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2011 A Year In Review My View
So 2011 has been a interesting year in the Traffic Exchange world. A lot has changed and opinions have become a lot more divided about certain topics. I wanted to write a post to let you all know how I feel the year went and what my opinions are to the changes and happenings.
Towards the beginning of the year a lot of exchange owners came together to talk about how to push the industry forward. A lot of things were talked about and some people did not agree on some of them and others after a moment of thought agreed.
You see we all talked about a lot of different things and what it mainly comes down to is the fact that nowadays there are so many exchanges coming online and a lot of them are run by people that do not know how exchanges fully function.
It is a bad belief that exchanges can just sell or give away endless credits and promise the world but this in reality is not the case. I understand why this happened. I mean to have an exchange now it needs to be different. It needs to be better than the rest. However by giving away the world maybe some surfers or members whatever you want to call us might see it as a good thing, it really isn’t.
So I open an exchange and someone else who has one is giving away 200 credits for joining and a 2-1 ratio. I know I will make mine better I will give a 1-1 ratio and 1000 credits. Heck I will even sell credits cheaper than them, give my upgraded members 1-1.5 and throw in 5000 credits with an upgrade. That makes mine better doesn’t it?
Well hopefully you can all spot why so many get it wrong. If you have a 1-1 ratio or higher for everyone there is no way you can deliver any more credits than the 1-1 (I have a 1-1 ratio exchange and I get asked all the time why don’t I sell credits. The answer is where would I get them from) Even on a 2-1 a 1000 pages surfed means 500 earned by the member. That leaves the exchange owner with 500 left. This goes to selling credits, bonuses on surfbar, contest prizes, and those you get for being upgraded. There is not loads to play with like many think.
This is why so many have gone wrong, this is why so many exchanges die. This is why some of those new ones out there are a JOKE. Even the small things like giving 200 credits for joining can kill an exchange. You see at a 2-1 ratio you are banking on every member who uses those 200 credits surfing at least 400 pages to pay it back. What about the people like me that laugh and then join them, use the 200 credits and never go back?
Anyway that is my reasons for exchanges promising the world, Everyone has to be better than the others.
Then we have the reduced surf timer. Some people will argue that computers have sped up, pages load quicker, or a shorter timer is enough time to see a splash page. I just want people to think a moment. All those new members that only just found traffic exchanges. They do not know what a splash page is yet let alone that they should be using one. Wait no problem. There is training for that, But how many go.
I am not in favour of reduced timers for this reason. You see some exchanges boast about bringing in 400 members a week. But does the exchange get any busier? There is not 400 more people in these exchanges every week. Members are going as fast as they come in in most cases. One of the reasons I believe is because new people are not given a chance to succeed as the reduced timers only benefit the few that are doing it right? Some will argue that people should learn to do it right.
Yes but how many will right away. I am a big believer in people should see some results from the start and then learning improves the results. Too often people see no results. That is why most go.
The only reason timers were originally reduced was so exchange owners could deliver more traffic FACT (Even I followed suit when every one did)
Then we have the massive surfers. Do not get me wrong. A lot of people gave me stick for saying I didn’t want power surfers. You got it wrong. I dont want people surfing 3000 even 7000 pages a day (have a look at top surfers etc in some exchanges and see the numbers) It is not effective for advertisers. Power surfers create poor results from traffic.
Surfing for cash or cash prizes in surf. Fact it brings in a lot of new members. That is why exchanges do it. However is a exchange that is full of people basically being bribed to surf really good for results. Those people surfing their 1000 pages a day for a few cents or those surfing eyes peeled to the place where hopefully the $1 prize will appear. Are they part of the reason results have dropped. When was the exchanging of traffic suddenly not enough?
So social was the next big thing. Now I want to get something straight from the start I WAS NEVER AGAINST SOCIAL like some have said I was or am. I am against chat while surfing (Hey some of you may have seen me in the chats monitoring whats going on) So I was in the chats but am against them, A Little bad of me some say. Well lets put it this way. The reason I am against chat in exchanges is that it is a distraction away from the main point of exchanges. An exchange was born to exchange traffic with others doing the same.
Anything on the surf screen that is not the advertisers things is a distraction. Some will even still say it is not a distraction to this day. However the definition of distraction is anything that takes away from the original thing.
Heck the main argument at the time was social is good, you can build up friends and referrals etc from it. Yes you can, however I am a believer that this is wrong because the advertiser has either purchased credits or exchanged their time surfing for them. Most referrals from the chat come from people asking about advertised programs.
I would like you to look at it this way. You buy credits to advertise program x and it displays. Someone on chat pops up and says that looks good, oh anyone here got a link. Oh yes someone says and there you go, boom they got a referral for being social. However should that not be your referral, you paid for the adverts?
Maybe it’s just me. But I see it as I rent a shop and pay rates etc, I would not be happy someone stood outside my door pinching my customers.
But back to the me against social. Can I point out that chat is social yes. But it is not the only social thing is it. This is what I got stick for this year, I was against chat so im against social. No I am against one form of social. I love twitter, I love tweeting about sites I see, I love Facebook. I love Sweeva and the way you can comment on pages you see, I love all that social stuff so just to put record straight Im not against social :)
Conferences and conference rooms was the next big thing. Yes I put together TEHangout, Now I just want to say now. No it was not put their as competition for other rooms that have conferences. Its main reason for being there was for me to have a room where I can do conferences and help sessions for my members (This is coming in the next few weeks)
When I put my room together I noticed that other popular rooms have schedules etc and becoming pretty full. Now I remember back to the day before Skype as such or before I used it anyway. But all us owners would hangout while we worked in a room, we networked, we bounced ideas off each other and I thought, Lets not have a set schedule lets open the room up for people to just hang out in :) It was ment as a nice gesture, You could hang out whenever you was free.
Heck even my first session I held in my room about my program changes I got some stick for it clashing with a conference in another room. Crumbs can people not decide where they want to go.
Anyway these are my main points of the year, I have had a big rant now lol.
You all know how i feel and yes a lot of this did annoy me. However the matter of fact is a lot of people will be reading this thinking what a load of old moaning and a few will be thinking when they think deep, Steve has some really good points.
The matter of the fact is that a lot of owners met up because it is a plain simple fact Traffic Exchange results have dropped in the last few years and we met to discuss what we could do to change that. We all agreed there was an issue and we all agreed on some of the things that us owners did that help change the results but when I took the bull by the horns and made some changes, Did anyone follow (A few smaller exchanges did) Most just sat and watched. You see we created power surfers and when they complained about the changes everyone jumped to keep them happy instead of thinking big picture and future results. The result no real change in the results of traffic exchanges.
Now Yes I got very upset with the stick I got this year when all the time the people that really know me know I love Traffic Exchanges and the changes was done to help the Traffic Exchange industry. In general tho you can not change the world on your own.
Some people have changed the way their exchanges are going and hats off to them. I might not like the route they take etc but if it works for them then good on them. I wanted to change things my way so after the hurt and upset this year brought. I knuckled down to work. You see I love Traffic Exchanges and I am damn sure not giving up on them :)
I have set my plan out for 2012 I know which way my business is going and I am really excited and looking forward to it.
I have a lot of free tools and resources that are there to help the Traffic Exchange user. A lot have no hidden agenda either, you dont even need to give an email address or download anything (My TETips as an example) you just read the info online.
I am going to use my Hangout room more to help members etc but mainly I am going to teach and educate people and try get Traffic Exchanges going back upwards :) I feel that it is an owners duty to give some education or help back. We should not be satisfied with the number of people that go because we do not help them learn the right way. Some maybe happy but every single member that does not come back because they did not understand or did not get results because they did not know makes me feel that I have failed them.
I hope you all have a plan, I hope your all excited about 2012 and I hope that whatever route you take you have all the success you desire. I will look forward to some of you joining me on my journey to a better year.
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Wow Steve!
This post was fantastic!
Though I might not necessarily agree 100% with EVERYTHING you wrote, I certainly agree with the majority of it.
Thank you very much for giving your perspective on the events of the preceding year in traffic exchanges.
It is always refreshing to read other people’s points of view and to think about things from their perspectives.
Your passion for the industry is self-evident, and I cannot wait to see what you have in store for us in 2012 :)
Here’s to a successful year for the traffic exchange industry!
- Jared
I could not say it any better then Jared did, so I will just say DITTO ;)
Sometimes I forget your such a young man Jared! You do the young generation proud!!
I had planned on doing a post like this, but Steve beat me to it. Every once in a while, we need to step back, analyze, and attempt to fix the problems in the TE industry. It’s posts like yours that will help make that happen.Yes I love zombies but not when they are surfing because they just don’t look at anything. We need to put the focus back onto actual advertising. If an exchange is good, there is no reason to dangle a carrot in front of a member in order to get them to join it.
Great post Steve,
Don
The traffic exchange community was responsible for teaching me many wonderful things about business and marketing in general. I am thankful for having the opportunity of being a part of the community during the time I was, when it was truly vibrant.
The race to the bottom has made the margins so low that the work required to be a competitive exchange owner is no longer worth it. At the same time, it has effectively eliminated any real customer base for a premium product.
So while the community is now mostly useless to me, It has granted me extremely useful skills that I now leverage for a proper monetary reward elsewhere.
Email lists – Capture pages – Structuring an OTO tree – Creating solid calls to action – etc etc
Use what you learn in a market that will reward you for it. Particularly as offline business wakes up to the power of online communities. Add a little geo-targeting to what you learned online and you can make a real living.
Thanks for the great insight for TEs Steve. I agree with many of your points, although not necessarily all. Also with the “surf as many sites as you can” or surf 1000 etc, it just really just eat ups the credits with no good results on advertising.
I think it really should be the goal of all TEs to deliver great results in the least amount of visits. That makes our advertising credits much more valuable.
best regards
Gil
A traffic exchange is a business…
Businesses with a winning edge use
established operators in their industries
as role models. But carbon copies are never
as good as the original. If your going to
use an existing business model, you have
to plan for a way to stand out from all
the others.
Those that do will succeed in 2012
Well said DA. How is everyone going to “stand out from all others”? A TE is basically going to be a TE. I look forward to things “standing out” in 2012!
Back to the post: a lot of huffs and puffs but nothing new proposed for the future.
So, it is going to be more of the same? Where are the solutions?
I’ll still use TEs but only a selected few to mix and match. Am not expecting any enhanced results from any TE.