Ad HustlerConfessions Of A Serial Internet Entrepreneur

This is a guest post by Internet Gangsta Kris Trujillo From CashTactics.net

The Holy Grail of Local Offline Advertising

About a year ago I got into advertising in local classified ads.  When I first started out I was quite surprised by the return on investment that I could make in certain niches.  However… my ultimate goal was to advertise on a Billboard!

Now, you may think that Billboard advertising is expensive… But I will be the first to tell you that it really isn’t. Often times I could pick up advertising spots in local areas for cheaper than the cost of adwords in the same geotargeted location.

I got an idea a few months back when I saw a “Single in McKinney” sign. I had recognized the little black and white message in several other suburbs.  So I figured to myself… If they are successful enough to have these signs on every major intersection than how profitable would it be to purchase a spot on a Billboard.

I did some digging around.  On average you can get a Billboard spot for $500 for 30 days. Talk about CHEAP.  While on the phone with some of these Billboard companies I asked questions like “how many people pass the sign in a given month” (impressions) and they would give me their best guess.  See, companies that place Billboards have to know their numbers.  And if they don’t… Then their no good.

Anyways… After some more research I thought I would start out advertising on a bus… So I jumped in with $1000.

The bus company I went with was “trimet”.  They are the mass transportation providers in the Portland Oregon area.  I used to work for Trimet when I was in highschool.  So I contacted a few people that I know still worked there and I got in contact with their marketing department.  Sure enough… Trimet offered many different marketing plans.  I just had to pay for the banner creation and placement for a 30 day period.

I found that my $1000 could grab 3 banners roughly 6′ wide by 2′ high for 30 days.  That didn’t include the actual banner design. So I had my banner created and placed on 3 different buses.

The trimet marketing department estimated that a banner placed on the right side of the bus would be seen about 300,000 times in 30 days.  That means that my banner would would receive 300,000 impressions in any given month. Now, I had 3 banners placed.  Thats a total of 900,000 impressions combined.

For my $1000 spent and my 900,000 impressions received I spent a total of $0.001 per impression.  If I had continued to use the banners then the cost would go down as I would not need to pay for more banners.

Okay so we’ve figured out the cost of my advertising… Now let me give you some hints on promoting other people’s offers. You have to be careful how you promote when it comes to billboards or other mobile advertising.  If I was to promote a netflix offer I couldn’t just put up a netflix ad.  Instead I had to tailor the advertisement in such a way that people would want to go to my landing page instead of the traditional netflix page.  To combat this you can create your advertisement with the city in mind.  For example, Portland is known for rain. So… every one of of my advertisements played on the rainy portland days.

My banners looked like they were washing away from the rain AND the URL was memorable to Portlanders. I won’t give you the exact URL but here is an idea of what I used… “StuckInsideWithNetflix.com”.  Do you get it?  People are stuck inside because of the rain… and they have netflix to watch videos!

Anytime you can humor your audience you will grab their trust!

My landing page had quite a few hits. In the 30 days that I had the advertisements running I had approximately 10,000 hits which equated to roughly 1.1% clickthrough rate. And my actual landing page was just a HUGE banner… And honestly… I had it stuff the netflix cookie onto the visitor incase they decided to leave and visit netflix direct.

So let me talk to you a little about what I made that first month.  I spent a total of about $1000 so in order for me to make a profit I had to convert roughly 45 people to break even.  To be honest with you… I didn’t make my goal… I was short of my original spend by $100. BUT … that was ok and here is why…

If you remember we spent $500 to create the actual ads.  This was a cost that I didn’t have to spend month after month.  Instead I just have to spend about $500 each month that I want the advertisements to continue running. So in two months if my profit remains the same I would have spent a total of $1500 and made $1800… That is only $300 profit for two months… But what about three months?  Or 4? $2000 spend for 3 months with roughly $2700 profit! $2500 spend for 4 months with roughly $3600 profit.

Do you see how you can benefit from this?? It may take a while but that is only because you have initial costs to create the actual ads.  You don’t have to pay for new ads every month… You can re-use ads month after month until you want to change up your campaign.

So… If you haven’t looked into advertising on a Billboard or some sort of Mobile advertisement I would highly suggest you give it a shot… Just remember… If you don’t risk it you won’t make it.

Kris Trujillo is an internet marketing veteran and writes CashTactics.net

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I am an avid reader of ZacJohnson.com.  I can’t explain why.  It’s like a train wreck that I can’t look away from.  The blog is horrible.  Zac never writes about ANYTHING.  All he does is take money from networks, hold stupid ass contests between outing peoples landing pages and explaining how Flogs work.  You can probably learn more from analyzing John Chow’s bowel movements then you can from a Zac Johnson post.

Does any blog really need 24 ads on its home page, not including all the promotional crap within the posts? (Yes, I counted).

Zac’s newest post is about a Gary Vaynerchuk billboard he saw on the way to a New Jersey Nets game.  He ponders whether billboards are effective advertising or not.  Rather then actually giving any info about billboard or outdoor advertising, he just writes a retarded post that offers NO VALUE.  Yea yea he’s supposed to ask Gary some questions about how it’s doing for him but I assure you, you will gain nothing from that interview.

Well…Ad Hustler likes to actually give away information that can make YOU money.  I’ve asked one of the most trusted bloggers in the industry (as well as my good friend) to do a guest post case study on a billboard advertising campaign that they recently ran.  The post will be up within 12 hours.  Enjoy.

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This is NOT a Paid Review

“Trust Agents” is written by Chris Brogan & Julien Smith.  Both of these guys are social media veterans who have ran the conference circuit as speakers.  Typically, guys with bios like that would bore the hell out of me as that description lends to guys who have big heads, are blowhards and don’t actually practice what they preach.  Chris & Julien however, have written a compelling book about the mechanics of developing trust on the web.

The process of becoming a trusted authority on a topic is not an accident.  It can be broken down into a series of actions that can be repeated for results every time.  “Trust Agents” describes these steps so that you can take your own actions and become a Trust Agent.  In my opinion this book can benefit two types of people:

Someone Who Wants To Be A Trusted Authority Within Their Niche

Let’s face it.  Every niche has their “gurus” and trusted authority figures.  People within that niche strive to become these figures.  If you are one of those people, this book gives a great explanation of how to achieve your goals.

Affiliate Marketers Who Want To Sell More Effectively

Although the book does not specifically speak about this, the concepts that are taught can easily be ported into affiliate marketing.  Making affiliate sales involves developing trust with your prospects.  Using the concepts explained in “Trust Agents” you can better understand what builds trust and put it to action.

Overall I think that “Trust Agents” was well worth reading.  It can be a little long winded at times but understanding the concepts of what builds trust on the web is vital for those who want to operate in the space.

Have you read “Trust Agents?”  What did you think of it?

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