Paid Traffic Vs Free Traffic, Which One Works Best For You?

I like Blog Commenting and Article Marketing because it truly works. Yea it use to carry more power years ago but its still a great way to get traffic. I have ranked sites up to Page one of Google with Article Marketing alone.

Social Bookmarks help greatly. I love using Social Bookmarks. I also helped rank other peoples websites with Articles and Social Bookmarks.

Free traffic is both the best, most responsive, most profitable traffic (article marketing traffic ) I've ever had, in any niche, at any time, and the worst, least responsive, least profitable traffic (search-engine traffic ) I've ever had, in any niche, at any time.

All the paid traffic I've ever used has been somewhere in-between those two extremes.

It could be argued that there's no such thing as "free traffic", really: you're just "paying" for it with your time, effort, energy and skill-usage instead of with money.

An interesting perspective. I think I tend to agree, actually, if I've understood you correctly. It's always been my perception that, in general, "paid traffic" is not as scalable as its proponents typically claim, while "free traffic" tends not to have so many restrictions.

Well, not necessarily: there are forms of paid traffic that don't require webites at all, you know? (I'm thinking of "solo ads" as an example).

Yes, this is true. You're just paying with "skills"/"effort" rather than with money?

No, sorry, but this isn't necessarily right at all, Vince.

You're just conflating "free traffic" with "SEO traffic", there.

There are loads of kinds of free traffic that have nothing to do with Google at all.

"Paid traffic" and "SEO traffic" is not a meaningful distinction between traffic-types. The reality is that traffic from search engines can be either paid or free, and traffic that isn't from search engines can also be either paid or free. Trying to classify traffic as either "SEO" or "paid" is both confused and confusing. The reality is that it's just a "category error".

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I agree with your statement that Free Traffic does not have such a huge restriction like Paid Traffic. Paid Traffic is a way to gain instant and sometimes targeted traffic. It depends on the circumstances. Do you solely rely on Free traffic or do you do both?

Thanks for your insight. Google's update did lower my websites ranking from page 1 to page 9. But 14 days later without any work, my website went right back to page 1. So yea it can be very unreliable at times.

You also pointed out what many people need to know. And that is to build a list. That will be the best traffic you can get.

I completely agree. There's a whole new psychological dimension social has added to the game. Of course, paid or free doesn't really matter if your site doesn't convert. I'm still of the opinion that it's generally a good idea to test conversions with some paid traffic then scale for the long term with free methods once the conversions warrant the effort involved.

*Applause* Yes, its all about the right method and what you want to do. I currently use Paid traffic as I have sources that do bring in great results. But its all about testing and seeing which one actually converts best. I get questions all the time like, "How do you build quality traffic?" I start threads or point people to threads I feel will actually help them. Or if I have some free time, I will talk to them and help them find the answer that they need.

Top Traffic Methods I use:

* Video Marketing
* Article Marketing
* PPV
* Solo Ads

Solo Ads is one of the best ways to build traffic and a list. I think Solo Ads is the number one payed method that actually works. Solo Ads is the main traffic source for me as its really targeted. But their are some non payed traffic methods that in the long term, become powerful. Appreciate your insight.

Thanks for the share and you pointed out something that I wasn't really thinking of at the time. For those that have the time, go for it. For those that don't then paid traffic is the best option for you. But it all comes down to testing what works.

And I am just curious, out of PPC, Ad Space, and Offline Advertising, do you know which one does the most for you? I use PPC, Ad space, and Solo ads. Solo Ads are the best for my work.

Very True. But for some people, one does work better than the other. And the ones that works best is the one your going to focus more on. But your right. Do you do both? If so, which one works best for you?

You should try it and see if it pushes your results higher for the best. Paid isn't for everyone but its worth a try. Its cool that your main traffic is from Social Media and Search Engines. And if your profiting greatly, that's a plus.

I have done Free for many years, but in the past year or two I have really switched over to doing mostly Paid traffic.

Solo ads and PPC mainly. To me Time is money and some of the FREE methods I was performing to get traffic in the past were way too time costly !!



- Robert Andrew

It can go either way honestly, some people are getting much better results with non payed traffic then they do with payed traffic. So it depends on the business model and what works best for that person from testings methods.

Agreed.

When i first started out, i started with EZA and article marketing. And i actually looked DOWN on paid advertising. Sometimes i would write 10 articles per day and upload to EZA, only to receive nominal hits one day, then 50+ clicks other days. But it was never consistent. Then when Panda hit, the articles had no more purpose for posting on the site.

But with paid advertising, i get fast results, i can test on the fly, and it's pretty much predictable - and reliable.

Right, I see much better results in PPC and Solo Ads than in any other method. However, I do both free and Paid. If I had to choose, I would go with paid as its where most of my traffic come from.

I am seeing a lot of people go with paid traffic or Free. So its a close one here. I actually expected most people to say Paid to be honest. But Paid traffic does take a long time however, if done right you can get alot of traffic given you have the right method and time to do it. Do you outsource or use both?