Over the years I have been asked many times what the best traffic ad network is to buy traffic to my website.
The Truth is, There is no one traffic source that is best for everyone.
Some people will succeed with a source of income while others will not.
What is Paid Traffic?
Paid traffic sources refer to visitors who view a website that was created by a paid advertisement campaign. Paid traffic is most common through Pay per Click (PPC), however, it can also include banners, ads, pop-ups and video ads.
Paid traffic is used by advertisers to get new customers, leads, and sales. However, it’s usually faster than other forms, but comes with a higher risk because of the cost.
You Want to Be a Success with Paid Traffic?
Why you should use paid traffic:
- Demographic targeting allows advertisers place ads in front visitors most likely to purchase.
- It’s quick to set up and you can start receiving traffic immediately
- Reach an audience that you might not otherwise be able to reach
- If there are any issues, you can stop receiving traffic
It’s quite surprising, to me, how few business owners actually take advantage of paid traffic. There is always risk when running a paid traffic campaign. If you do it correctly, you can make sustainable revenue that you otherwise wouldn’t have.
What is Paid Traffic?
Paid traffic can be purchased via an ad network, or ad exchange. Advertisers are charged on either a Cost per Click (CPC), or Cost Per Mille(CPM) basis. Advertisers have the option to select different targeting parameters such as demographic data and keywords.
Campaign budgets determine how much advertisers spend on paid traffic. Budgets can be set for daily or lifetime.
Payed traffic has many benefits
Every traffic source is unique and each audience engages in different ways. Youtube is an example of a unique audience that watches videos for many different reasons.
You must understand that all visitors to Youtube share one thing: they want to consume. They want to consume, Video content. Youtube won’t likely work for your website or offer if it doesn’t contain video content.
YouTube is the best place to be if you have a lot of videos that convert visitors to leads.
Brent, I am starting a website. How do I determine which traffic source is best for me? It’s simple.Test
Which source works for you?
Get it now
There are many traffic sources available. Not all traffic sources should be taken as equal. Although it may not have the most comprehensive list of internet sources, it is one of the most useful.
These traffic sources can be used to drive traffic to many different types of products.
What is Paid Search?
Paid search allows search engines to show ads in sponsored listing based on the keywords that visitors are searching for.
This method of paid traffic works in a Pay-Per Click (PPC), meaning that advertisers only pay when visitors click on an ad. Advertisers have several targeting options, depending on the keywords searched and the previous actions taken by the visitor.
1. Google Ads
Pros
There is a lot of traffic. Google has a lot of traffic. 75.2 percent, Mobile is not included in the search market. There are tons of ways to optimize your campaigns.
Scale your campaign once you have identified the winning metrics. Google Ads is the best place to get this paid inventory if you are looking to scale your campaign with a large budget.
Cons
Highly competitive and costly as hell. For more competitive industries, we’re talking about over $100 per click. They are very strict about what is allowed on their network. If you don’t comply with the rules, there is a high likelihood of your account being suspended.
Conclusion
Adwords is a term that almost everyone knows. Adwords is a huge market share and can be used to scale your business.
Adwords is not recommended for anyone who is new to paid traffic. Why? You can easily lose your budget within minutes if you make a mistake. Adwords offers remarketing which is very powerful.
2. YouTube
Pros
YouTube is the second largest search engine in the entire world. You are likely to be surprised that I consider YouTube a paid source of search traffic.
YouTube has a lot of traffic and is still quite affordable. My cost per visitor has dropped to $.02 CPC.
It’s not often that you can get search traffic for this low a price. You can not only buy YouTube traffic with banner ads but you can also run video ads.
Cons
YouTube’s audience is different from other search engines, as I have mentioned. This means that you must have YouTube video content to drive traffic.
For companies who have never made a video before, this may be a problem. 75% of your visitors won’t even watch 30 seconds of your video, according to my experience.
Conclusion
YouTube is the best place to find kick-ass content. YouTube traffic is inexpensive and abundant, so I have successfully managed several campaigns.
Make sure you include a call-to-action in every video. Try to grab their attention within the first five to ten seconds. You don’t need to spend too much time introducing your content. Just get right into the meat.
3. Bing Ads (Updated).
Pros
Yahoo and Bing have teamed up. You can create campaigns on Bing Ads and appear on Yahoo.com.
Google traffic is usually of a higher quality, but much less expensive than traffic. Bing is flexible and will approve almost any campaign.
Cons
Google can only provide about 1% of traffic. Their interface is a mess and should be updated. Once you have a winner, it is difficult to scale up your campaign.
Conclusion
If Paid Search is what you think is best for your business, I recommend that you test Bing ads. You have a better chance of finding a winner and it will be cheaper.
But don’t expect that you will be spending more than $100-200 per day on most niches. You can test new paid traffic campaigns with Bing. It offers high quality traffic at a fraction the cost of other sources.
4. Yahoo Gemini
Pros
Gemini’s clean interface makes it easy to set up campaigns. Gemini is still relatively new but I have already managed several successful campaigns with it.
It’s easy to get clicks on Display at.05 CPC in America. Yahoo inventory is often populated by older people who are more financially savvy and purchase more frequently.
Cons
Yahoo seems to be following the lead of Google by restricting what they allow. The CPC for Gemini is very expensive for both desktop and mobile inventory if you want to run search campaigns.
Conclusion
Gemini is still not well-known by advertisers. This has its benefits. Gemini is a great option for those who are already running Google & Bing campaigns and looking to increase their traffic.
5. Yandex
Pros
Quality traffic at a low price. Yandex is used by very few advertisers. Clear interface with many marketing tools.
Cons
Yandex will not have much volume unless you are looking to advertise in Russia.
Conclusion
Yandex has helped me to run quite a lot of traffic. Overall, I am happy with the platform. If you have already used Bing and Google to test your traffic, then Yandex is a great option for diversifying your traffic through paid search. Yandex could be a good option.
6. Baidu
Pros
Huge Asian search traffic.
Cons
Baidu is very difficult to use unless you can speak Mandarin. There is not much traffic from outside the Asian Market.
Conclusion
Baidu has never allowed me to run traffic. Each attempt has proved difficult. Mobile Baidu has huge potential, despite the growing Chinese market.
What is social media traffic?
Banner and text ads are a great way to increase social media traffic.
Social media companies have the ability to collect lots of information from their users, which they can then give their advertisers.
Social media traffic offers some of the most targeted demographics you will find. This allows you to drill down to see which visitors convert into customers.
Marketers looking to increase brand awareness through sharing shareable and useful content can use social media traffic.
Facebook Ads
Pros
Facebook was relaunched in 2014.1.19 billion active monthly users. Just like Google Adwords but with Facebook traffic, you can scale up your campaigns like mad.
Facebook has excellent demographic targeting, which allows you to target people who are already interested in your industry or product.
Cons
Facebook, like Adwords is very competitive. Prices are high because of this.
Your ads can also become very stale depending on how targeted your demographics are. Your CTR will drop, and your CPM/CPC will increase.
Conclusion
Facebook has been a great platform for me personally. I have a love-hate relationship. It’s amazing that I can scale up a successful idea if it works.
Due to the nature of traffic, running a Facebook campaign correctly will require a lot of time and resources. Facebook loves to remove redirects so it can be difficult to track campaigns using some marketing tools.
Snapchat Ads
Pros
Snapchat may be something you’ve never used before. Snapchat is smaller than Facebook, but it has almost 200 million daily users.
This means that there is plenty of traffic available for everyone.
Snapchat’s current audience is dominated by US teens. If your brand or offer caters to this audience, it’s worth checking out.
Cons
Snapchat is a great international traffic source, but other GEOs that I have tested have shown terrible results.
Snapchat recently has become more stringent about what is allowed on their platform. A soft ban will be issued if you have at least 3-4 disapprovals of ads before they are approved. Any ads you try to run after that will be automatically disapproved.
Conclusion
Snapchat is not well-known as a traffic source. Snapchat is a popular traffic source. I see the same 3-5 advertisers purchasing the majority of my traffic when I use the app.
Snapchat is a great traffic source. However, certain verticals may do better than others. I recommend Snapchat.
Snapchat is a mobile-only application, so all traffic you buy will be from smartphones and tablets.
You will need to hire or learn from our team if you want to run campaigns on Snapachat.
Instagram Ads
Oh yes, Instagram! Do you remember the “picture website” Facebook purchased for USD 1 billion?
It’s one of the newest social networks that allows you to advertise.
Some demographic data include:
- 73% of users aged between 15-35 years old
- 48% are professionals, 46% have degrees.
- Brand engagement on Twitter and Facebook is far higher than on Facebook.
Pinterest Ads
There is currently a waitlist for “Promoted Pins” but it is possible to join. However, Pinterest is the most popular social network that is almost exclusively female.
Twitter Ads
Pros
Twitter, with 288 million monthly active users in 2014, is smaller than Facebook. However, I have seen Twitter attract much more quality traffic.
There is also a lot of opportunity, as Twitter has been releasing more ads products in 2015. Twitter, like Facebook has amazing demographic targeting. Twitter recently added keyword targeting.
Cons
Twitter’s lack of ad types is the only problem I have encountered with them so far. As I mentioned, they have been really pushing for new ad products in this year’s cons.
Twitter ads can be expensive so make sure you have enough money to convert demographic data.
Conclusion
Twitter is a great traffic source and social network. It’s one of my favorite traffic sources in 2015, and I’d even say that it was the reason I was so excited. If you haven’t started Twitter, I strongly recommend it.
Linkedin Ads
Pros
Linkedin is the best place to advertise B2B. Like many social media, Linkedin offers excellent targeting for demographics.
Linkedin is a great place to promote your product and get it in front of decision makers. For a few niches, the traffic quality is exceptional.
Cons
This is one of the best social traffic sources I know. A $25 campaign yielded only two clicks. Unless you have a high lifetime value for every customer you bring in to Linkedin, it’s unlikely you will be able to make Linkedin profitable.
Conclusion
I have only done a handful of campaigns on Linkedin and although I did see conversions, traffic was too costly for what I am doing. Linkedin is ideal for recruiting agencies and B2B SaaS companies.
Reddit Ads
Pros
Reddit has174 Million MAU, There are many gamers and tech geeks among them. Reddit traffic is high-quality if your product/service appeals to this audience.
Reddit’s unique feature is that you are the only advertiser in a time slot when you purchase ad space. It is easy to see if traffic is working for your business, since there are less variables such as new advertisers stealing your data.
Cons
Reddit does not have many targeting options. You can only select what is known as a sub-Reddit to target your audience. This is basically category targeting, but it makes optimizing campaigns extremely difficult.
Conclusion
Reddit, unlike other social networks is community-driven. It is also a strong supporter of privacy. Reddit is a community-driven social network. If the community doesn’t like your advertisement, it could backfire.
Reddit’s lack of targeting options and privacy for its users is another reason. Split testing different landing pages is the only way to optimize a campaign. Reddit is not a good place to promote gaming or tech-related products.
What is mobile traffic?
Mobile traffic refers to traffic only for mobile devices, as the name implies. Most mobile ad inventory comes from websites and apps. Advertisements can take the form of text, banners, and even multi-media like video.
Some networks take advantage of the built-in features such as push notifications. If you want to drive traffic to your website or mobile app, or run click-to-call ads, then mobile ads are the perfect solution.
InMobi
Pros
InMobi is the best way to manage mobile traffic. 1 Billion Monthly Uniques, You’ll love it. InMobi offers exclusive deals with large app publishers that you won’t find anywhere else. InMobi has high-quality traffic in India and the Asian pacific with an easy-to-use interface.
Cons
InMobi is not a good choice unless you are spending a lot of money. Their traffic is largely from exchanges, since Google’s Double Click.
For example, advertising in the United States will result in a large portion of your traffic being 2nd-tier. InMobi offers many targeting options, but no dynamic tokens that allow you to easily track what is working.
Conclusion
InMobi is the place to go if you want to do app installs. Be aware that tier 2 apps will generate the majority of your traffic, but they have lower quality traffic.
In most regions. InMobi has representatives available. Be prepared to spend a lot to access their top-tier traffic.
Media for the Millennials
Pros
It is able to deliver much more quality traffic to the US and Canada than any other network on this list. Their review process is thorough.
This results in higher quality traffic for users. It is easy to use the platform and create a campaign. If you are able to find a winner, you can scale up your campaigns quickly.
Cons
Traffic prices can be more expensive than other items on the list. You won’t get warm reception if you don’t own the products that you are promoting.
Traffic comes mainly from the same RTBs that all the others fight over. Traffic prices can be more expensive than other RTBs. You won’t get warm reception if you don’t own the products that you are promoting.
Traffic comes mainly from the same exchanges that all the other RTBs compete over.
Conclusion
This network is for app developers who want to expand their reach in the US or Canada.
You won’t be able to get an agent on the phone unless you spend a lot of money. With several campaigns, I have had great success with millennial media.
AirPush
Pros
Airpush’s interface is one of the most intuitive I have ever seen. Their AirDSP also offers some of the most accurate targeting in the industry.
This allows real-time optimization right down to the device level. Airpush has also recently introduced a number of new products, including abstract banners. These will have higher click-through rates that standard mobile ads.
Cons
Since 2013, when Google stopped pushing ads, Airpush seems to have been run by a small crew.
My campaigns took as much as a week to go live. Support tickets can take up to a day.
Conclusion
Airpush is an excellent place to begin if you are looking for low-cost traffic sources to test your mobile campaigns. Airpush’s easy-to-use interface and real time optimizations will benefit you, provided you don’t mind slow approvals and lack of support.
TapJoy
Pros
Tapjoy is a great way to increase your app installs. Tapjoy can be used to increase your installs, which will help your apps rank organically on the Play Store.
For US traffic, I have averaged between.30 and.40 cents per install. However, you can get much lower numbers if you target Tier 2 and 3.
Cons
Incent traffic is low quality. You can expect a substantial % of your installed base to remove your app within a few hours. As many companies do not allow incenting, make sure you check with the company that you are sending traffic to.
Conclusion
Although I don’t like the idea of incent traffic, it works. Tapjoy is the best place to go if you want to quickly build a user base for your app. Tapjoy can send you up to 10,000+ installs per day. That’s nothing to be proud of.
What is push traffic?
Push traffic works in the same way as receiving push notifications on your phone from an app, social network, or other app. Push notifications sent to subscribers on the push list are actually ads.
Push traffic is a well-established feature of the internet. However, push traffic’s focus has changed in the past year.
Before 2014, push notifications traffic was mainly from Android apps that sent ads to their users.
However, many browsers began allowing web push notifications in 2019. Ad networks took advantage of this and started selling web push notification traffic.
Admaven
Pros
Ad maven offers both push traffic as well as pop traffic. This includes desktop and mobile traffic. Their push traffic pricing is reasonable, but their quality has been excellent for most geos that I have tested.
I have found the team to be helpful and they have responded promptly to my questions.
This may seem like common business sense. However, many affiliate networks and sources have been failing to communicate with their users in recent months. Sources like Snapchat, Google and Google are just a few examples. It’s great to know that there is a cause you can turn to for help when you need it.
Cons
Their traffic is in “spurts.” My bid may be set at the current recommended bid, or even higher. However, sometimes my traffic will slow down and then come back hot and heavy just a few hours later.
For US-based marketers to contact support, the only con I can think is. Their office hours are at night because they are based in Israel.
This is something I am used to seeing with many traffic sources. However, it’s something you should be aware of if your campaign takes up most of your time during the day.
Conclusion
Admaven is a great tool to test push traffic.
What is Discovery Traffic?
Content discovery is a relatively new source of traffic. Traffic to content discovery comes from text or banner ads that are usually related the content the visitor is currently reading.
These ads are often found under “Around the internet” or “Related articles.” This is a great way for large brands like CNN to drive traffic to your website.
OutBrain
Pros
OutBrain is more popular than Google and Facebook. This means that once you find a winner, there is a lot of scale potential.
OutBrain receives high-quality traffic from many brand websites. It’s also easy to set up your campaign and get it running.
Cons
OutBrain is the king and queen of the mountain so their prices reflect that fact. Their engine will display your ads to the most relevant users. They don’t offer any targeting options.
Conclusion
Look no further if you are looking for traffic sources with serious volume. OutBrain is ideal for business owners who want to promote their content on trust and popular websites. This is a relatively new resource that I highly recommend you take advantage of before your competitors.
What is redirect traffic?
Domain redirect traffic is also known as domain traffic. It refers to traffic that originates from parked domains. Domainers buy expired domains with traffic coming from old links or content on the internet. These domain owners then sell the traffic to you.
Domain redirect traffic is a great source of traffic.
Domain redirects are also very affordable. This is a great option for marketers who want to run campaigns for customers who are ready to buy products or services.
Tonic Ads
Pros
Tonic receives over 1 billion clicks per month and has a minimum CPC at $.002 per redirect. You read that right ladies and gentlemen, large amounts of traffic are cheap!
Tonic offers many targeting options such as keyword/category and GEO. DNTX has been a great tool for me. I have had many successful campaigns with it with ROI’s exceeding 1000%.
The traffic quality is excellent for the price. DNTX is also one of the few networks that offers instant approvals for campaigns – I have never seen it.
Cons
DNTX has a few flaws. I wish they had more targeting options. Their traffic numbers begin to drop outside the US.
Conclusion
DNTX is a great option if you are looking for dirt-cheap traffic with decent quality.
ZeroPark
Pros
ZeroPark offers a great interface and many targeting options. You can also get a lot of traffic at very affordable prices. Their platform offers real-time price bidding for various metrics.
Cons
Traffic can be very expensive and volatile. It can take some time for review times to complete.
Conclusion
ZeroPark is a great option if you want to increase your redirect traffic. They also own the Voluum mobile tracker.
What is Pop Traffic?
Pop traffic is generated by advertisements that are opened in parallel to the website they are trying to reach. Two ways can this traffic be generated:
The site has the code to generate the popup and it is physically on the property. The second is when a toolbar on the browser generates the popup.
Many pop networks let you target keywords and domains to help you determine when the popup should happen.
Popads
Pros
PopAds offers tons of traffic in many geos, both for desktop and mobile. Traffic can be purchased for as little as $1 per 1,000, making it an affordable option for those looking for traffic.
Cons
PopAds, like most pop sources has low-quality traffic. They are also considered blind networks and will only pass an ID for a website, not the actual referrer.
This is also where many people who are new to paid traffic come to. There are between 300-400 advertisers in each country you will need to compete with.
Conclusion
Your offer should be easy to complete and “impulse-driven” such as Sweeps or Email submissions, App installations, etc. PopAds is a great choice for you.
With the support of our team, learn how to run campaigns.
Adcash
Pros
Adcash is the most popular domain in many countries. This is because they have tons of traffic. Adcash was once a managed platform for buying, but it recently launched its self-serve platform.
Cons
Adcash is similar to other blind traffic sources. It has a lot low-quality traffic. It will take a lot of money to determine which placements aren’t working and blacklist them accordingly.
Conclusion
Cash is an excellent place to start if you’re already having success with your campaigns and want to scale them on a larger source.
Limit your variables to the extent possible or you could quickly burn through a marketing budget.
Popcash
Pros
There is tons of inventory at a very low price.
Cons
Traffic of lower quality, usually from adult and torrent sites.
Conclusion
PopCash works in a similar way to Popads. It even buys and trades traffic with them. Your offer should be easy to complete and “impulse-driven”, such as Sweeps or Email submissions, App installations, and so on.
**Popcash Dynamic Tokens/Macros/Scripts**
Tokens Description Site ID %cc% Country code Advertise on Popcash
WigetMedia
Pros
It is one of the most intuitive interfaces I have ever used. It is much more quality-oriented than other pop-under networks.
Cons
Self-service requires a $500 minimum deposit
Conclusion
Wigetmedia is an amazing network that has yet to be saturated. Advertise on Wigetmedia
Useful Resources & Tools
Paid Tools
Perplexity : A spy tool is essential if you want to be successful in pop and redirect traffic. Adplexity is my favorite because it allows you to see which offers you have, which landing pages you have, and what traffic sources you have. It also allows you to easily download landing pages by clicking a button.
Is paid traffic a good SEO tool?
Paid traffic can indirectly impact Search Engine Optimization (SEO), but only through brand awareness. Paid traffic won’t have an impact on your search ranking directly.
Which traffic source is the most lucrative?
Depending on the business, each paid traffic source may provide different results. These five paid traffic sources are worth trying: Google Ads – Paid traffic for both display and search is available.
- Facebook Ads
- Snapchat Ads
- Quora Ads
- LinkedIn Ads