Pixel Ads: The Next Big Thing in Web Marketing? - My Experiment
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My Experiment
I hold the opinion that it really is nothing more than a phase, but what the heck; I decided to give it a try. After all, a Pixel Ad is so inexpensive to purchase that anyone could do it. Since several sites are offering freebies, I decided to go this route just to see how it turned out. So I checked out PixelWars.com, which is basically a directory of sites that sell Pixel Ads. I found one in the free category, and placed my 6-pixel ad. Over the next few days I’ll watch the traffic, and find out how it goes.
After watching my stats for traffic from the Pixel Ad, I am really surprised to find about 25 visitors after about 2 days. I’m pretty surprised because I didn’t expect my ad to even be found, let alone clicked on. I’ll keep watching it, and see how it goes. Who knows? Perhaps I’ll spend the money for other ads. I guess even if it is a fad, I might as well ride the wave of momentum in the meantime. I’ll keep track of the referrers, as well as the time spent on the site from those clicks, and then compare it to traffic or visitors I receive from other types of advertising that I do.
Several days and analyses later, I’ve determined that while the Pixel Ad has definitely increased my traffic a bit, more so than I would have expected; I have yet to see where it is bringing me qualified traffic, or increasing my ROI or conversion ratios. I am very careful about my advertising, if and when I do it, and there is nothing I can see so far in the site traffic patterns that tell me that this is worth doing just yet. It has only been a week, and like I said earlier, the ad was free, so I certainly will keep it where it is for now, and watch it from time to time.
So my final take on Pixel Ads? I’m really not sure, as it really is too early to tell. It is definitely a novel idea, and seems to be catching on very quickly. There are things this idea has going for it, even if my points of concern I listed above far outweigh the good points. But over all, If I had to make a prediction, I’d have to say that it’ll fizzle out and fade away like a one-hit wonder, and we’ll all sit around and say, “Hey you remember those Pixel Ads? Weren’t they silly?” and “Oh yeah, I remember those!”
Still on the other hand, I could be very wrong. I'd rather have a small ad in a high traffic place than a billboard in the middle of the desert. If the idea takes off, and sites that have high PageRank jump on board the new Pixel Ad Era, pass all kinds of PageRank to the advertisers, and Pixel Ads gain massive targeted traffic and conversion ratios for its advertiser; then I will eat my words politely with a knife and fork, and ask for more. But if the plan falls flat on its face, I’ll be the first to say, “I told you so!”
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