A History of Advertising

History of Advertising

The Ancient Greeks and Romans had advertising, did you know that? Oh, yes. They would print their ads on papyrus and circulate them by hand or put them up on a wall for public viewing.

If you're interested, you could go to ancient Arabia or even to Pompeii to see still existence remains of advertising there.

These people put the 'history' in the history of advertising.

Boy, have we come a long way since that time. We no longer use paintings on walls to promote business and people, we have modern communications and Google for that.

This interesting article about the history of advertising is a summary of sorts. It takes you through ad development and is quite enjoyable. You'd think it a very long read but it's not. It's more like an abridged version presented in an entertaining fashion. It's worth taking a few minutes to read. Who knows, you might even learn something.

Read more of the History of Advertising....

Traffic Exchanges and AdSense

There's a note at the top of this blog about NOT putting AdSense on any sites that you want to use in traffic exchanges.

The reason that I stress this periodically is because people who are new to AdSense or online traffic may not realize the harm they can cause to their earnings and their relationship with Google.

The Dangers of Mixing Traffic Exchanges and AdSense

• Google will not pay you your AdSense earnings
• You may get your AdSense account suspended
• It has the potential to affect your Google rankings

Google considers the clicks their ads receive via traffic exchanges to be 'illegal'. The reason for that is quite simple. They feel that the people viewing your ads are not organic, targeted traffic. They have not sought out the product or service that you are advertising and therefore are wasting the advertiser's resources. Folks pay Google to show those ads that appear on your site, so they are intended to have the highest conversion rates possible. If they are not being shown to the intended target audience, the impression is deemed wasted. Google gets testy about that.

If you are already committing this Google sin, take heart. You may be able to redeem yourself and get back into their good graces. Remove the AdSense code from your site if you want to continue using traffic exchanges. You can add it again when you are ready to use 'legal' means of generating your traffic, such as classifieds, Adwords or forum signatures.

If you have already received notice that your earnings or account is in danger, remedy the situation then contact Google. You may be able to reinstate your account. Many people have been in this position, accidently or intentionally, and have been able to rectify the situation.

What You Need to Know About Traffic Exchanges if You're a Small Business Owner

The Pros and Cons of Traffic Exchanges

Many home business owners have little or no advertising budget, but still need exposure to help increase sales. There are methods of spreading the word about your business that cost you nothing but a few minutes of your time. (You can refer to this article on advertising your home business for an example) Traffic exchanges fall into this category, but be aware of the Pros and Cons.

Read the full article here

Places To Run Your Ad For Free

This is a great article that puts several free advertising resource links in one convenient place, along with a brief description about each site. Just click on the title of this post to view.

Traffic Exchanges – Another Free Resource

How are you promoting your web site or blog? Are you taking advantage of free traffic exchanges? If not, you may be missing out on a great resource for site exposure and traffic.

Most traffic exchanges have the option of an upgraded paid membership, but if you don’t have the money, don’t worry about it. The freebie versions still give you tons of advertising. In fact, there are a few other benefits:

• Search engine love. Traffic exchanges have tons of incoming and outgoing links. It’s the stuff that makes search engines giddy with joy. Not literally, of course, but all the links plus all the constantly freshening content helps improve everyone’s standing in searches.

• The more popular the traffic exchange, the higher the page ranking. The higher the page ranking, the more new members join and view your web page.

• When you find a free traffic exchange that works for you, all your conversions are pure profit. The only thing that you invested is your time. Granted, that’s worth something, but are you willing to do it for increased sales?

Really, the only way to know which traffic exchange is best for you and your business is to try a few of them. Try at least a few.

It’s best if you’re offering a product or service that is different somehow from what the herd is showing. If there are a lot of people with exactly the same website or product you have, your chances of conversion success drop substantially. You may want to move on and try another exchange, or change your web page or your offering. Stand out from the crowd and get noticed.

Something of extreme importance to note – please pay attention here – DO NOT USE TRAFFIC EXCHANGES IF YOU ARE RUNNING ADSENSE ON YOUR WEBSITE!!! I cannot stress this enough. Google considers the clicks from traffic exchanges to be ‘illegal’ clicks. You will lose all of your AdSense earnings and possibly get banned.