Paid Top Ten Listings

Paid Top Ten listings are similar to Paid Inclusion, but distinctly different in the costs and benefits. Some search engines (or search engine networks) will offer a flat monthly or quarterly rate for top 10 listings.

Whereas with a directory listing you pay for a single site listing, with Paid Top Ten, you pay for keywords, and a single ad. You choose specific keywords, and you get traffic based on searches on those words. It is important then that you choose good keywords, because good ones that get you lots of traffic will cost you the same as bad ones that bomb.

It is different from Pay Per Click, because you pay a flat rate per month or year. It makes it quite a bit simpler to budget, but more challenging to track.

You have to make sure that your keywords give you CUSTOMERS, not just window shoppers. That the traffic actually increases your revenue from the site. If it doesn't, then no matter how much traffic it brings, it won't be worth it. Keywords that bring lower traffic amounts, but higher income will actually be a better buy.

Since you only get one set of keywords for your fee, you need to choose well. You will have to pay an additional fee if you want additional keywords.

Some listings are for Search Engine Networks. This gives you broad exposure among a variety of smaller search engines. While this increases the traffic potential, it also makes tracking the clicks more difficult, because you cannot just check your traffic stats and see whether you are getting traffic from one source - they come from a whole range of obscure and hard to identify sites. You will be able to tell though if your traffic average per day goes up - for some networks, an increase of 10 to 20 hits per day is typical - the price for the listing is low though, and even that little is worth the fee.

Top 10 are not worth paying for if you already get top listings. They are helpful for a new site though.

The cost to benefit issue is fairly simple. IF you can make enough additional profit from the site to cover the cost of the listings, then it is worth repeating. If not, then try something else.

Do a net search before you try them, and see if you can find some comments on forums about whether or not they worked for other people. This is no guarantee that they'll work for you, but you can often get a feel for the potential by reading comments from other users.

Flat rate fees can often be a more affordable option for new businesses, and if you choose well, and manage them intelligently, they can get you traffic at a far lower rate than Pay Per Click. Do the math - at $.05 per click (a conservative amount!) you can spend $1 per day for 20 clicks. If you pay $4 per month for a top 10 listing or paid inclusion (yes, there are options at that price), you only need to get 80 clicks before you are already ahead.

The down side is that if you do not get that many clicks, you end up wasting money. The potential for losing is not terribly high, but it is there. And with Paid Top Ten listings, there is a ceiling to how much traffic they are going to bring you - you can tweak your ad, or adjust your keywords, but you cannot pay more and get more like you can with Pay Per Click, unless you can find another keyword and ad combination that works well.

They are worth considering, and worth doing some math to figure out how much you have to sell, or how much you have to earn from Ad Revenue in order to afford it though. If the target is reasonable, then give it a whirl and see whether it works!

Written by Laura Wheeler