March 9 2017 Updated

What are Traffic Sources?

Wow, there’s a lot of ways to spend money online to help grow your business. Deciding which paid traffic sources to focus on can be pretty overwhelming. Focus is essential when optimizing your marketing mix, so we’ve identified some traffic source that you should master or at least test, before looking elsewhere.

Social Media Traffic

Social media traffic comes in the form of banner and text ads found on some of the most popular websites in the world. Social media companies are able to collect a lot of information about their users and in turn allow their advertisers to use that information. Because of this social media traffic has some of the best demographics targeting you can find. This allows you to drill down and find exactly what type of visitors turn into customers. Social media traffic is perfect for marketers looking to expand their brand awareness by promoting shareable, useful content.

Paid Search

Paid search as the name suggests is traffic that comes from advertisements placed on search engines. These ads usually come in the form of text ads and sometimes banner ads. Paid search allows you to bid on keywords allowing you to advertise to visitors who are actively searching for your product or service. Paid search is a great choice for marketers looking to promote most products and services.

Mobile traffic

Pop traffic, is driven from advertisements that open in parallel with the website they’re trying to reach. This traffic is generated in two ways: The first is when the site physically has the ad code for the popup on their property. The second is when the website visitor has a toolbar or plugin on their browser that is generating the popup. Many pop networks allows you target by keywords or domains as a way to determine when the popup should occur.

Pop Traffic

Pop Traffic

What is Pop Traffic?

Popads

Pros:

PopAds has a ton of traffic in several geos for both desktop & mobile. The traffic can be bought for as low as $1 per 1000 so is for people looking for a ton of traffic for a cheap price.

Cons:

Like most pop sources, PopAds has a ton of low-quality traffic. They’re also considered a blind network and will only pass a website ID as opposed to showing the actual referrer. This is also a source that many people new to running paid traffic flock to, because of this there are 300-400 different advertisers per country that you will have to compete against.

Conclusion:

If your offer is simple to complete and is “impulse” driven such as Sweeps, Email submits, App installs, etc. – PopAds will do very well for you.

Popads Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts

Tokens	Description
[WEBSITEID]	ID of the website that was source of the popunder
[QUALITY]	Quality score of the website which triggered the ad impression
[ADBLOCK]	Set to 1 when visitor uses AdBlock or 0 otherwise
[FORMFACTORNAME]	Form factor name
[BROWSERNAME]	Name of the visitor’s browser
[CATEGORYID]	ID of the category website target
[CATEGORYNAME]	Category name of website target
[ISPNAME]	Name of visitor’s ISP
[OSNAME]	Operating system of visitor
[SCREENRESOLUTION]	Detected screen resolution of the visitor

adcash

Pros:

If you look at the top traffic domains in most countries, you’ll see adcash at the top. Rightly so because they have a TON of traffic. Adcash use to be a managed buy platform but just recently released their self-serve platform.

Cons:

Much like the other blind traffic sources available, adcash has a lot of low-quality traffic. You will have to spend quite a bit of money to find which placements arn’t working for you and blacklist them appropriately.

Conclusion:

If you are already having success and want to scale your campaigns on a larger source, adcash is a great place to be. Just remember to limit your variables as much as possible or you can burn through a marketing budget very quickly.

Adcash Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts

Tokens	Description
[zone]	Zone ID (recommended)
[lang]	User main browser language
[clickid]	Click ID (for server 2 server)
[time]	Time in seconds since Epoch (aka. timestamp) (cache buster)
[campaign]	Current campaign ID in Adcash system

Popcash

Pros:

Tons of inventory available for a very cheap price.

Cons:

Lower quality traffic, generally adult & torrent sites.

Conclusion:

PopCash is very similar to Popads and even buys and sells traffic with them. If your offer is simple to complete and is “impulse” driven such as Sweeps, Email submits, App installs, etc

Popcash Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts

Tokens	Description
%siteid%	Site ID
%cc%	Country Code

wigetmedia

Pros:

One of the best interfaces I’ve used. Has much higher quality traffic than many other pop under networks.

Cons:

Requires a minimum deposit of $500 for self-serve.

Conclusion:

Wigetmedia is a great network, that hasn’t been satruated yet.

WigetMedia Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts

{pid}	The Placement ID the visitor came from.
{adId}	The ID of the ad.
{campaignId}	The ID of the campaign.
{campaignGroupId}	The ID of the campaign group.
{advertiserId}	The ID of the advertiser
{width}	The width of the ad
{height}	The height of the ad
{country}	Two letter country code according to ISO 3166-1
{region}	Region codes. Usually three letters.
{browser}	Browser as string
{os}	Operating System
{transactionId}	The transaction ID can be used in S2S Postbacks for conversion tracking.
{cache_buster}	Random numbers to create a unique url so that browser cache will not be used.
{cost}	The CPM/1000.

TribalFusion

Pros:

Tribal Fusion has a lot more premium publishers than others in the space. They also make it much harder for advertisers to get on, so there is a lot of opportunities.

Cons:

TribalFusion allows their publishers to have multiple popups on a page.

Conclusion:

Desktop Pop Traffic is a dying breed in the age of smart phones and popup blockers. Because of this, however, a lot of advertisers overlook the opportunities. If your product or service is very eye-catching, and an impulse buys, then TriablFusion would be a great addition to your traffic stream.

Mobile traffic

What is Mobile traffic?

As the name suggests mobile traffic is traffic that exclusively for mobile devices. Mobile ad inventory usually comes from mobile apps & websites. The ads can be in the form of banner, text & even multi-media such as video. Some networks even take advantage of features built into the phone such as push notifications. Mobile ads are perfect if you’re looking to drive traffic to your mobile app, website or running click-to-call offers.

inMobi

Pros:

If you’re looking to run mobile traffic then inMobi’s impressive 1 Billion Monthly Uniques is a place you’ll want to be. inMobi has some exclusive deals with some large app publishers that you won’t be able to advertise on anywhere else. inMobi also has super high-quality traffic in India & the Asian pacific all with an easy to use interface.

Cons:

Unless you’re spending some serious volume with inMobi, then you’re going to have a tough time with this network. A large majority of their traffic comes from exchanges since as Google’s Double Click. If you’re advertising in the United States, for example, a large majority of your traffic will be 2nd tier. inMobi also has several different targeting options but have no dynamic tokens to track easily what is working.

Conclusion:

If you’re looking to run app installs, then inMobi is a place you’ll want to check out. Just note that the majority of your traffic will come from teir 2 apps which have much lower quality traffic in most regions. Make sure to get yourself a rep at inMobi and be prepared to have some serious spend to get your hands on their top tier traffic.

millennial media

Pros:

Has much higher quality traffic for the US and Canada than other mobile networks on this list. Since their review process is very strict, it results in a better for the users which means higher quality traffic. The platform is also very easy to navigate and set a campaign up for. Can easily scale your campaigns if you find a winner.

Cons:

Traffic prices are very expensive compared to others on the list. Unless you own the products you’re promoting outside of app installs, don’t expect to get a warm welcome. The majority of traffic is from the same exchanges as all the other RTBs fight over. Traffic prices are very expensive compared to others on the list. Unless you own the products you’re promoting outside of app installs, don’t expect to get a warm welcome. The majority of traffic is from the same exchanges as all the other RTBs fight over.

Conclusion:

This is a perfect network for app developers looking to grow their audience in the US and Canada. Unless you’re spending some serious money, you’ll have trouble getting an ad rep on the phone. I have however had a lot of success with millennialmedia with several of my campaigns.

AirPush

Pros:

Airpush has one of the cleanest interfaces that I’ve seen. They also have some of the best targeting in the industry with their AirDSP. It allows for real-time optimization all the way down to the device level. Airpush also has recently been introducing a lot of great new ad products such as, abstract banners. These will result in higher click-through rates than your standard mobile advertisements.

Cons:

Ever since Google officially killed off push ads back in 2013, Airpush appears to be ran by a skeleton crew. My campaigns have taken as long as a week actually to get set live and support tickets take well over a day or two.

Conclusion:

If you’re looking for a low-cost traffic source to test some mobile campaigns on, then Airpush is a great place to start. As long as you mind slow approval times and a lack of support, you’ll benefit from the easy to use interface and real-time optimizations.

Airpush Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts

Tokens	Description
%guid%	GUID is an unique variable generated by Airpush when a click happens. This is automatically generated by Airpush.
%d%	IMEI (MD5 encrypted)
%androidid%	Device android id
%carrier%	Carrier name
%device%	Phone model
%manufacturer%	Device manufacturer name
%campaignid%	Campaign Id
%creativeid%	Creative Id
%ip%	Device ip address
%state%	State
%city%	City
%dapp%	App Id
%pubid%	Application Developer/Advertiser Id
%framework%	Device OS Version

Go2Mobi

Pros:

Much like AirpPush, Go2mobi has a super clean interface and has real-time campaign optimization. The traffic quality in my experience is much higher than other RTB networks for the price.

Cons:

I haven’t been able to scale a campaign over $300-400 a day on this source. If find a winning campaign you may not be able to scale this as much as you’d like. Also, this may not be a con but it should still mention, you’re only able to bid CPM on their network.

Conclusion:

I have had a few successful campaigns on Go2mobi, and it’s one of the better mobile networks out there. The staff is very helpful and reply very quickly. If you’re new to running mobile traffic, this is a great option to check out.

BuzzCity

Pros:

Buzzcity Unlike several others on this list, isn’t an RTB. All of its inventory is from direct relationships it has with mobile apps and mobile websites. Buzzcity also has more advanced targeting features such as custom based IP targeting, allowing you to geo-locate & carrier target at the IP level. Buzzcity is also extremely cheap allowing you to get traffic for as low as .01 CPC in some regions. Their traffic in Asia & Africa is high quality.

Cons:

Because it’s one of the older mobile networks, it’s age shows. It’s interface is extremely ugly and Buzzcity lacks many good targeting options found on other networks. It’s traffic outside of Asia and Africa is also very low quality.

Conclusion:

If you need traffic in Africa or Asia then Buzzcity is a great option for you to test. However with its lack of targeting options you’ll find it’s difficult to optimize your campaigns on the front end. Support from Buzzcity is almost none existent so expect to be on your own when running campaigns.

Buzzcity Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts

`{clickcode}`	To substitute the unique click code value associated with this click
`{pubid}`	To substitute the publisher ID associated with this click. You need special privilege to use this parameter.
`{random}`	To substitute a randomly generated value associated with this click
`{timestamp}`	To substitute an unix time value associated with this click. E.g. 1379453899 – Which represents ISO 8601:2013-09-17T21:38:19Z

TapJoy

Pros:

If you’re looking to grow your install numbers on new apps then Tapjoy is great. Using Tapjoy to inflate your installs also works very well in helping your apps on the Play Store rank organically. I’ve averaged $.30-.40 cents an install for US traffic, but you can get these numbers much lower if you go after Teir 2 & 3 countries.

Cons:

Incent traffic is low quality in nature. Expect a large % of your install base to uninstall your app shortly after. Be sure that whoever you’re sending traffic to allows incent as several companies don’t allow this.

Conclusion:

I personally am not a big fan of running incent traffic, however it does work. If you’re looking to get a fast user base of installs on your app, then Tapjoy is the place to be. They can easily send you 10,000+ installs a day which is nothing to gawk about.

Social Media Traffic

What is Social Media Traffic?

Pros:

Facebook back in 2014 passed 1.19 billion monthly active users. So just like Google Adwords, if you run traffic on Facebook you can scale your campaigns like crazy. Facebook also has awesome demographics targeting. Allowing you to target audiences that already show interest in your industry or product.

Cons:

Once again just like Adwords, Facebook is super competitive and because of this prices are pretty steep. Also, depending on how targeted you get with your demographics your ads will become stale very quickly. This will result in your CTR dropping and thus your CPM or CPC increasing.

Conclusion:

I’ve ran a hell of a lot of traffic on Facebook personally and have a love-hate relationship with the platform. I love the fact that if I can find something that’s working I can scale it to the moon. However, because of the nature of the traffic running a campaign properly on Facebook will take a lot of your time and resources. Finally, Facebook likes to break redirects so it makes it very difficult to track campaigns with some marketing tools.

Twitter Ads

Pros:

Though Twitter is smaller than Facebook 288 Million monthly active users in 2014. From what I’ve experienced Twitter has much higher quality traffic. Also, since Twitter has really been pushing out more ad products in 2015 there is a ton of opportunity. Just like Facebook, Twitter has incredible demographic targeting and has even recently introduced keyword targeting.

Cons:

The only real con I’ve experiences thus far with Twitter, is their lack of ad types. However, like I mentioned in the cons, they have been really pushing out new ad products this year. The other con is Twitter ads are pretty expensive out the gate, so unless you already have converting demographic metrics expect to have a large burn budget to get a significant data set.

Conclusion:

Personally, I love Twitter as both a social network and a traffic source. I would even go on to say it’s one of the traffic sources that I’m most excited about here in 2015. If you’re not running on Twitter yet, I highly suggest you start.

Linkedin Ads

Pros:

If you’re advertising B2B, then Linkedin is the place to be. Just like many other social Linkedin has great demographics targeting. Linkedin is also one of the best places to advertise your product to get in front of decision-makers. The traffic quality is super high quality for a select number of niches.

Cons:

One of the most expensive social traffic sources that I’m aware of. I ran a $25 campaign and only got two clicks. Unless you have a very high life term value for each customer you bring in, you’ll likely struggle to get Linkedin profitable.

Conclusion:

I’ve only ran a few campaigns on Linkedin and even though I did get conversions, overall the traffic was just too expensive for what I running. If you’re a recruiting agency or B2B SaaS company, then Linkedin is perfect for you.

Pros:

If you’re promoting content, that is very shareable, like this post ;). Then StumbleUpon Ads are a great way to get the ball rolling. I’ve had $25-50 spend campaigns to bring in over 8,000+ visits in a single day.

Cons:

StumbleUpons traffic all in all is very low quality. That is just the nature of StumbleUpon; the users just click a button to go the next page. Expect to have people on your site for 5 seconds or less.

Conclusion:

I’ve used StumbleUpon quite a bit through my internet marketing career. If done right, StumbleUpon can bring you links to your site, social shares and tons of traffic outside of the StumbleUpon community. Make sure your content is eye-catching and extremely useful as you only have a few seconds to capture their interest. Don’t expect to directly send StumbleUpon visitors to your sales page as it likely wont work.

Pros:

Reddit has 174 Million MAU the majority of which are tech “geeks” and gamers. Reddit’s traffic is very high quality if your product or service is appealing to this audience. Reddit is unique in the fact that when you buy ad space on their platform, you’re the only advertiser during that selected time slot. This makes it very easy to know if the traffic is working for you or not, as you have less random variables, such as new advertisers screwing your data.

Cons:

Unfortunately, Reddit doesn’t have very many targeting options at all. The only targeting options you have been by selecting what is called a sub-Reddit. This is essentially category targeting but makes optimizing campaigns very difficult on the front end.

Conclusion:

Unlike the other social networks, Reddit is community driven and is a big support of privacy. Be very careful with what you advertise on Reddit, because if the community doesn’t like it, it may backfire on you completely. Also, because of the privacy Reddit has for it’s users and lack of targeting options. The only way you can optimize a campaign is through split testing various different landing pages. Unless you’re promoting gaming or tech related products, I would stay away from Reddit until you have other profitable sources.

Ah yes, Instagram you know the “picture site” Facebook bought for $1 Billion USD?

Being one of the newer social networks that allows you to advertise it’s definitely a hidden gem.

Some demographics data include:

73% of users between 15 and 35 years old
48% of users are professionals; 46% have degrees
Far higher brand engagement than on Facebook or Twitter

Currently there is a waitlist to join what’s known as “Promoted Pins”. However, if your business targets women, Pinterest is one of the most popular social networks that is almost exclusively women.

Paid Traffic Sources

I’ve never ran traffic with Baidu. As every time I’ve tried has been very difficult for me. With the growth of the Chinese market however in mobile Baidu is a huge opportunity.

Statistics

March 9 2017 Updated

Traffic Source Guide

What are Traffic Sources?

Pop Traffic

What is Pop Traffic?

Mobile traffic

What is Mobile traffic?

Social Media Traffic

What is Social Media Traffic?

Paid Traffic Sources

What is Paid Search?

Google Adwords

YouTube

Bing Ads (Updated)

Yahoo Gemini

Yandex

7 Search

Baidu