Is it worth doing? Estimated revenue? Stats included.

[CharlieTango]

Hi,

What method would be best to generate an income from my online forum?
We have over 6500 active members. I've tried to include an image of this weeks traffic stats but it wont let me..
Page Views, Unique Visits, First time visits and Returning Visits respectively

Sun, 4 June 2017
13,563 / 11,337 / 11,213 / 124
Sat, 3 June 2017
13,792 / 11,673 / 11,562 / 111
Fri, 2 June 2017
10,150 / 7,380 / 7,278 / 102
Thur, 1 June 2017
8,672 / 6,519 / 6,417 / 102
Wed, 31 May 2017
10,903 / 8,274 / 8,185 / 89
Tues, 30 May 2017
11,795 / 6,911 / 6,710 / 201

The website is aimed towards electronics, amateur radio, cb radio and associated products.

What sort of revenue could be expected from my stats above using the following advertising method?

Ideally Id like to sell banner adverts which would be sold on the basis of unlimited impressions, visible at the top of every page on the whole website.

Any other suggestions welcome

Thanks

 

[CharlieTango]

Adverts sold on a monthly or annual basis I was meaning to type

 

[decades80]

It solely depends on what % of your traffic is from search engines. If its close to 0, you will have difficulties in monetizing the forum, because advertisers will anyway not find you.

 

[CharlieTango]

Thanks for the reply. My forum is very busy, always at least 500 people online at any given time. Here are the top few stats from my Google Console. The actual list is way longer but these are my best search keywords. The numbers below are from the last 3 days and the total clicks from search engines in the 3 days is at 1,975 as of right now.

Queries Clicks
charlie tango dx = 323
charlie tango = 306
ctdx = 134
ct dx = 124
charlie tango dx group = 94
charlietango = 87
charlietangodx = 40
ct dx group = 30
cb radio uk forum = 20
cb radio club = 20
cb radio in the uk = 20

regards,
Lee

 

[decades80]

Thanks I was thinking you are one of those with pumped and bought cheap traffic to manipulate alexa rankings. But Ive heard forums are difficult to monetize. I would try with Adsense bulit on a background with same color and I would use same font. Ive seen plenty of directories who build the Adsense so wisely that the users in many cases are not aware the ads are actually there, but the CTR on forums is surprisingly low.

 

[CharlieTango]

I created the forum using Zetaboards which stick their own adsense on which is what you see there now. I pay monthly($7.99) for the "Premium forum" but this unfortunately does not include ad removal.

Ad removal is $0.18 per 1,000 page views. Working it out with my google stats it would cost around $60 per month to get rid of their adsense. So, mine would have to make in excess of that to make it worth it.

I've never bought traffic, I simply join forums of relevance and join in the chat, add my URL to profile and signature, add to relevant directories and getting backlinks from high PR sites like storify, youtube and microsoft. Also, many of my members have personal sites which link in.

In this niche or indeed hobby, word of mouth is very much a huge part of website growth.

 

[CharlieTango]

I've recently been writing relevant articles and publishing them on Google+ and other similar sites.

It's a lot of work but I'm passionate about my club and website

 

[decades80]

Great, hope you are able to monetize your passion . Why not calling the potential advertisers? I wouldnt write emails because normally they go to spam....

 

[CharlieTango]

Thanks, I'll do that. The website "Brand" is very well known in the UK. its now the biggest radio group in the country and third in the world so hopefully I'll get a few positive results

 

[domaintrades]

I wouldn't buy traffic. A good forum shouldn't need to do that, and the quality of traffic is likely to be poor.

I'd say that 500 people online at any given moment sounds very good. Are they mostly members, or visitors?

It's a pity you have the kind of forum that forces it's own advertising on you, most forums charge you for the license and you are free to do what you want with it.

Anyway, as far as advertising goes, there really is no way of forecasting whether it will be profitable in your circumstances. I would say that you might want to give it a try, perhaps having Adsense ads, and paid text and/or banner ads by advertisers.

I reckon most advertisers will want to go with either one month, or perhaps 3 months, to try it out, then if it's a success, pay for longer periods.

 

[Kuffy]

How difficult would it be to switch from Zetaboards.

 

[CharlieTango]

250,00 forum posts, 6450 registered members.

I'd lose the lot. Or is there a way it could be done?

Ive tried to add adsense code yesterday and Zetaboards dont allow it. They're on to a winner there.

 

[domaintrades]

I'm certainly no expert in the technical side of forum scripts, but I'd think it would be a major project, if not outright impossible, to move everything over to another forum type.

 

[namezest]

You can save your content and users info but it depends what you want to use going forward as to difficulty level.