How can I attract advertisers to my website?

How much traffic do you need on your website to attract advertisers?

• Answer:

  If you are talking about selling directly to advertisers it will depend on the topic of your site, the demographic of your audience and if your audience is merely surfing the web or actively engaged in a buying decision. Another factor is if the topic is of local vs. national (or even international) interest. There generally are ad selling opportunities anywhere along the spectrum. However, the larger your audience and the more valuable it is, the process of selling will be easier and your deals will be bigger. Instead of selling ads directly you can also sell ad space through ad networks and ad exchanges (i.e. Google AdWords or PulsePoint). You could have a site with 10 unique vistors a day and use these options. You won't make much but nonetheless it could be done. Finally, there are sites with 10,000 uniques a day that don't sell ads directly because the time and expense of putting together an ad sales team and forming relationships with big brands is a high enough hurdle that they would prefer to work with premium ad networks to sell their ad impression inventory (usually at a 50/50 revenue share).