Looks like a Google PageRank update is in progress, as a result Linkexperiment.com has just received pagerank of 4, with the links page getting a rank of 2. So now people buying links will get a link on a pr 4(average now is about a month) and a permanent link on a pr 2. Our alexa rank has also gone to 255,349! Very exciting, I think we can get down below 200,000 pretty soon.

Also to note, The links that have fallen of the main page got their clicks at a rate of 1/6th of a penny per click. I’d like to see you get that on adwords!

I suspect that the link sales and traffic to the site are going to surge now that people know that linkexperiment.com is passing pr.

On June 15th at 5 PM I decided to create a promotion in order to boost traffic to my linkexperiment site. My site is an experiment designed to find out how much I could sell links on my homepage for. It features 100 links sold auction-style with the highest-bid links showing at the top, and the lower-bid links showing at the bottom. Links fall down the homepage as they are outbid, and fall off completely when 100 new links have outbid them. All links retain a permanent link on the past links page.

In order to promote my page I decided to give away $50 to the webmaster that could refer the most unique visitors to my site. I made the process as easy as possible in order to encourage participation. Webmasters didn’t have to sign up, but only point users to my site with the tag ?e=youremail@adress.com added to the linkexperiment.com URL replacing the email with their own. Everytime a user entered linkexperiment.com with an email tag, their ip address and the webmaster’s email were recorded into a database. I posted the details of the competition at several forums: digital point, namepros, siteowners, html forums and Money Maker Group.

Initial Results:
The 3 days prior to the contest I had 33 unique visitors total to the site:

Once the contest began at 5 PM on June 15th the unqiues bumped up to 72, then 272 on the 16th.

However there were only about 5 visitors at this point sent by webmasters participating in the contest. The 340 uniques were all webmasters who were reading about the page or about the contest. The large increase in webmasters viewing the site resulted in an increase in sales. Over the first two days of the contest, 19 links were sold for a total of $25.69. The picture below shows the links sold:

Contest:
After the first two days, the traffic shifted from webmaster traffic to general population traffic, and the incoming traffic was the result from webmasters sending traffic, this graph shows the first 5 days of the contest:

This shift in from webmaster traffic to general traffic resulted in a decrease in sales (since webmasters are the ones buying links). On the 6th day I bought some cheap traffic to try to increase clicks on links to help stimulate link purchases. However, the traffic was complete trash, and didn’t result in many clicks (moral:you get what you pay for). Here’s the traffic over the course of the entire contest (notice the surge on day 6 from the traffic purchase)

Almost all of the traffic generated was a result of the contest, as you remember I was getting about 10 uniques a day before the contest. When you take out the huge surge on day 6, the traffic averaged over the length of the contest was 165 unique visitors per day.

Referrals:
Traffic sent from webmaster referrals picked up as the contest progressed. There was a battle for the winning spot until the last day, when the eventual winner posted a link on a myspace bulletin. His total uniques ended up at 298 with second place at 200, third and fourth at 78 and 49 respectively. The total hits (not uniques) produced by referals from the contest is 3029 and still growing(traffic is still coming in from links put up for the contest).

Conclusion and traffic post-contest:
The link sales for the contest totaled at $34.69 so the net cost of the contest was $15. The contest generated 3000+ hits, several backlinks, and a large amoung of PR for $15.

The traffic since the contest ended has maintained a high level. This graph shows the traffic to linkexperiment.com from June 22(last day of the contest) - June 25th.

This is a result of continuing traffic from the links generated by the contest, and a result of people coming back to linkexperiment.com to check in on the progress of the page.

Contest Winner:
The winner of the contest is a good story in itself. The winner used a combination of adwords and myspace bulletins to claim victory. His name is Brandon, he’s from South Carolina, and here’s the kicker, he’s homeless, sort of. He’s currently living with friends trying to make it in web design/marketing. To read more about Brandon visit the linkexperiment contest page.

The $50 giveaway was a worthwhile endeavor that resulted in $35 in link purchases, 3000+ hits, several backlinks, and an increase in repeat visitors to the site.

To receive notice of the next linkexperiment contest join our mailing list.

Technorati Tags: link experiment, make money, PR

Brandon from South Carolina won the link experiment $50 referral contest. Brandon sent 298 unique visitors to take first place in the contest. Brandon is currenly homeless, living with friends, trying to make it as a web designer/marketer. I wish Brandon good luck with his business and thank everyone who participated in the $50 contest. For more info on Brandon visit the contest page.

I’ve also switched the blog to wordpress, it’s a lot easier to manage this way.

Stay tuned for the official writeup of the contest.

winner, contest, designer, martketer, wordpress, business, promotion, giveaway

Looks like this contest is going to come right down to the wire. The top two contestants have sent 75 and 74 uniques. Whoever makes a surge this last day is going to take the $50. I’ll have a complete report after the contest is over.

Technorati Tags: contest, cash giveaway, make money

12 links sold yesterday for a total of about $12. The contest is starting to get heated up. Top two referrers are at 45 and 37 referrals respectively. Also, listed on google #1 for the keyword “link experiment” pretty cool. I think once the contest is done, I’m going to write up a report for the findings.

Also, pretty cool. One of the contestants made this ad:

Technorati Tags: promotion, advertising, google

Lot of news. Alexa ranking is down to 383,169 pretty cool. After anouncing the contest yesterday, traffic has jumped up, although not due to participation in the contest, I’ve only received 4 links thus far from the contest itself. Rest of the traffic is from interested webmasters which has resulted in about 4 sales yesterday for about $13 a new daily high, although there’ve been 2 link sales already today and it’s only 10 AM.

The contest is still wide open, the top referrer has sent 2 visitors I’ve also set up a top ten list for referrers on the contest page so once there are at least 10 referrers it will show the top 10, for now it’s just two. As of now there are 99 links sold, so just one more until the page is full.

Also, I checked out the #2 spot find in forums very cool site. It’s a forum search engine, which is very usefull to me since I’m always searching through forums.

Technorati Tags: Alexa, ranking, webmasters, contest, cash giveaway, find in forums, referrers

Ok, it’s been a while since my last update. I’ve been working on some other projects to help promote linkexperiment.com. I launhced an Adsense Tracker and a couple other websites the last couple weeks, but now it’s time to turn my attention to the link experiment.

So 92 links sold, 8 shy of completing the 100. In order to fill out the site I’ve decided to have a $50 giveaway referral contest. Whoever sends me the most traffic this next week will get $50 for their efforts. For details on how to send traffic go to the contest page.

Technorati Tags: adsense, promotion, adsense tracker, contest, cash giveaway, traffic