Saying an exchange does not work for them is a load of poo

The exchange does not work for the page you are using, That is where you need to change the page you promote there.

99% of the time its not the people in the exchange or the traffic that is a problem its what your promoting.

The other thing that needs to be learnt is that exchange users are not stupid. If you slate or dont get on with certian owners publically then their members who read it will prob not join your exchange.

I love startxchange and if a owner of a exchange slates startx with something like it dont work then im very unlikely going to join or use their exchange as it just shows that person knows absolutely nothing.

Its all about what and how you promote, One page or offer may not be right for one place and yet may work wonders in others, Try adapting adverts to suit the market, thats what marketing is :)

Steve Aylings lastest blog post..I Will Give You 500 Hits For Joining Something You Should Be Joining Anyway

1st 2 paragraphs, exactly my feelings.
Thanks .
dave

I have seen some large traffic exchanges use the human code even though they have the multiple surf bar button or graphic. The result is the surfing slowly stops. The daily surfing goes down over time. One example is forevertraffic.com. They used to provide shows at a rate of 35 per day at 18,000 members then at almost 20,000 members this dropped to around 15 per URL. Now they suck up credits at a rate of 100,s per day but they only show 3 to 6 different pages. This shows me that they have been hit with some heavy duty cheating. As a regular surfer at forever traffic I still surf there but I do not use my credits because they would be waisted. I am waiting for the owner to clean up the exchange before I release any credits. I stopped surfing a lot when they first put up the human number as I found it an irritant like many other surfers. What I think went on was this. over time they number of surfers dropped because of the human number it became a big problem for the owner. The surfers started to notice and this aggravated the situation so less and less surfers surfed. The owner somehow boosted the use of credits but not the number of surfers. This could be a few cheaters that were allowed to stay as members just to use credits. Or it could be the owner. Who knows? But what I do know is that when surfing a large traffic exchange you should see a large number of different ADs rather than just a few. I also think an owner has to not sit back and let the technical aspects of a script encurage surfing and cut out cheating. Rather I would surf your own exchange as an owner to keep an eye on what is going on.

I have seen some large traffic exchanges use the human code even though they have the multiple surf bar button or graphic. The result is the surfing slowly stops. The daily surfing goes down over time. One example is forevertraffic.com. They used to provide shows at a rate of 35 per day at 18,000 members then at almost 20,000 members this dropped to around 15 per URL. Now they suck up credits at a rate of 100,s per day but they only show 3 to 6 different pages. This shows me that they have been hit with some heavy duty cheating. As a regular surfer at forever traffic I still surf there but I do not use my credits because they would be waisted. I am waiting for the owner to clean up the exchange before I release any credits. I stopped surfing a lot when they first put up the human number as I found it an irritant like many other surfers. What I think went on was this. over time they number of surfers dropped because of the human number it became a big problem for the owner. The surfers started to notice and this aggravated the situation so less and less surfers surfed. The owner somehow boosted the use of credits but not the number of surfers. This could be a few cheaters that were allowed to stay as members just to use credits. Or it could be the owner. Who knows? But what I do know is that when surfing a large traffic exchange you should see a large number of different ADs rather than just a few. I also think an owner has to not sit back and let the technical aspects of a script encurage surfing and cut out cheating. Rather I would surf your own exchange as an owner to keep an eye on what is going on.

Thanks,
warren

First thanks for a very interesting article :)

I do one question...

I don't understand the paragraph, "Inside the Surfbar, or Outside the Surfbar".

If you have time could you explain a little more please?

best wishes

Thom

And no, no script is invinsable, but there are better scripts than others and if you do alot of tracking you can see where some of your wasted credits are going and at what time of the day, etc.

And yes, there is a TE owners forum at Jon's NMF where we can alert everyone if we find a cheater to delete, but to me...I want to secure my TEs as much as possible so they don't get in there in the first place. And, I want my users/customers knowing that I'm doing everything possible to keep them out. (which I do)

And if that means it's a tougher interface or otherwise, at least I know I'm protecting my customers at the 'sitepoint' as opposed to waiting for support folks to manually delete the cheaters which could mean thousands of credits in as little as 30 minutes.

Just my 2 cents..

Jen

Jon Olsons lastest blog post..Issue 234 - There’s Gold In Them Numbers

I have been working online now for just about 2 years so I do not consider myself a newbie, but I also do not consider myself an experienced IM. I consistently surf between 10-15 exchanges weekly. I usually do 6-8 daily with 3-4 open tabs. I feel that this gives me enough time to see the ad and not only determine if it is something I am interested in but also am I doing justice because I hope to get the same respect when my ads are being looked at.

I'll be honest I usually surf on certain days for different TE's as I typically surf on the TE's that are doing the specials that day such as 20% increase that day ect.

However, here is my dilemma I have not upgraded at a single TE yet as I have been getting mixed results at all the exchanges. I have been tracking however, have only been doing it for a couple of months now as that is when I had made a decision to use TE's as part of my campaign because if you do it correctly it is very time consuming. I do not think anyone can make any statement about any TE unless they have tracked them for a minimum of 6 months as we all know that different months have different users now using them. IE: vacations or working on a new project that is time consuming.

I would like to upgrade at several of the TE's so I can use my time more beneficial to me such as creating blogs or articles to assist me with my traffic as well. However, I am on a limited budget still as even though I am making a living online and I am lucky enough to be able to stay home to do it I am just making enough to get by not at the point where I would like to be (which I would be perfectly happy with a lower 6 figure yearly income). Therefore, until I am positive which TE's have the most cheaters or doing the least to stop cheaters than I can not throw away my money it is bad enough that I am already possibly wasting my time.

My personal opinion (for what ever that is worth)LOL is that you all focus on helping each other and not only deleting accounts of cheaters but also set up a specific blog and list them out therefore, they can not just run to another TE.

In addition and I believe it was Sharon who came up with this concept have mystery surfers to help track and work with all the owners of the TE's. For example if the mystery surfer is aware of the cheaters they can specifically watch for them on other TE's as well.

If all the owners work together on this concept then you can either pay some surfers, which would not hurt anyone particular TE owner as you would all be splitting up the bill or as I eluded to in another blog that was similar topic to this is to do the barter system. Another words, have certain surfers do the grunt work for you all and then like myself, as we build up a working relationship then you all could act as JV's to promote that particular surfers product or website. This could then be a win-win situation for everyone.

Lastly, I just wanted to thank everyone who participated in this conversation as it did demonstrate many different angles/ideas for what seems to be a worsening situation not only for the TE owners but also for the legitimate surfer who is attempting to get traffic for themselves.

Considering many of you probably do not know me very well you may know my call name as I use it everywhere and that is Just A Regular Guy.

Until next time,
Rich T. AKA Just A Regular Guy