What is Traffic Acquisition Marketing (TAM)?

New industries have a habit of ushering in new buzzwords, and internet marketing now has a new one - following 'traffic acquisition', we now have 'traffic acquisition marketing'. But what is traffic acquisition marketing?


New York based Forward Branding & Identification, reference it a list of job requirements for a Web Project Manager:

"Experience in online consumer media, including Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, with success in online traffic acquisition marketing."

So, it's clearly something to do with social marketing and Web 2.0, and Miami, Florida's Apparent Internet Marketing would seem to agree:

"Apparent offers an array of white hat online traffic acquisition marketing services, in addition to strategic website and landing page optimization efforts, to help our clients build a loyal audience following."

So, what do we glean from these? Firstly, traffic acquisition marketing seems to be about generating traffic through a marketing message geared towards awareness and loyalty over advertising and traffic purchase.


It's also clear from Apparent that it's not about search engine optimization or landing pages, nor is it about straight up advertising. It's about generating (or acquiring) traffic because that traffic wants to visit the site, out of loyalty or brand attachment, and not just because they need to buy something.


Google returns around 13,000 pages that use the exact term, and using their Keyword Tool to research around the topic, another well-known phrase comes up : customer acquisition marketing.


Suzanne Taylor, a marketing consultant with clients including Adobe, Yahoo! and PayCycle, and member of Stanford University's faculty, defines customer acquisition marketing as having three main aspects:

• Awareness - does the target market know you exist?
• Learning - what does your market know about your benefits?
• Persuasion - do they want to buy from you?

She also notes that it's part of a model that she calls the 'Customer Experience Model', and notes that:

"It is driven by the other two elements of the Customer Experience Model—Product Wow and Customer Retention."

Putting all this together, we have a workable idea to answer the leading question - what is traffic acquisition marketing?


My summary would be as follows : Traffic Acquisition Marketing pulls in the target market by giving the marketing message an online personality, that can draw in, delight, and retain a loyal following online.


It's no longer just about the product. Now you also have to deliver a reason.

Techniques to Drive TAC Costs Down

TAC, or Traffic Acquisition Cost, is a measure of the amount of money required to buy in traffic. It is usually calculated on a percentage basis, using either revenue or visitor numbers to yield a figure that can be measured over time.


For example, if you pay out $5 to Google in AdWords fees, and receive 1,000 visitors, then the cost per visitor is 0.5 cents (actually, it's more common just to say that the cost is $5 per 1,000 visitors, otherwise known as CPM).


Others may choose to measure it in terms of revenue - if you sell an eBook for $15, and pay $100 in advertising fees to sell 500 copies, then you have generated $7,500 for $100 of advertising. That's quite a margin!


Actually, these numbers might be a bit optimistic, and so helping reduce TAC costs is usually high up on the list of priorities for online entrepreneurs.


One method might be to hunt after JV's (Joint Ventures) where partners each get something out of the relationship. An eBook can be exchanged for the traffic that this might bring, for example - one partner offers the eBook to their list, and the eBook contains links to the other's online store.


Or, a software manufacturer or online service provider might pay a third party to pre-install software on a piece of hardware, or even supply software with certain settings that provide an opportunity for third party promotion.


This last example is use by advertisers to buy advertising in applications (so-called adware), which is a method that works, but can be costly and obtrusive to the end user.


When formulating your TAC cost reduction strategy, remember one thing - it's much better to offer something of value if all you're after is traffic; otherwise it may end up costing more than it brings in.

Reducing Traffic Acquisition Costs using Destination Sites

Traffic acquisition costs are probably one of the highest direct costs for online businesses. Anything that you can do to reduce traffic acquisition costs must, almost by definition, be a good thing - but there's a right and a wrong way to do it.


Like the hotel industry, the web is split into two kinds of page - destination and everything else. Budget hotels that people use whilst traveling offer a very different experience to so-called destination hotels, which have to give customers more than just a bed for the night.


Likewise, destination sites are places people go to for something, unlike 99% of the other random search results which are just places people find themselves almost by accident.


Look at your own mental bookmark list. The chances are that you have a favorite site for social networking, video sharing, even email. There's also a good chance that these don't need to be in your browser bookmark list. You know the URLs by heart.


Now, I'm not suggesting for a moment that you try to become a destination site. That's part of the misconception that people have about the web - everyone wants to be the next big thing, the next mental bookmark, but very few people reach that status.


Mostly, we're all part of the 99% of pages that people visit on their way somewhere else. And that's okay, because it's what makes the web tick.


However, despite the fact that Google AdSense is available on many of these destination sites, and despite the fact that you might be paying for prominence on them, what happens when traffic acquisition costs outstrip the earning power of the target site.


We're in a world wide recession, after all, and people are cutting back spending in the so-called power niches of health, money and sex. Never mind hobbies, dating, and suchlike.


However, the power of the destination sites can still be harnessed by offering content in return for traffic, thereby significantly reducing direct traffic acquisition costs.


Right now, for example, there's a WSO (Warrior Special Offer) that uses the power of YouTube to drive traffic. It's called the Royal Affiliates Banker, and seems to be a process, coupled with some software which purports to drive traffic to a web site with only 15 minutes of real work.


(Disclaimer - that link makes me no money. Zero. I have NO affiliation with the product, and am just citing it here as an example.)


If the Royal Affiliates Banker works, it could significantly reduce traffic acquisition costs, and boost profits. And, it's likely that a very similar process can be applied to other destination sites - it's all about giving potential customers valuable content, and a reason to click through to the target site.


Just like a promotional blog, but potentially with much more power, and certainly a lot more fun to put together!

The Online Media Challenges of Traffic Acquisition

It used to be easy to get traffic. Well, easy-ish, anyway. Back when all we had were static web pages and a generic email address (webmaster@somewhere, usually) traffic acquisition was just a case of making sure that the page was indexed by the search engines, was relatively unique in terms of keywords, and was useful to the visitor.


This was back when we all edited our sites in a text editor, mobile (cell) phones were still almost a novelty, and certainly very, very few people had heard of social media.


These days, anyone can have a web site, and throw up any old traffic-catcher garbage, and it tends to clutter the search engine indexes. Of course, the boffins over at Google are making incredible headway in weeding out the rubbish, but it has still forced the rest of us to spend slightly more time (and hence money) making certain that we get seen.


Were it not for social media, it'd still be a case of throwing money at the issue.


Solving Online Media Challenges


See, these days, the challenge is not getting indexed. It's getting people to be aware of the site/brand at a number of different levels. Sure, people still use Google as a search engine, and they still type in words that they hope will return information, but they're a lot more savvy about choosing the results.


For all those people who continue to say "you gotta be on the first page of Google SERPs, otherwise it's a waste of time", I say : you're at least half wrong. I say this because people are using Google search engine results in a more canny way. They can spot if the top 5 places are going to be selling them things while offering them nothing.


On top of which, Google is going to be using (and has started using) social media techiques such as +1, and G+ Circles, to inform search users as to the perceived value of the page behind the result. 

 I have no proof of this, beyond what you can see on every search page, if you're logged in to Google, but it's a logical extension.


It also means that we have to be similarly more canny about the way we approach traffic acquisition. We need to leverage social media and rise to the online media challenges in making sure that if we are the best, then the online world knows we are the best, and, more importantly, Google recognises that we are the best.


How do we do that? Twitter. Blogs. Forums. In a buzzphrase, Social Media. We've come full circle, and we're back to word of mouth advertising, the best kind. Only, these days, they're digital mouths and ears.

Using PLR to Generate Traffic

PLR - Private Label Rights - is a term used to describe material that has been created for the express use of being re-used to create web site content. The seller hands over a number of rights to the buyer, amongst them, the right to use the text in any way that they wish, and assume the ownership (or at least the right to be recognized as the author).

So, in theory at least, you could take the content, stick it in a blog, and then drop the URL on Google, Twitter, Facebook, or whatever, and watch the traffic come rolling in. Right?

Well... if everyone does that, then everyone's pages end up looking the same and you'll irritate the PLR owner into the bargain. On top of which, they'll be optimized to rank well in search engines for a variety of keywords, but there are a limited number of spots - 10, if we're trying to hit the first page of results.

Those top ten spots will quickly go, if all you do is copy and paste the PLR content in it's entirety. Using PLR is clearly as much about re-branding it, as it is about re-using it. Unless it's an eBook, or something to be used for newsletter content, which keeps it relatively private, it is vital to re-work the PLR content to make it your own.

In the final analysis, PLR is about research, getting snippets for insertion in your own products, and pulling out likely keyword phrases.

JustOutsourcing.com have a list of 101 things to do with PLR, and it's well worth a look, as there are some great ideas for turning PLR content into traffic acquisition content. Be warned, however, what might seem like a quick short cut to traffic actually does require some work to make it worthwhile.

A great place to get PLR content is from ghostwriter extraordinaire, Tiffany Dow, from her PLR Mini-Mart. They're bang up to date, seasonal where appropriate, and her blog is full of useful tips and tricks. Learning from the trenches of PLR and ghostwriting is a great way to get ahead in the internet marketing game, so I heartily recommend Tiffany's blog.

That's PLR, in a nutshell. It's a great investment when used correctly, and should be at the top of your traffic acquisition checklist.

Traffic + List = Profit?

Recently I stumbled across a blog post by Nicole S. Cooper, titled 'A Valuable Lesson Learned About List Building Popups on your Lead Capture Page'. It was interesting to me because it highlights a few salient points about traffic acquisition and the process of leveraging that traffic.

The conventional wisdom is that you need to get the visitors onto a list in order to market to them. This has been adjusted of late to promote content over and above sales, where the marketing becomes a touch more subtle, and the actual selling process is part of a confidence building exercise.

Now, many readers might assume that the quicker the visitor is presented with the option to sign-up, the better. Visitors are notorious for clicking away from sites after only a short stay, so getting them to sign-up as soon as possible is surely a good thing?

As Ms. Cooper found out, however, this isn't the case. The post itself is a great snapshot  of the marketing process, and I wholeheartedly recommend it. The long and the short of it is that she had a bounce rate (visitors dropping in and clicking out straight away) of upwards of 30% (3 in 10) when visitors were immediately presented with a sign-up box, but that this dropped by 10% the moment she adjusted the script so that the box appeared after a short delay.

Other variations might include changing the page that the sign-up pop-up appears on, and playing with the position, layout, and presentation - the end message is clear, and as Ms. Cooper herself says:

"metrics and tracking is pivotal in the world of Online Marketing"

So, if this wasn't enough to convince you to take another look at your sign-up box placement, timing, and statistics, head on over to The Mailbox Money Blog  and get the scoop from the lady herself!

What Do I Do With All This Traffic?!?

It's a question that often comes up - traffic acquisition is one thing, but once it's flowing, the story doesn't just end!

After all, there is a whole process that begins when the user (potential client) lands on the page, one which takes them through the marketing funnel, step by step. First they are a visitor, then, they become a prospect, then, hopefully, a customer, and eventually, a repeat customer.

Along the way, there are ample opportunities for upselling, special offers, one time bargains, and so on, all geared towards maximizing the revenue generated now, and into the future. The question is : how can we possibly know what is working, and what isn't?

The answer is given on the blog I've linked to above. It's all about testing traffic, tracking results, and helping to read customers minds, all with one goal : raise revenue and the value of each and every visitor.