Need an Ad suggestion

High traffic site, but very hard to monetize

[BriGuy20]

I have just started a site related to a very popular videogame. I have used AdWords to get traffic started, but it is beginning to get a fair amount of traffic from other sources (about 600 visitors a day from AdWords, and I'd guess about 100 a day from other sources). It is a fairly "sticky" site, averaging 5 to 10 page views per visitor. If I had to guess, I'd assume my visitor base is similar to the group that watches Spike TV or TechTV/G4 -- i.e., male, young, and probably without a whole lot of disposable cash.

My aim of the site is partly to help get some high PR links to my other sites, but I would ideally like to make the site profitable (Taking out the AdWords ads and relying on search engine traffic, which is actually beginning to appear). The problem is that it seems notoriously difficult to monetize my visitors. AdSense is improperly targeted on the main page, so I'd prefer to stay clear of it. I've tried free videogame sites, videogame rental sites, and refinancing sites, the first and second having a respectable clickthrough but no conversions, and the third having very few clickthroughs (and no conversions). I realize I'm in a sector of the marketplace that's hard to monetize, but I would still like a way to realize some sort of gain off of my site by itself. Does anyone have any suggestions of good advertisements to put up for this site?

[shri]

I'd discount the traffic from adwords, unless you're trying to do an arbitrage thing or sell your own product or the landing page is a well crafted affiliate pitch.

Look at how your organic traffic finds you.

1) Word of mouth traffic can be difficult to monetize, unless its a product site.

2) Can they find you for the name of the videogame or "videogame prices" type searches?

[veroxii]

Low price (and low margin) products are probably the way to go: t-shirts, posters, music downloads?

-V

[BriGuy20]

Right now, I have an AdWord up for one of the titles of the game, so they can find me that way. For the most part, the organic results come from the particular aspect of the game my site specializes in.

The problem with the site is that it's a reference site. I think (for the most part) that the people interested in the information already HAVE the game.

I've added a discount internet ad and a free widget ad to the sidebar, they both seem to be doing reasonably well. I've also added #*$! on the top of my page, but it currently isn't displaying. The text of the ad requires that I add my site into it, but I honestly have no clue where to put the code. If anyone has a suggestion for where the code goes, I'd appreciate hearing about it.

I'll take into consideration the low margin, low cost idea. If #*$! doesn't do too well, I'll try that.