I tried Ah-ha.com in 99 (with a lot of other smaller PPC's), and the traffic was garbage. Has it improved? Can you filter traffic to just allow US and Canadian visitors?
CompWorld
sem4u
9:07 pm on Sep 21, 2003 (gmt 0)
Personally, I don't think that it is worth it. Too much poor quality traffic.
chaitan
1:19 am on Sep 23, 2003 (gmt 0)
I have just setup an account with them two weeks ago, I can't believe at least 99%(if not all) of the traffic are fraudulent, pure click-thru to steal my money and bandwidth and gone, don't even bother to spend a few more seconds in my site.
RoboPal
3:01 am on Sep 23, 2003 (gmt 0)
Hello chaitan, I just wonder if you could sticky mail me the keywords you've used, please? If it's not a secret/problem/something else. I'm doing a small research on the subject. Just out of curiosity.
Compworld
1:05 pm on Sep 23, 2003 (gmt 0)
Guess they haven't changed. I have found that some of the smaller ones aren't that bad. I will be giving a few of them the ole kick the tires situation and let everyone know what my opinion is. Cause I'm sure everyone cares :)
CompWorld
figment88
2:34 pm on Sep 23, 2003 (gmt 0)
In addition to traffic issues, I found their business practices irritating -- constant phone calls to "see how you're doing," barrage of horrible email offers to spend more money, constant role-out of new half-baked services, etc.
chaitan
5:46 pm on Sep 23, 2003 (gmt 0)
RoboPal, The keywords I am using are popular magazine titles for our magazine site, which working well with overture or google, although few time more expensive, they do bring us real users (who may not, yet, place any order but at least spent their time in exploring our site) as well as customers. The average ah-ha CPC is much cheaper, but the cost-per-user is much much much higher, not to mention cost-per-customer.
dmorison
6:01 pm on Sep 23, 2003 (gmt 0)
See my reasoning in the Sprinks thread as to why you should walk away from excessive "non-refundable" deposits.
RoboPal
11:35 pm on Sep 23, 2003 (gmt 0)
Thanks, chaitan. I am actually after different kind of information - how competitive the keywords are (number of links returned by ah-ha and bid prices).
JuniorOptimizer
2:35 pm on Sep 25, 2003 (gmt 0)
I agree with figment. Not only is their traffic crap, but the whole company is a pushy overbearing sales outfit.
chaitan
10:59 pm on Sep 25, 2003 (gmt 0)
I got total 651 clicks in last 2-3 weeks. The bid prices are 0.02-0.08 for all ranked #1 or #2, and now I totaly understand why they are so much "cheaper" than overture (which may cost $0.40-$1.50).