Coco Posted February 28, 2007 Share Posted February 28, 2007 Advertise with us.Why we are different:· We will input your advert for FREE if you would prefer.· You can add a free link to your private website and you don't have to link back to us.· We're the exclusive holiday rentals website for France Magazine, Living France and French Property News and will be consistently marketed in these publications and websites, guaranteeing quality traffic and leads.· We don't charge commission on bookings - just a fee (£85+VAT per year) to advertise on the site.· You can upload your advert and up to 6 photos and change the details at any time.Derr, sorry but just exactly WHY are you different? WHAT exactly are you offering for free? As far as I can see, absolutely nothing. You are one of the highest charging of all the online websites, with, as yet, no proven record. I for one wouldmost certainly NOT be interested in advertising with you. How do I know that I am going to get any kind of return? Even the other hihg-charging websites usually offer a free introductory offer for a period of time.We will input your advert for FREE if you would prefer. What does that mean? You can add a free link to your private website. For £85 +VAT I should B****y well hope so. The only sites that say you must have a reciprocal link are those that do it completely for FREE and free meaning FREE, ie no charges!Sorry, can't see anything there to entice me to advertise with you yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cassis Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 "Free" in this context means if you pay 85 squids then you get an ad and the same services almost everyone else offers, often for less. However, there are some advertisers already on there so perhaps it is worth seeing whether they can reply in a positive light - if they are taking plenty of bookings from the site then it would be worth it.Input your ad for free means that if necessary they input the text of your ad for you - I suppose you send it in a Word document or email? [:)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coco Posted March 1, 2007 Author Share Posted March 1, 2007 EXACTLY - FOr £85 I could be advertising on one Dutch and two French sites that I am currently on, who both gave me a free 6 month period to start with, during which time the enquiries that I got proved to me that it was worth going with them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ex Forum Admin Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 Hi,The free uploading of the advert means that we will upload your advert for you, the advert can be supplied by post or email...this service is free, other sites charge for this service.Likewise some other sites allow only 4 photos, charge you for extra, a certain amount of wording, charge you for extra. We wanted to keep ours simple and not charge for all little extras.We are certainly not 'one of the most highest charging of all the online websites', we checked out pricing...although I am aware that some websites do let you advertise for free...and there are alot of them that do require a reciprocal link back (and ones that DO charge). We are however part of a big company who's magazines are the largest selling in the France market as well as websites, exhibitions etc, and therefore have marketing power. 'Sorry, can't see anything there to entice me to advertise with you yet.'That's fair enough, we've only just launched but are already planning upgraded systems later in the year. If you are getting good response from your current marketing that's good. [:)]Perhaps I should offer say 5 forum users the opportunity to advertise on the site for a year for free....see how they get on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 The general rule is that if you want advertising that works, you have to be prepared to pay for it. There are of course exceptions - ripoff directories and websites at one end of the scale and effective free or low cost sites (often new startups) at the other. If the cheap sites work, that's fine, but it's usually true in advertising, just as in life, that a free lunch just doesn't exist. Always ask to see genuine recommendations or audited circulation figures. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lizzy h Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 Ill Perhaps I should offer say 5 forum users the opportunity to advertise on the site for a year for free....see how they get on, okay then I'll do it free I'll be your ginea pig!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cassis Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 If any site can promise a thousand per cent ROI outside of the period June - August or my money back I'll buy it.I would not dismiss this particular offer without knowing what it will return, but that's hard to tell, isn't it?Will's right about the free sites mainly being rubbish, but as I've posted my opinions on that before I won't repeat it here. Other than to say we got over 1000€ of business from free listing sites last year [:)] We focus on marketing ourselves through our own website but the same strategies, even the same listings sites, won't work equally well for everyone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cassis Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 I'll take a free trial, if Archant want to try us out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 We've only just entered the gite business, this will be our first year. Our main (expensive) advertiser, Chez Nous, has not yielded a single booking so far but one of our cheap ones has generated almost £10, 000 worth of business! Therefore we are leaning towards the cheaper sites at the moment so I am willing to try a free year if it's on offer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suandpete Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 Interesting. Would you mind PM'ing me with the name of the cheaper one that is working for you? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clair Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 [quote user="Brian"]We've only just entered the gite business, this will be our first year. Our main (expensive) advertiser, Chez Nous, has not yielded a single booking so far but one of our cheap ones has generated almost £10, 000 worth of business! Therefore we are leaning towards the cheaper sites at the moment so I am willing to try a free year if it's on offer. [/quote]That sounds really good.Can you tell us which is giving you such excellent return? By PM if you prefer... [:)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eslier Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 Any rental listing website is only as good as the effort the owners put into marketing that site to bring it to the attention of potential rentors. What makes this one different is that, being owned by Archant, it is guaranteed of exceptionally good placement in the three leading UK magazines which are purchased by people interested in France. This sort of targetted advertising would be very very costly to any other business or individuals and certainly out of range to those offering free listings to owners. With the resources that Archant has, I think it is fairly safe in saying that they will be able to achieve those hard to get high rankings in search engines. This new site has a lot of promise and could be a very good investment. Perhaps, rather than offering freebies, it might be better if they offered to fix the price for three years to all launch year advertisers. It could easily take off in a big way and we could see advertising rates treble over the next few years.. . . and before anyone asks, NO I haven't got any financial interest in the new site and I don't work for Archant - I am going off now to fill in my details and get my properties listed ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cassis Posted March 1, 2007 Share Posted March 1, 2007 If you try "advertising AND gite AND free" in the search box you can find some wonderfully heated threads from the not so distant past! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mitsi Posted March 4, 2007 Share Posted March 4, 2007 I advertised in two magazines, one with France Magazine and one other. Neither produced a single enquiry over the 6 months. I have had several bookings through free sites. Guess who I won't be advertising with? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frogslegs Posted March 5, 2007 Share Posted March 5, 2007 Perhaps I should offer say 5 forum users the opportunity to advertise on the site for a year for free....see how they get on.o.k. I will be the 5th user if the offer is still on! [:D]www.le-tilleul.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coco Posted March 5, 2007 Author Share Posted March 5, 2007 I'm the one that made the complaint in the first place - I'll be a guinea pig [:P] - sorry, couldn't reply earlier, had to make a flying visit to UK to visit sick MIL. I still don't wear it about free uploading - I don't think I've even come across a site that DOES charge and I'm on quite a few!!I also advertised with Living France some while ago but never got a single enquiry! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lizzie15 Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 OK then are they giving a free trial? I think quite a few of us would be interested if that were the case? We don't expect something for nothing. A quality product has to be paid for somehow but at the moment there is no track record so we just don't know ! Archant- what is the position here ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coco Posted March 6, 2007 Author Share Posted March 6, 2007 You're quite right Lizzie, I have no problem at all with paying to advertise on France-Rental but I do want to have an idea as to whether it's going to be worth my while. I don't have a huge advertising budget and £85 for an unproven site is too much for me to consider! I'm getting several bookings a day at the moment so now would be a good time for them to prove what they can do. I never have a problem with not getting bookings during a trial period (no provider can do any more than guide the business to your site, it's then up to the individual if they want to purchase your services) just as long as I see that enquiries are coming through. What I want to know is that people are finding and using the site before I'll pay to go on it.In fact, thinking about it, I don't think I know of any new paying site that hasn't offered a trial period! [;-)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cassis Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Well, if there is to be a trial now is the time to do it otherwise it sounds like everyone's going to be full before it starts! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coco Posted March 11, 2007 Author Share Posted March 11, 2007 It's all gone very quiet on the free trial front, perhaps James got his wrists slapped for speaking out of turn? [;-)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Russethouse Posted March 11, 2007 Share Posted March 11, 2007 I think there were just 5 free trials offered, and as far as I know this was exclusive to forum members. Admin has been pretty busy of late but you could always PM him via one of his posts in these threads. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cassis Posted March 11, 2007 Share Posted March 11, 2007 Okay, so which lucky people got the free trials? I PM'ed ages ago and nothing! [:)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lizzy h Posted March 11, 2007 Share Posted March 11, 2007 I was the first to ask re the free trial and I've heard nothing! has anyone else? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cassis Posted March 11, 2007 Share Posted March 11, 2007 I think we can take it as a NO. Read into that what you will! [:D] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Smith Posted March 11, 2007 Share Posted March 11, 2007 How very odd.Some forums use a separate section to tell forum subscribers what is going on, things like new moderators being appointed and such like. Not here, though, Admin only works in secret. By order... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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