How to advertise and monetize a proxy?
Now you already know What is a Proxy, and I have shown how to setup a proxy in my previous post. It is time to show you guys how to advertise and monetize a proxy.
Proxies are very easy to promote, and very easy to make a dollar or two a day. So lets begin with how to advertise a proxy.
First of all you should submit your site to all social bookmarks. Stumble it, Digg it, and all the other ones that you can do. Get other people to stumble yoursite also. Next thing you can do is submit your site to proxy topsites. There are alot of those out in the public so submit your sites there. Search for them in Google. Once you have done those. I will try using Google and Yahoo Groups.
Some of the most popular groups
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/free-proxy-lists/
http://groups.google.com/group/free-proxy-list
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/proxy-sharing/
There are many more out there. Post your proxies atleast 2 times a day for a week or two and you are good to go there. Now you are getting tons of traffic. Try to post it on some forums also, there you will get visitors.
There is another technique which there are people who have different view points. Submitting your sites to Proxy.org. This site will list your site among the thousands of proxy and bring you alot of traffic. All they ask for is a link back which is not that big of a deal. This will bring alot of traffic. But some people believe that your site gets blocked from schools by getting listed on proxy.org because all the administrators are constantly looking on the updates on this site, and as new sites get listed those people block it so the users can’t use it. I put my site in there and Its doing good. The techniques defined above is what I took and it gets me around 200 – 300 uniques daily.
Now lets discuss how to monetize a proxy. You can use popular publishers like Adsense, Bidvertiser and other ones. Check out the money makers I recommend. Let me tell you how exactly I did it. I placed one ad on the top, and other ads I tried to embed in the content and put it close to the buttons. Alot of sites are putting ads above and below the url form. Most are 728 x 90 or 336 x 280. These two works great. 468 x 60 also works but not as great as the other two. Make sure you don’t put google ads on the proxified pages. So only put it on sitepages not the proxified pages. Sell private ads on proxies. Because they recieve traffic, alot of people will buy the ads.
You have to balance the ads because sometimes they outlook the site. Alot of proxies I see are very ugly and I don’t like going to those sites every again because of their ads are very ugly. You can make the ad looks pretty with a clean design. But some people say don’t worry about the prettyness and I don’t agree with them.
Now you know
What is a Proxy?
How to setup a proxy?
and this post shows how to Advertise and monetize a proxy.
Make your proxies and report back here how it worked.
Hey, I am Syed Balkhi, The guy who is behind Balkhis Inc. I entered the industry back in 2002 not knowing a single thing. I barely spoke English at that time. In the past six years, my language barrier has been eliminated. Aside from English, now I also speak html, and php. Along with the languages I have also managed to master a few arts. Art of web-designing started when I first entered. Messing around with photoshop, I learned how to create my first web design. Now I founded a web designing firm Uzzz Productions. After running numerous amount of websites in various niche, I have mastered the art of web-development. Now I am compiling a resource of what I already know, and what I am learning on this blog. This resource is to help me if I ever need a guide to look back to, and it is help my fellow webmasters.
You’ve told us the why, how, and money of making a proxy. However, your “why” focused only on the good things that are done with a proxy.
There are unfortunately, those would want to “hide”, not because they are trying to look at some content that’s been prohibited by their school or country (ah, gee… and there is no censorship in the USA!) but rather because they have evil intentions.
Many of those wanting to commit fraud are probably unsuccessful with your proxy as I don’t believe it proxies SSL connections, so you can’t connect to a bank or ecommerce site?
However, one could most likely use your proxy to use email and non-ssl websites to participate in all kinds of bad behavior including various forums of fraud, harassment, soliciting child porn, etc.
What happens next? When someone tries to track down that activity the first thing they will run into is YOUR IP address. You’ll end up with a lot of explaining to do, and in exchange you’ve made a buck or two a day.
Now, what is the sense of setting up a proxy? Or, if you setup a proxy, how do you keep it from being used for bad purposes?
once again, why would I teach users the bad things that can be done with the proxies ???
How can you stop your server from being hacked and launch a torrent sort of software ?? Don’t make a website will definately won’t be a solution.
How can you keep the child from not turning into some typoe of gangster? Don’t give birth to one because if the child commits crime you would have alot of explaining to do….
Proxies are a good source and I explained it why I use it. Ofcourse these are used for numerous bad reasons including hacking…. But most of those are done through CGI Proxies and If you read carefully I recommended people not to use that script.
Well, Syed thank you for the nice series of post. I’m not planning to setup a proxy anytime soon but the information is always welcome.
For Wilbur, I think we can do bad things with a lot of stuff on internet, as an example, if you don’t take care of updating your computer’s security, this pc could become a clone for some attacks without your knowledge.
You miss my point entirely. You would not teach YOUR USERS how to do a bad thing with a proxy.
You would teach those you teach how to install a proxy, how to deal with THOSE WHAT WILL use it for bad things. How to deal with the complaints your IP provider will receive when someone uses YOUR IP to do bad things.
By running a proxy you are allowing other people (presumably anybody in the world, if it is an open proxy) to access the internet via YOUR IP.
We are not talking about hacking. Maybe something as simple as going to a forum and posting a message about a “monkey for sale”. Now, rather than showing the fradusters IP address in Cameroon, the forum post would appear to be coming from YOUR IP.
Now, without or without your proxy, the monkey scammers will post their messages. However, with YOUR PROXY server, their messages will APPEAR to be FROM YOU!
And since it would appear that YOU are using YOUR IP to post fraudulent monkeys for sale, that opens the door for people to COMPLAIN TO YOUR IP provide about YOUR bad activities.
You give all the details about setting up a proxy, except what to do when your IP provider starts getting complaints.
I see what your saying wilbur – A person who sets up a proxie can’t be responsible for the bad ways people may choose to use them anymore than the owner of a sporting goods store can be responsible for the customer who purchases a firearm and uses it for illegal acts.
There are some good uses for them which Syed covered. People who may use a tool for illicit purposes rather than its intended use well that is on them. People need to be held accountable for their own acts.
One thing which you mentioned would be interesting to know more about would be what does happen in the case of complaints to the host? Do they shut the site down or do they realize that it is a proxie?
A nice series of posts Syed that covers proxies pretty well and I learned a few things.
Maybe one more question would be – What is the potential income from a proxie?
If only a couple bucks a day from adsense – well a person would need a hundred of them to make anything worthwhile.
I have this perception that at a few cents a click trying to make money off adsense is futile – That might be a good topic for a later post. Maybe you can prove me wrong and it is possible to make significant income from adsense.
I am not even talking about responsiblity, but EFFORT… for a buck a day you aren’t paying for much time to deal with hassles.
Also, if it operates on the same IP use you for surfing, or other business then you may find your activities being blocked by firewalls and spam blocks as a result of your proxy users behaviors.
I am just suggesting that if you tell people how setup a proxy and how to make money you cover negative aspects as well.
Now, if that Sporting Goods store has a section for viewing child porno what happens? If you make a website to facilitate viewing child porno what happens? If the police trace child porn viewers back to your IP you’ll probably have a lot of hassle, even if you are not responsible.
So, everything else aside, a user of their service agrees not to transmit such data through their service. Operating a proxy server on their equipment may well transmit such data through their equipment, as you have no control over what data is transmitted.
And plenty more about copyrighted data, access by minors, etc.
Just by the hosting contract alone, you have agreeded that “DATA” is not just “DATA”, but that you are responsible for controlling the flow of some “DATA” through their network!
I am wondering are you checkin the guidelines of the proxy host. If yes tell me which one. Second if you put on your site that you are not to held responsible and you explain everything on your site then I don’t think there should be any issues.
German Police Seize 10 Proxy Servers. Of course that article and notes that they will “expect the servers to be returned shortly.”
Good debate you have here
Thanks for the tips syed, and good debating.
We know how to advertise a proxy but didn’t shed enough light on how to monetize a proxy. Why not Adsense on the proxified page?
For promoting proxies you can always submit your proxies to proxy list sites.
Hi,
Good debate here!
Hey ppl you can use atomic power both for healing and killing.
So use it as you like…but you can’t blame the the power within the atom for that……..
why using internet if you can’t distinguish good from bad…..there are tons of bad stuff in internet….also tons of good stuff…..I like the good side of proxy.
thanks
That is my point as well.