Doing Background Checks On Sites

[Viktori]

I was wondering if any of our members here had any good methods on finding accurate information and statistics when it comes to doing background checks on sites you plan on advertising with or investing in. I've seen a lot of offers for ad spaces, but I'm always wary that the statistics are mostly comprised of bot visits, if not all of them, therefore rendering my expense as just a waste since no real person would be viewing them anyway. Tips on how to do this better will be greatly appreciated!

 

[Nymph]

Well, the first thing I do to check a site's standing is via the whois. I'll then check to see if any information is blacklisted or anything along those lines. If everything checks out, I go to Alexa to see the rankings in comparison to their traffic statistics. This is nice, because the Alexa rank details how many approximate unique visitors and such visit the site, so you can immediately tell if something is off especially if, say, their rank is in the millions or hundred thousands (verrry low), but they claim to have XX amount of thousand or even million hits per time frame. There's nothing too fancy you have to do, information is available, you simply need to find the platforms that facilitate it.

 

[Spintax]

Short of seeing someone's actual stats (with a logged-in guest account), you really can't be sure of anyone's claims. Alexa stats are easily faked. It's unfortunate, but the truth is, most analytical packages still struggle to categorize bot traffic as well (Yes, even Google Analytics is manipulated by bot traffic). You're going to have to use several different sources, and then compare notes. Personally, I'm lazy. I'd rather let other people do the grunt work, and then follow their leads. Look into WhatRunsWhere and AdGooRoo to see what I'm talking about. If my competitors have been placing ads on ABC site for 8months straight, then there must be something to it. I'll give ABC a try as well.

 

[Viktori]

Short of seeing someone's actual stats (with a logged-in guest account), you really can't be sure of anyone's claims. Alexa stats are easily faked. It's unfortunate, but the truth is, most analytical packages still struggle to categorize bot traffic as well (Yes, even Google Analytics is manipulated by bot traffic). You're going to have to use several different sources, and then compare notes. Personally, I'm lazy. I'd rather let other people do the grunt work, and then follow their leads. Look into WhatRunsWhere and AdGooRoo to see what I'm talking about. If my competitors have been placing ads on ABC site for 8months straight, then there must be something to it. I'll give ABC a try as well.

Wow this is great! Thanks for the complete rundown, I might look into doing your method as well and thanks too for the sites you shared I'll look into them in a while.

Also, I was looking into buying ad space with some blogs through Fiverr. And I was mainly asking because I was unsure on whether those sites just bulked up their stats through bots which are also easily available in Fiverr itself and that's why I was very skeptical. Anyone have any experience when it comes to this?

 

[Nixon Marcion]

I normally use scamadvisor.com or bbb.org to check out a website. I many times google the website name and look for reviews on the site and how long it has been in operation.

 

[mikong]

It is important for us to do some background check on whatever site we visit. There are more that one reason as to why we should do this.
1. It will avoid any unnecessary e-mail from the site
2. It will give us the knowledge as to what it is about
3. It gives us the opportunity to avoid being "tricked"