by 1 person |
Rotators
A URL rotator (sometimes known as page or link rotators) is a system where the same link or URL sends the visitor to different addresses either in some rotation pattern or randomly.
This might be done so that one URL promotes different websites, e.g. where a group of people do a group 'co-op' advert and they want to ensure the traffic is divided fairly and automatically.
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What is a Rotator?
And how does it work?
The main function of a rotator is to display a different web page from a selection each time a certain URL is loaded in a web page.
The page may be random, the next in sequence for the particular visitor (meaning visitor A will see 1, 2, 3, 1, 2 etc as will visitor B) or the next in sequence across all visitors (meaning visitor A might see 1 then B sees 2 then A reloads and sees 3 and so on).
The most common is that any visitor advances the sequence as the person using the rotator doesn't generally care who sees the individual sites in the sequence as long as they are all displayed equally.
The page may be random, the next in sequence for the particular visitor (meaning visitor A will see 1, 2, 3, 1, 2 etc as will visitor B) or the next in sequence across all visitors (meaning visitor A might see 1 then B sees 2 then A reloads and sees 3 and so on).
The most common is that any visitor advances the sequence as the person using the rotator doesn't generally care who sees the individual sites in the sequence as long as they are all displayed equally.
Why use a rotator?
What's the point?
It's true that many people would have no legitimate use for a rotator.
However, in the context of advertising, a rotator can be an extremely useful tool. Here are a few examples...
1 An advertising co-op
Someone can set up an advertising co-op where people can be invited to buy shares in an advertising pool. The organiser can purchase traffic or advertising and point the traffic at the rotator. The rotator then displays the next website in sequence, ensuring that all the members of the co-op get their fair share of the traffic. It even lets people buy multiple shares in which case they have their URL in more than once and equal to the number of shares they bought.
2 Single user promoting multiple sites
In this scenario, a user has a source or multiple sources of traffic that they point to their rotator.
They can then customise very easily where that traffic goes. This is especially useful if they have multiple sources of traffic because they only have to change the sequence in the rotator and all the traffic from all the sources will be diverted accordingly.
It can also be used to divert different ratios of the traffic to different sites, e.g. 75% to site A and 25% to site B (include site A 3 times in the rotator setup and site B once).
3 Easily switch to promoting different sites
This is similar to the previous examples but the user again might have many traffic sources. By poining all those sources to one rotator, it's then very easy to switch from promoting site A to promoting site B.
E.g. An affiliate might abandon product A because a new product B is better with higher commissions and the marketer can instantly switch all the traffic to the new product.
Also, if product A disappears for some reason, it's much easier to just change the rotator to a new site then to have to go to all the different traffic sources changing their destination url.
However, in the context of advertising, a rotator can be an extremely useful tool. Here are a few examples...
1 An advertising co-op
Someone can set up an advertising co-op where people can be invited to buy shares in an advertising pool. The organiser can purchase traffic or advertising and point the traffic at the rotator. The rotator then displays the next website in sequence, ensuring that all the members of the co-op get their fair share of the traffic. It even lets people buy multiple shares in which case they have their URL in more than once and equal to the number of shares they bought.
2 Single user promoting multiple sites
In this scenario, a user has a source or multiple sources of traffic that they point to their rotator.
They can then customise very easily where that traffic goes. This is especially useful if they have multiple sources of traffic because they only have to change the sequence in the rotator and all the traffic from all the sources will be diverted accordingly.
It can also be used to divert different ratios of the traffic to different sites, e.g. 75% to site A and 25% to site B (include site A 3 times in the rotator setup and site B once).
3 Easily switch to promoting different sites
This is similar to the previous examples but the user again might have many traffic sources. By poining all those sources to one rotator, it's then very easy to switch from promoting site A to promoting site B.
E.g. An affiliate might abandon product A because a new product B is better with higher commissions and the marketer can instantly switch all the traffic to the new product.
Also, if product A disappears for some reason, it's much easier to just change the rotator to a new site then to have to go to all the different traffic sources changing their destination url.
Some Popular Rotators
(Ones that I Use)
I have used or use all of these rotators but the ones I recommend most highly are PageSwirl and HitsConnect. That's largely because these are the ones (if any) that traffic exchange owners trust.
- HitsConnect
- The reason I recommend HitsConnect is that HitsConnect provides the technology behind some of the traffic exchanges' site checking function.
HitsConnect is therefore the most likely rotator to be supported by many of the traffic exchanges. - PageSwirl
- PageSwirl is one of the original and best URL rotators and as such is trusted by many traffic exchanges.
by Troy_Wray
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