By now you all hate me for having you deal with TGP owners and their numerous rules (see Part One, Part Two and Part Three), and you are right… TGP sites do have a lot of rules. But remember that they also have a lot of traffic, and you need traffic, so don’t forget to smile and thank them for the service they perform for your site! .By now you all hate me for having you deal with TGP owners and their numerous rules (see Part One, Part Two and Part Three), and you are right… TGP sites do have a lot of rules. But remember that they also have a lot of traffic, and you need traffic, so don’t forget to smile and thank them for the service they perform for your site!
This week we are going to talk about the Free Site. Again, these sites can come in different sizes and shapes, but the one I am going to talk about today is basically a fancy TGP Gallery, or more correctly, two galleries put together with some navigation links and a warning page. So that you can get an idea what I’m talking about, here’s a sample of the kind of Free Site that I’m referring to (warning, adult content): free site.
Free sites are a great source of traffic, but generally speaking they don’t send the sheer volumes of traffic that a TGP gallery does… but that is because the traffic is more targeted, and it is a different type of surfer that uses Free Sites. I have found that the Free Site generally converts better than TGP galleries, provided you follow a few simple rules.
Rule one is: Don’t give away the farm. Stand by for the ‘softcore sells’ rant. To get the most success in terms of getting your Free Site submission approved with Link Lists, your Free Site should be carrying two galleries of 15 images per gallery… so we are looking at a site with 30 images on it. Please think about the images you are using so that you don’t finish your surfers off for free; remember that the goal here is to get them horny, but make sure that they need to buy what you’re selling in order to “finish” themselves off. Don’t make it easy for them to get what they want without buying anything from you. Don’t worry about the guy that leaves to go find something else because your pictures weren’t explicit enough… he wasn’t going to buy anything anyways, so why bother? Now before anyone says, “Everyone else is doing it,” I would ask you: If everyone starts jumping in front of a bus, are you going to join them too? Softcore sells, so don’t believe all the garbage about how much traffic someone gets with hardcore. Ask them if their bank accepts click deposits. Remember that the goal is sales, not just clicks.
Okay, that rant is done, so let’s move along.
Free sites are great for a lot of reasons, but their biggest advantage is the extra real estate they provide for your links. Build a free site, include a link to a pay site (either your own or someone else’s) and a link to your Hub on each page; that’s two money-making links for a pay site and two traffic-related links for your Hub.
Compared to the TGP gallery, the free site requires a little more effort in the way of design and should have decent graphics for the sake of achieving high rankings on link lists. You also need a warning page that is optimized for search engine traffic, and you need a “main page” that will link to the two galleries. Each gallery page should link both to the other gallery page and to the main page, but not the warning page.
Link lists, like TGPs, have their own rules, and you will want to read these rules before you submit your site. Generally speaking, link list rules are lax when compared with GP site rules, but care needs to be taken here nonetheless. The bigger lists are starting to require 50 to 100 images for inclusion, especially in the Gay market, so keep that in mind.
These sites are a little more complex, but they have some benefits as well; the biggest benefit that the free site has over TGP sites is the fact that it has more pages, and that means it can hold more banners and links.
We now have TGP galleries and free sites built and submitted; you need to continue to add these pages to your Hub. You should be constantly looking for new things to add to your Hub, and remember that it does not hurt to try something new. Trial and error will be a common approach with your Hub, and while your Hub will require attention on a regular basis, if maintained it will do you a lot of good.
Next week I am going to talk about putting it all together. I will show you the Hub that I have been putting together while writing these articles so you can see what I did and compare it with your own work. Now remember, the Hub is a traffic circle, and your Hub does not have to look like my Hub or anyone else’s Hub. The key is getting traffic to and through it.
Have a great week building your free sites, and be creative. Don’t forget to show me your masterpieces; that means show me what you have for your Hub, TGP galleries and free sites. I will be glad to take a peek and offer suggestions, etc. Please email (
