Millio Dollar Homepage

[newhomeplans]

Has anyone heard of the “Million Dollar Homepage”? Apparently some 21 year old college student, Alex Tew; in England had started selling ad space on his web site for £1.00 per pixel. Supposedly hundreds of major international companies have purchased blocks of 100 pixels each and he is now a millionaire. There are 10,000 blocks. Is this a joke or just hype? What do you folks thinks about it?
http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/index.php

Allen Jones
Salmon Arm BC

[cspelts]

Is this a joke or just hype?
It's both a joke and hype - and yet it's still very real! He came up with a simple idea, and figured out how to get some publicity. If you read his blog on the site, he was contacting journalists right at the start, before there was really even a story to report on.

I think it was brilliant - but even he admits it was a one-off deal. It's not likely that the thousands of sites that imitate his will be as successful. But, yeah, he had a billiant idea and make a million dollars. It's a great story!

[cspelts]

Is this a joke or just hype?
It's both a joke and hype - and yet it's still very real! He came up with a simple idea, and figured out how to get some publicity. If you read his blog on the site, he was contacting journalists right at the start, before there was really even a story to report on.

I think it was brilliant - but even he admits it was a one-off deal. It's not likely that the thousands of sites that imitate his will be as successful. But, yeah, he had a billiant idea and make a million dollars. It's a great story!

[coder]

it's real and we purchased pixels from him. Best investment we ever spent for the results we are getting.

[cspelts]

Best investment we ever spent for the results we are getting.
Can you post a link to the image you submitted? Or directions on how to find it on the real site? I'd love to see what you submitted - since it's working!

And congratulations! It's one of those things where you had to have a bit of imagination in order to buy in, and if you waited too long, it was too late. You were smart enough to get in - and I applaud that!

[chandrika]

it's real and we purchased pixels from him. Best investment we ever spent for the results we are getting.

What kind of results do you get. I have heard the story and think it is cool, but I am a bit in the dark as to how people actually get results from advertising on a site like that.

Have the results you have got come from people clicking through? Or from an increased pagerank for your site for the link from what must be a high ranked site?

I kind of thought that there must be so many links on one page that the chance of anyone clicking through wouldnt be that great. Is it that the site gets so much traffic that the odds are that even just a small percentage of the number that might click is still quite a large number?

Do people use the site as a kind of directory?

[SPC2]

The site doesn't pass any ranking juice. It was a one-off idea that worked brilliantly for the guy becuase he got the buzz, but none of the thousands of copycat sites have succeeded.

I imagine that the ads get clicks from the curiosity traffic that his site gets, but that'll fade away. I've clicked on plenty of ads there myself, but it was all just curiosity stuff.

[coder]

Can you post a link to the image you submitted? Or directions on how to find it on the real site? I'd love to see what you submitted - since it's working!


Sure it's towards the bottom left corner.
15 in from the left and 10 up. it's a 10x10 square.
small picture of the Phantom head. We originally got that location because when we purchased the spot there was nothing else around, this was back when Alex had less then 150,000 sold. we were averaging 120 visitors/day now we average 20/day.

Another bonus of purchasing pixels from him is that other sites list the sites that purchased pixels, hence more traffic and IBL's

[fuzzygay]

chandrika made a few very good points. My guess is that is just hype. There is no real value in a map like that, not from search engines point of view nor from regular visitors.

Let me explain: Search engines love text, the most you get (as advertiser) in the map ad is an "alt" tag, which can be classified as spam if abused. It is being said that search engines record only the very first 100 links in a given page, so 999,900 of those potential links will be ignored. On the other hand, what is a visitor going to do with one million (even one hundred thousand!) links in one single page? My guess is that just have fun clicking here and there, are these the targeted customers you will want visiting your site? You bet!

I do not see any value on these page, it will fade away as fast as it came up, I give it another three or so months to completely disappear from the landscape. Does anybody remember banners? Link farm banners? Of course current advertisers are looking a ton of traffic, I would ask: What about sales?

It was a nice idea, though!

[coder]

Let me explain: Search engines love text, the most you get (as advertiser) in the map ad is an "alt" tag, which can be classified as spam if abused. It is being said that search engines record only the very first 100 links in a given page, so 999,900 of those potential links will be ignored. On the other hand, what is a visitor going to do with one million (even one hundred thousand!) links in one single page? My guess is that just have fun clicking here and there, are these the targeted customers you will want visiting your site? You bet!

I do not see any value on these page, it will fade away as fast as it came up, I give it another three or so months to completely disappear from the landscape. Does anybody remember banners? Link farm banners? Of course current advertisers are looking a ton of traffic, I would ask: What about sales?


MSN lists the milliondollarhomepage as an IBL, are you saying that doesn't count???
http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=link%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.fireworks.c om

also there is nowhere close to a million links. the site is full with somewhere around 2700 links. As for sales we can't sell fireworks online, so that isn't a factor for us. Since our link has been on hit site we've had over 7,000 visitors. Where else can you get 7,000 visitors for $100 in less then 4 months with a decent PR?

[newhomeplans]

Sorry Coder; but I think the above disbelievers are right. What good is a hit if it doesn't result in sales. The smallest number of pixels that I could use for the words "IT'S A SCAM" is 37x7 or 259 pixels. You can buy a lot of classified ads in your local newspaper for $259 and get far better results.

Allen Jones
Salmon Arm BC

[promarkweb]

So, in our marketing and sales efforts, is sales our only objective? I noticed a lot of conversation here about "no sales coming in", not worth it.

But do you think that Buick gets a few million dollars in car sales from sponsoring each PGA tournament they sponsor? Or do you think they do it for exposure, and brand building.

I think the concept was a great one, wished I came up with myself, and I think that if you're focus goes beyond sales, being listed there is not only worth it, but can be effective.

Note that the final 1000 pixels sold for, and this is right, 38,000 dollars! Obviously, sometimes it's about brand building, and not sales. Long term image is huge.

It's not the immediate affect, it's how the longterm works out.

[SPC2]

Would Buick sponsor PGA tournaments if they thought they wouldn't profit by it? Brand building is profitable, and, imo, the bottom line for Buick is profit. It doesn't need direct sales for something to be profitable.

[coder]

Sorry Coder; but I think the above disbelievers are right. What good is a hit if it doesn't result in sales. The smallest number of pixels that I could use for the words "IT'S A SCAM" is 37x7 or 259 pixels. You can buy a lot of classified ads in your local newspaper for $259 and get far better results.


So does that mean that we are wasting time and money being open year round as a fireworks company when the vast majority of our sales are from the Fourth of July and New Years? Should we stop advertising the rest of the year? And since we can't sell fireworks online should we stop expanding our site if it doesn't directly lead to sales?

[cspelts]

In my opinion everyone who bought from the original guy got a great bargain! Coder's experience is proof of that. That site has gotten a ton of media attention and most of the advertisers only spent $100.

But it was a one time deal and it's HIGHLY unlikely any of the copycat sites will ever acheive the same level of exposure.

[brian.mark]

This page (http://blog.outer-court.com/zero/) seems like a much better deal. I think I'll take all 1,000,000 pixels. ;-)

Brian.

[coder]

it is kind of odd since the site reached it's goal of $1,000,000 it has been down for days now.

[brian.mark]

Yep... DDOS rules, doesn't it? Or is that a decent firewall that rules and not DDOS. I think I'll take the firewall being a good thing for our site, even if their site doesn't have one.

Brian.

[infinity_shore]

Many copy-cat sites haven't succeeded because they didn't try to do anything different from the original.

I came across these guys, http://www.pix-cube.com, who have added a new slant on the idea:
1) Animated adverts
2) Ads for businesses that don't have their own websites
3) A referral scheme where everybody can make some cash

I wish I had the original idea myself!

[kerer99]

The guy who created the site was brilliant - good for him.

As for those who actually purchased space on the site, I'm not convinced that it's worth it.

Even if you're getting 20 visitors a day, what is the bounce rate of these visitors? For example, I've clicked on many of the pixel images, and then clicked on the back button once I saw what website the image represented.

If I have an extra 100 bucks, I'll spend it on AdWords thanks.

[citypublife]

Having signed up to Alex's newsletter here is the latest news we have:-


I'm pleased to report that The Million Dollar Homepage is back online
after almost 6 days of downtime due to a malicious attack by hackers who tried to extort $50,000 from me. I'm pleased to say that I did not pay a penny, and worked closely with my hosting company Sitelutions and DDoSprotection.com to stop the attack.

I can also report that the FBI are investigating (this is because my website is hosted on servers in the US).
Happily, now that the site is back online, I'm able to properly announce the winner of last week's eBay auction for the last 1,000 pixels. The auction
ended Wednesday 11th January, but unfortunately that was just as the attackon the site began, so I was unable to upload the winning bidder's pixels and give them the fanfare they deserved.

So, without further ado, I'm very happy to announce that Elijah Kliger of Brooklyn, NY, is the proud owner of the last 1,000 pixels for his new site,
Million Dollar Weight Loss (http://www.MillionDollarWeightLoss.com) which sells a variety of weight-loss products and supplements. The winning bid was $38,100 - congratulations Elijah!

The auction completed the sale of all one million pixels on the homepage and brought the final total I've earnt from the site to a massive $1,037,100 - not bad for less than 5 months work eh! I've kept saying it, but this whole thing still hasn't sunk and I'm really not sure when it will. It's been an amazing experience and I'm sure 2006 will be an exciting year.

I'll keep you posted - I have a few new ideas up my sleeve :)

Thanks for your support, and have a great year.

Alex
The Million Dollar Homepage

Great story.

Pubs and Bars (http://www.citypublife.co.uk)

[simonm]

Aren't we missing the point. The guy stated he wanted loads of money, he innovated, thought latterally, came up with an idea, promoted it. It worked, he got loads of money! Job done.

[digitallabz]

The guys made news in CNN. This website was mentioned in CNN news again much more publicity and traffic to this site.

Nice Idea and Good Effort.

Article Submission (http://www.articlenetworks.com)
Free Press Release (http://free-press-release.articlenetworks.com)

[brian.mark]

More coverage on the DDOS can be found here (http://www.securitypronews.com/news/securitynews/spn-45-20060118MillionDollarHomePageHacked.html).

Brian.

[jackson992]

His idea might have been decent if you could tell what was on the site. As it is it's much much too small to even be able to read.

[greeneagle]

This is the most serious (delirious) copycat page I have seen:
http://www.smashmyviper.com/

Make sure and watch the introductory video at:
http://www.smashmyviper.com/v/20051206.php

Those "boys" get an A+ for creativity and knowing that they had to go the next step, but... Will they make it happen? Raw marketing, and I mean "raw", at it's best? LOL - I'll be watching the outcome.

Shouldn't this thread be under "Marketing Strategies"?

Ken

[jstout1]

why even ask such a question when u know it isnt true.