For maximizing the value you receive for your money, the most important question is - How to select which websites to place ads on? Here is how you do it:

1. Identify Your Target Market

The first step will be to identify your target market i.e. who is likely to buy your product or service. Break down your research into:

Sex - Men, Women or Both
Age Group - Kids, Teenagers, Adults etc. v Geographic Location - Country, State, City etc.
Interests

Example: If you sell anti-aging cosmetics, your main target market is likely to be women in the age group of above 50 residing in the countries where you can ship your products to and who are interested in maintaining their young looks. Your secondary target will be men of similar age group and beauty-conscious young women.

2. Identify Websites with Desired Demographics

Your next step will be to identify websites where you will find visitors of your target market. Continuing with the above example, you will find your target customers on beauty and fashion websites and forums with useful information for skin and beauty care for women above 50 years of age. Such websites should be your main targets for advertising.

You will also find your target market in the 'Beauty' or 'Fashion' sections of Women's websites. And don't forget that men might be interested in buying your products for the purpose of gifting. So, websites like AskMen.com can also be on your list.

Other useful places to advertise can be websites selling beauty products, directories and indexes of beauty-related websites, women's message forums etc.

3. Other Factors to Consider

Apart from identifying your target markets, some other factors also play an important role in website advertising.

. Identify traffic statistics and Click-through Rate (CTR) of the individual websites along with the ad rates and compare. Try to strike a balance between minimum ad rates and maximum traffic.

. When identifying traffic, do not be mislead by only the number of 'hits' a website receives. Ask for page impressions and/or unique visitors etc.

. Check beforehand if the payment terms and methods are suitable to you.

. If the website provides you with the statistics of your advertising campaign, it will be an added benefit

. If you are NOT advertising on a CPM (cost per thousand) basis, i.e. you are paying a monthly/weekly flat price for advertising, take into account the number of other banners your banner will be rotated with. The more the number of banners, the lesser the chances of your ad getting seen by website visitors.