This wall is the one that prevents me from making a server. I cannot figure out how to drive traffic to the site. Yes, I understand SEO, and I know blackhat experts that can help me well beyond that. So there's really little concern about getting myself a good page rank. But that only helps when somebody blindly goes to Google and starts looking for RO servers. Sure, I could also throw in adwords if I wanted to invest money in building a player base. But that's still the same problem. Ditto Youtube and social media advertisement.
I think the biggest key is hype before launch. If you start out with 5 players online, I don't think you'll ever grow very much. Meanwhile, if you can start with at least 50, it's more a matter of not messing up. However, a new owner hyping a new server seems... challenging at best. Yes, you could promise things like special items only available to people who sign up and play the first two days. But you'd still have to have people's ear. In order to hype, you need time. But that also causes your server to fade from someone's mind.
If I thought I could invest $500-600 and have online players north of 60, I'd be on it tomorrow. Problem is, there's no reliable way that I know of to do this. I've also considered PPI campaigns, but I can't find anyone outside of Russia and former Soviet countries that seem to have success with that.
