This Affiliate Marketing Path

New Year, New Blog!

2007-01-05T15:46:00.000-08:00

I finally did it! I've got my own domain name and moved to http://this-affiliate-marketing-path.com/ -so please come and stop by!

In a New Place

2006-12-13T07:30:00.000-08:00

I am now at a place where I think I can pour all of my earnings back into my internet publishing - up to this point I've had to use most of what I made for bills.

I have been keeping with my current schedule pretty well, but this changes things. So in the next few weeks I need to carefully evaluate where the money will go and what I should focus on - I am very excited!

threads like this scare me...

2006-12-08T12:01:00.000-08:00

I saw this in the Digital Point Forums today: "It happend ( All Accounts Banned ) 25.000$ month."

OMG, that's so scary - of course, upon reading more, the guy did break the terms by having more than one account... I get so nervous because once every few months I'll accidentally click one of my ads while feverishly working on a site, then I'll nervously write them a letter apologizing, to which they always reply "thank you for your honesty, again. Please review our guidelines...."

We all see it happen here and there... but $25,000 a month??? - ouch.

What can you do? That's why I'm focusing ob some new blogs right now, so I can use Text Link Ads and some other promising forms of advertising.

Where to go from here?

2006-12-07T09:19:00.000-08:00

I'm facing a bit of a dilemma now - I have around 40 sites and 15 blogs now, and I am struggling with where to go from here. They all have a good amount of content - some purely original, some PLR's, and some press releases - I'm not worried about the kind of content on them at this point because they all seem to bring in relativelty the same amount of traffic, relative to how much I've promoted them.

I know that I definitely do want to start working on my new site - the one that's going to be purely original, hopefully very high quality, and based on something I enjoy doing - I do want to work on that, so I plan on writing it into my schedule.

But now what do I do with all of these other sites?

I thought of looking at them from a revenue angle, and going for a goal that seemed pretty simple - to promote each site until it's making a regular $2 a day - then move on... and then I thought that I should really promote the new blogs and get them ready to submit to Text Link Ads in a few months... and then I have some promising older sites I'd also like to focus on... One is in DMOZ, that might be a good one to focus on, one is getting a good amount of Google traffic, that might be a good one to facus one, one's making more than the others, that might be a good one to focus on too.

See my problem?? Where to go?????

So, I have decided, for now, to promote my sites/blogs at a week at a time. I didn't want to worry about adding content but with the blogs, I think I'd better, so I'll spend a little time updating them.

I'm going to start with the sites/blogs that look the most promising - and promote them for a week - with article distribution, submitting to directories (which I really hate!), and quality link exchanges.

I also have an ebook I will be promoting.

And then I plan on writing a little each day for the new site - this will be my most important daily internet task.

I suppose I will do this until something better presents itself - the content is there, time to get back to promoting!

Social Bookmarking Worked for Me!

2006-12-06T15:13:00.000-08:00

Since I recently decided that it would be a good idea to diversify my online empire with a few blogs, I started looking into things like social bookmarking. I didn't think it would help at all, but I tried it out, if for nothing other than to further my site-building education.

With most of the blogs that I tagged on del.icio.us, nothing much happened - I got the random visitor here and there, but nothing to speak of really. That was the case with all except for one of my blogs... one of them got picked up by a section in Yahoo! At first I got a nice little flood of visitors, then it calmed down... but it didn't stop. I realized that if I posted new content every day - that this section of Yahoo! would pick it up.

Last month I made about $70 from these visitors. And that's not all... since my brand new blog had this great backlink (I can only assume) I started getting a nice handful of Google visitors - this equated to more revenue.

So all in all, for taking a few seconds to submit my posts to del.icio.us, I ended up making about $100 extra last month - making the month's total $560.

Another thing about blogs is that it seems easier to get good backlinks with them - I've made some good blogroll exchanges and have even stumbled into getting 4 PR 7 backlinks... so I'm very optimistic to see how they turn out in a few months.

As for the other sites... they seem to be doing a little better all the time - of course, it is the holidays, but they're getting more Google traffic than before - so that's promising.

How do blog networks get away with linking all of their blogs together?

2006-11-16T11:43:00.000-08:00

Everyone has thought that excessively linking their own sites together is a no-no - especially if they are unrelated. But blog networks don't seem too worried about this. I've noticed several blog networks lately that link all of their blogs together, the most prominent being Weblogs, Inc., which links their entire network of blogs over a slew of subjects on the sidebar of each and every blog.

These networks have very high PR and seem to get a lot of comments... so how is it that they don't get penalized?

Do you link your own blogs together? And under what conditions?

That was fun...

2006-11-14T18:46:00.000-08:00

Ok, it looks like things settled down right after my little flood of traffic - I still have a little trickling in from Yahoo! but not like before - luckily I got the AdSense earnings on there long enough to make for a better than average day.

Alright, I've settled down - that just REALLY surprised me - I know now that I'm going to tag as much as possible - and I don't even know how or why all of that works, really, but it was really amazing to see a site go from zero traffic to a steady stream in no time.

HOLY S#*T one of my new blogs is suddenly getting a FLOOD of traffic!

2006-11-14T16:17:00.000-08:00

[edited title - i'll be nice :) ]

Wahhh - I didn't even have ads on it until just now - let's hope it keeps up!

I didn't even know what "tagging" was before today - but I looked into it and decided to tag a few of my new blogs in del.icio.us - or whatever - today (grumbling, I might add, I really didn't think it would do a darn thing).

So I check back about a half hour later - and I'd gotten 70 uniques (from ZERO) in that half hour - all coming from a section of Yahoo! that has a link to the new blog. TOO BAD IT ONLY HAS LIKE FOUR POSTS - LOL! So I just stuck some AdSense on there - wish me luck guys - I'm at work and have to head home now so I won't be able to check on it till later.

OMG I'm more giddy than a schoolgirl - hope it lasts!!!!!

If You Give a Blogger Some Syrup... A ReviewMe Review

2006-11-14T05:39:00.000-08:00

Sponsored Post:

Getting paid per post may seem like the syrup on the pancake for bloggers, but many have concerns about it, like 'is it really worth it' and 'will it make me a whore' and 'where is a good place to get started'? Well, the answer to the first two questions can get complex, but the third one isn't.

Over the past few weeks, ReviewMe has been one of those buzzwords that's been flying around blogs and forums. But like many other affiliate-marketing related buzzwords, I chose to ignore it - I mean, there are just too many "new ways to make money online" for one to look into each and every one - especially since my time is limited. So I ignored it. That is, until two bloggers who I really trust, Chrissie and Empress were checking it out - and had some good things to say about it.

So I decided to give it a spin, seeing as how I am currently working on some new blogs and plan on looking into good ways of monetizing them in the future. The first thing that impressed me (as well as other bloggers) is how quickly you can get started (webmasters tend to have disturbingly short attention spans). It took right around three minutes for me to apply and to get accepted, and voila! I had a project.

The payout is another thing that impressed me - I can see how one could make a pretty good amount per post if they had a decent blog going.

Now, for the big question on everybody's mind:

Will this make me a dirty little whore??

I don't think so... if the review is on topic with your blog - and if you're honest in your review (remember - they aren't paying you to give a good review - just a review - so by all means - be honest!), then I think it can be valuable to the reader. And as BJ pointed out, if you're clever enough, you can make a paid post full of integrity and wildly entertaining as well.

What if I can't make it wildly entertaining?

Then sharpening your thinking skills through writing will certainly help you become a cleverer writer along the way. And that's another plus - I know I put a lot more thought into this post than I do for most of my blog posts - which often range from stream-of-consciousness to downright flippant. Something about having an assignment just makes me want to make things a little more... structured - for good or for bad.

But whatever the case, having writing assignments may compel you to write more, which may make you a better writer, which may make your blog more interesting, which may make your payout higher, which may make you want to write more, and chances are, if you're writing more... you may want some syrup to go with it.

ReviewMe

New Goals

2006-11-09T14:13:00.000-08:00

Okay, I've been quite productive today and I'm excited about getting started on some new goals.

My last goal was to focus on a certain keyword - I picked said keyword because it was usually on the first page of MSN and I thought it would be an easy one to bring to number one. Well, I wrote countles PAD articles over this keyword - made that section of the site bigger, even did an interview, and guess what? Now that page isn't even in the MSN index - the other 437 [ages of the site are, but not that one.

This, amongst other things, has prompted me to started working on the quality site. Now, I do make some attempt to make all of my sites quality sites. But this one is going to be different - I have very high hopes for this one. I would like it to be in DMOZ's Cool Sites, in About.com, and even better - I even have a picture of this maybe being a print publication someday - maybe :)

I've bought the domain name, now I'm looking for the right host - I don't want it to be on a host where I have any other sites, I want it to be solo. Also, I'm following Brett Tabke's advice (per a recent post) and plan to have a bunch of articles written before I even put it out there. I already bought the domain name - it's a .net, but that's the best I could do for what I wanted. .Net's aren't so bad, are they?

Now the tricky part - the writing. I don't know if I'm going to set a goal of xx articles per day on this one - because I'm going to do all the writing and they need to be well-written articles. So I'm just going to do what I can.

Writing for the site will be in the afternoons - and that's the only site (except for some blogging) that I'm going to be writing for. I'm just going to post the rest of my PLR's and hire writers for the others - and that will be what I do in the morning, before my daughter wakes up and I get her ready and off to school and then go to work myself.

SO - I will keep you updated - the new site is daunting - but hopefully it won't be as slow-going as I'm worried it might be - I just want everything to go right with this one.

So I started 2 new blogs...

2006-11-08T13:13:00.000-08:00

They're pretty lame. I started them on two of my affiliate sites to maybe help things out, to maybe have something to put text link ads on as well, but honestly, I don't know if this is just a big waste of time or not.

They're over candles and dogs, and I can put products on them and news and such, but it's really hard for me to make them interesting, haha, I mean, I don't have any strong feelings for the subjects.

Have any of you out there tried out blogs with your affiliate sites? Is it worth it??? Should I just stop and delete them now???

The way it goes...

2006-10-31T14:22:00.000-08:00

So I do all this promoting for my current keyword, write all these articles on it, even interview someone over it, and what happens? Does my site go up in the rankings?

No, that page disappears from the SE's! Ok, it was really only getting MSN traffic anyway... but now it's NOWHERE to be found, it's like if you work on something too hard you get dropped.

Oh well, I'm not giving up that easy, I am finding it very difficult to write over the subject and have taken a break this week - but I'll be back on it soon.

Come as You Were? Blog Party!

2006-10-28T00:01:00.001-07:00

Ok, I took several close-ups of myself - but they are just too bizarre! So here's the most recent pic of me, taken 2 weeks ago, it's my sis and I; I'm the one on the right.

Thanks for the invite Chrissie :)

Who I’m Inviting to the Come As You Are Blog Party:

BJ is your husband back with the camera??
Jonny
Tara R U there???
Burke

How to Participate

If you’ve been pinged with this Meme (aka Bleme, or Blog Meme), join us! Let’s keep the Come As You Are Blog Party rolling through the blogosphere! Simply create a new blog post with the following outline:

1) Take an “As Is” photo of yourself and post it
2) Give us a quick little bio about you, and what’s going on in your home office today
3) List the links to 4 bloggers you want to invite to the Blog Party
4) Tell us who invited YOU, and link back to their CAYA post
5) If you use Tags, include “come as you are” and “bleme” in the tags for this post so that we can check out all the cool bloggers who join in!

(You may want to tell your readers that you are joining in on the CAYA Blog Party, and give them a link back to this post so they can see what it’s all about).

I have a new affiliate guide...

2006-10-24T14:49:00.000-07:00

Okay, I don't think I ever will follow just one system, but I'm using Brett Tabke's (Webmaster World) Successful Site in 12 Months in Google Alone post for my next site. It doesn't differ much from... others' advice... the only part that I think I'll implement in my current sites, but maybe not the newest site, is this:

G) Outbound Links:
From every page, link to one or two high ranking sites under that particular keyword. Use your keyword in the link text (this is ultra important for the future).

Okay, I see value in linking to great, on-topic sites... but if you use the same keyword that you're shooting for - isn't that simply bolstering the competition??

So anyway, this is all going into the planning I'm doing for what I hope to be my greatest site yet - hopefully on par, and better, than my hobby site (which I really actually like!) On this upcoming site, I'm aiming for a DMOZ Cool Site listing, and About.com listing, and hopefully more... we shall see...

My other major project right now is working on promoting one keyword for my candle site - unity candles - in the past few weeks I have written about 5 articles for distribution, as well as a few articles over unity candles for the site. I thought I could write about one a day but I cannot think of aything more than I've already said about them! I even interviewed a minister and posted that - which was a great way to get info - but I think I may need to hire writers whenever I can afford it to think up more topics on unity candles.

So the keyword was on page 17 of MSN last week - then earlier today it was on page 1 of MSN - yet now it's nowhere to be found... so we'll just have to keep watching this.

My other goal right now is to finish posting the loads of PLR articles I've got on my PLR sites, then be done with those for a while.

The Big Shift... well not quite...

2006-10-06T13:38:00.000-07:00

October 1st was to be the day when I shifted from creating on-site content to promoting my current content with off-site links. It was the end of the 50 site challenge, for one, and the beginning of my favorite season, for another.

With the exception of updating a few of my new PLR sites, I was planning on spending the majority of my site time writing PAD articles. Well, I got a few done, but forgot that my big shift coincided with my sister coming in from out of town. On top of that, I had some serious allergies at the beginning of this week. So, as you can guess, I haven't gotten much done on the sites, but the shift has nonetheless taken place.

Over the weekend I did manage to get a few articles written to promote my first keyword of choice. Okay, I need to back up, the way I decided to do it is to start with one site, and start with one of the product pages, and promote the heck out of that keyword until it gets into the top three of any of the big three engines. Then I will move onto the next keyword on that site, until, hopefully, all of the main pages of that particular site are rockin out. And then I will move on to promote the next site.

So that's the plan, I figure my sites are big enough to let them be for a while and just promote them.

As for the 50 site challenge, I didn't make it to 50 - but right now I have about 37 sites... and that'll do fine for now, and I'm happy that I've got these new ones, and they've already made the price of their hosting so that's cool too.

And it looks like my blog is locked, so this message will go up as soon as it is approved by the great blogger aka google - yeah, I love google more and more everyday...

Wrapping Up Challenge Sites and Gearing for Major Focus

2006-09-20T16:03:00.000-07:00

In the last month, I've created several sites based on PLR articles - some rewritten and some not - and it looks like they are currently getting just as much, actually even more, then my new sites with all original articles. So I'm going to be putting up the rest of these types of sites that I want until the end of the month.

At that time, I want these to have a good amount of articles, and some other extras, so that I can update them here and there, but mainly promote them!

And that's where my next phase comes in. Starting in October, I am going to spend one month promoting two sites, starting with the first affiliate site I ever did - candles, and going from there. It probably won't be in chronological order from that point on.

I'm going to promote them mainly by PAD, and I'll be trying to think up some unique things to do as well. I should probably print out Allan Gardyne's new and free ebook, "77 ways to get traffic" (or something like that) because he always has some good ideas.

When I first started the 50 site challenge, you may recall that I put sites over rugs, lamps, and other incredibly boring things out there - why? because my research showed they might do well. But REALLY - who in the world wants to read an article about rugs?? And I sure don't want to write about them - so I'm not going to do several of those after all, but am going to stick with things that I would want to read and write about, like gardening and pets and such.

I will let you know how many sites I managed to get up in a few days!

Another PLR site... Shoes

2006-08-30T07:40:00.000-07:00

I know this is a tough industry, but I decided to do a shoe site, and am just putting the PLR's from my subscription on there right now - Shoe Guide - I'm sticking with the same template I did for the last one. I figure the Adsense is still in the hot zone so I'm going to see how that works out.

I realize I need to get rolling to get 50 done by September, but I'm actually getting excited about putting these up. At this point I'm not even rewriting the PLR articles, so hopefully that won't end up hurting me in the end... but one great thing about having so many different sites is that you can try out different things.

Test, test, test, right?

Getting the 50 Out

2006-08-29T03:53:00.000-07:00

I just realized that the end goal for the 50 site challenge is approaching fast! So I'm going to work on getting these 50 out for now, then go one to building them up. I was writing PAD articles to get some of them indexed - because I don't want to sumbit them to the SE's, but I don't have time to do that with the rest, so I'm just going to link to them from here and get them going that way.

The newest one, AromaNaturals, is basically articles from my new PLR site (along with a few press releases on aromatherapy). I liked the topic so I figured I might as well try out doing a site based off of the articles.

Eerily Accurate Astrology

2006-08-25T14:41:00.000-07:00

So today has been a very productive day, and thank goodness, after having a week where I didn't even want to LOOK at the sites! I actually came up with some new ideas for my first site, and I'm really excited about them!

It's amazing, all these different ideas just came to me in the past few days, and I've decided that I really want to focus mainly on this one site for now, and get my new 50 sites (I still can't believe that!) indexed. On top of that, I've actually gotten a lot done today - posted some articles, did some great keyword research, started implementing ideas...

So, I go to MSN Astrology - which is always soooo eerily accurate (how does that work - I mean, I don't think it's just vague stuff!) and here's what it says:

You can be more productive today than normal. Your mind is much more centered and focused, helping you to channel your energy into one thing instead of millions. This is your secret to success today. Take this idea to heart and you will flourish.

I hope I will flourish - in any case, I think I'm going to end up with another site (besides my hobby site) that I really like!

This is the REAL plan

2006-08-08T15:17:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know I've come up with several gameplans over the past few weeks... but it really defeats the purpose when I don't stick to it - haha.

So really, here's THE gameplan - Back to the Basics

I'm going to go back to the days when I wrote like crazy with wide-eyed-enthusiasm... things just worked better then.

And I'm going to go back to two of my first sites, the two that used to do so well, and work on those.

My plan is to write 2 articles/day from scratch - one for each of those, and to rewrite 8 articles/day for my other sites. (On weekdays).

I'm going to stick with this for a month (unless just the most amazing thing in affiliate marketing presents itself) and see if there's any improvement.

Then I'm just going to hire writers to do my PAD articles - heck, I can't afford them for much now anyway!

So... new plan... starting tomorrow - today I'm just taking it easy and getting prepared.

"...Where have your walls gone? I Think about it now..."

2006-08-07T15:40:00.000-07:00

I had a look back today, to compare my stats with what I did last August. It really made me think about things.

-Last August I made over $900.
-I'll be lucky if I make $300 this August at the rate I'm going.

-Last August most of that came from TWO sites, which made over $300 each.
-This month my income is coming from... 50 sites.

-Last August I wasn't a link whore.
-Apparently, since I've placed a reciprocal link directory on each of those two sites, I am now a link whore.

-Last August I was writing 100% original content for each site, and around 3 articles a day.
-This August it's hard to crank out one, so I have recently taken to rewriting PLR's (will I pay for that later?). (Note -I do still think that rewriting them is a great way for me to create leverage at this time.)

-Last August I was quite optimistic about affiliate marketing.
-This August I'm... not always so optimistic.

This realization has really made me wonder if I'm the cause of my drop in earnings. Maybe I need to get back to the basics, maybe updating a few sites on a regular basis is necessary, at least in this stage of my sites. Or maybe sites simply do well at first, then drop. Whatever the case, I really need to stop and formulate a plan and implement some more focus.

I Jumped on the Leverage Bandwagon

2006-08-04T11:29:00.000-07:00

(Wait, first of all, I really do like this blog! Even though I deleted my last post...)

So I've really given a lot of thought to the idea of creating leverage lately, what with all the talk going around, and I'm glad I did, because I've found a new best friend: PLR articles.

Now there was a time when I shuddered at the thought of using them, but then I actually received some free ones, starting playing around with them, and realized it's MUCH easier for me to edit and add to one of them than it is for me to write an article from scratch.

What I do to make my PLR articles unique and valuable

First of all, I use my new 500 word minimum rule on each article. Since very few PLR's that I've seen reach 500 words - this means, of course, something has to be added.

This brings me to the second thing I do to give them added value - I look up the topic and try to add more information (as long as it's interesting) than other articles provide.

I also interject my own anecdotes and opinions.

And of course, I edit the article to make it grammatically correct, structurally sound, etc.

For most articles, after doing these things the article looks very little like the original.

However, I have run across a few great ones which just required a few changes.

The great thing about these is that I can easily do about 7 a day! Where as before I could barely get one or two articles written from scratch each day.

So, I'm reading reviews right now, and trying out free PLR samples, and after I find a good one I'm going to subscribe to it.

Oh, and my earnings for last month - struggling still - around $400

Time's winged chariot hurrying near...

2006-07-20T15:55:00.000-07:00

While I am not trying to get some action (as opposed to the speaker of "To His Coy Mistress"), I think the metaphor still works quite well (in business, as in life, and I'm sure Marvell was making a reference to life in general as well)... the time thing really got me today (even more than usual - which is a lot!) when I listened to quite an inspiring speech by Rich Schefren, if you've been perusing the forums and blogosphere, I'm sure you've heard about him.

I didn't really pay too much attention to him until I read this in Allan Gardyne's newsletter today: "If you think you don't have time to watch this video, then you need it more than anyone." And it was great... it really stresses the importance of creating leverage and utilizing your TIME.

Only problem for me is that I find it (creating leverage) really hard to do without much extra $$ :'(

But really, I did gain a LOT from it and would highly recommend checking it out.

One inspiring part of it is when he says that the internet is still the Wild West... but it won't be like that forever - now is the time to get on the ball!

But at my back I always hear
Times winged chariot hurrying near
-Andrew Marvell, "To His Coy Mistress"

Anatomy of a Site

2006-07-18T15:59:00.000-07:00

I've been a little hush-hush about the site I've been focusing on, but after watching it go down in the rankings, down in PR, and now to have half the pages drop off the Google index and the other half go into "supplemental" hell - I'm not too worried about it being copied!

It's kind of crazy that the site I'm working on the most seems to have been 'punished' the most by Google recently. So I thought I'd share everything I'm doing with it, see if I can pull it back up in the rankings, and if anyone sees any red flags or has any suggestions - I'd LOVE to hear them.

Despite all of the problems I've had with this site, I'm going to keep focusing on it, because if I can pull this one up from the depths of the SE's, I can pull any site up.

Site: A1 Wood Flooring

I'm trying to get some writing done before work in the mornings, and my only ruls for articles right now is to make them at least 300 words long. (I'd like to go for longer ones later).

Here are the ones I've added so far this week:
Exotic Hardwood: A Rare and Beautiful Addition for Home Decor
Red Oak Flooring: Lovely and Lasting
Hardwood Stairs
Resilient Flooring

And then I also wrote to articles for distribution this week, I am focusing on "hardwood flooring" on my distibution articles right now.

Current standing on MSN:
Page 13 for the KW "wood flooring"

Nowhere to be found on the others.

New Book on the Value of Niches

2006-07-18T13:16:00.000-07:00

I was browsing NPR today and found a feature on a new book entitled The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More by Chris Anderson which "references a statistical trend to suggest that the market for items that are not "hits" will always be larger than that for the most popular items."

It's good to see that the numbers are there - so keep plugging at your niches, guys, no matter how rocky things get, I still think this is where it's at. And like BJ recently pointed out, from what other business can you take time off and still get paid?

PageRank Update!

2006-07-15T08:16:00.000-07:00

Looks like the tri-monthly PageRank update is rolling out. For me, the bad news is that some of the sub-pages of my old established sites went to zero. The good news is that some of my newest sites (some with no link exchanges) have new PR's of 3 and 4.

For whatever all that means!

BTW, on the new sites, and this may just be a coincidence, the only difference that I can see between the PR3 pages and the PR4 pages is that the ones that got PR4 have very long articles.

Record Lows

2006-07-14T15:03:00.000-07:00

The past two days have been dark and overcast, with Adsense lows of close to zero. And as for my product - many are signing up for the newsletter, but no one's buying.

Okay, despite this very DEPRESSING trend, I'm going to maintain my bellicose attitude towards my site of focus and just keep promoting it like crazy. This is so obvious, but it was still a sort of revelation to me today: the benefit of writing over the same site for a long time is that you know that topic so well, that you get to a point where you can rattle off an article like it's nothin'. So while it's not getting more profitable at the moment... it is getting easier...

I mean, I can't really complain about not reaching my early retirement yet, there are worse things happening in the world.

Divide and Conquer

2006-07-11T15:25:00.000-07:00

On the current content site that I'm heavily focusing on, rather than trying to promote the entire site, I'm going to work on promoting it one keyword at a time. I'm "dividing" the product pages right now and am first going to work on promoting the least competitive of those, then work my way up. My rule is, once that keyword has "conquered" its competition by getting into the top three on any of the three big engines, I'm going to move on to the next one, and so forth.

The Tactics: Promoting the keyword with PAD articles and possibly a press release. I've also paid someone $25 to manually submit the site to 220 directories.

The Art of War

2006-07-10T03:07:00.000-07:00

Lately I've been thinking of affiliate marketing as a battle, what with so much competition these days and even worse, all of the search engine do's and don'ts (link partners frowned upon, the mysterious sandbox, etc...).

So last week, to find some inspiration, I searched for some Sun Tzu's Art of War quotes.

I couldn't find any that seemed to fit very well, but in today's Affiliate Programs Newsletter, Allan Gardyne did, being uncannily timely as ever.

His newsletter had a theme of strategic thinking, and here was his ending quote:

"Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory.
Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat."
- Sun Tzu

And it's one I really need to take to heart, I've got a short-term strategy, but I think I need to make a long-term one as well, and then plan out the best tactics for the mission.

Here are the latest skeletons for the challenge, I think these are the last challenge one I'm going to post, I'm too excited about some of the niches ;)
Restaurant Supplies
Art Supplies

June Stats

2006-07-06T07:42:00.000-07:00

Earnings: $614.11
Adwords: -$83.98
=$530.13

Newsletter Sign-ups for Product: 35

A little over $200 of that was made at CJ, coming partly from content sites, partly from advertising, and partly from a few of you who bought domains through this blog (thanks!). The rest was from Adsense and 1 product sale.

Another cool thing is that some of these new sites for the 40 site challenge are already generating some income.

I've been sticking to the focus schedule and writing articles for my content site that I'm working on and have also been working on getting the new sites up.

A Few Fascinating Niches

2006-07-05T07:27:00.000-07:00

Okay, that was sarcasm... they're actually pretty boring... but here are the latest for the 50 site challenge - no articles yet, just wanting to get these indexed right now:

[edit-changed mind on these]

I am really starting to believe that the "sandbox" has more to do with having a large ratio of link partners to one-way links than anything... so I'm going to try these with no partners.

On that note, I am happy to see that one of James Martell's very competitive sites - with few link partners - is getting pretty high on big G - maybe there is hope.

Three-way Focus

2006-07-03T13:42:00.000-07:00

Okay, I've really got a lot going on here, what with the two challenges, my content sites, and the new digital products.

It is definitely time to focus in on things.

So, I've decided to break up my day's work into three areas:

1. Promote one product
I've got one ebook that seems to perform better than the others I've tried (although I haven't done any extensive testing, it just got A sale and more newsletter signups than the others. So this part will be easy: advertising with Adsense ($30.00/month for now), and sending out a newsletter about once a week (I already have my autoresponder set up to send nine out after signing up - no, not all at once).

2. Focus on one content site until it gets into the top three positions in at least one of the major SE's
So, I'm going to write articles for it, and hire my Elance authors to create PAD articles until this happens. Maybe submit it to some more directories. This area is going to require the most work.

3. Work on the challenges
This means getting each of those 50 sites up - for the moment I'm not even going to worry about getting the articles written for those - I'm just going to get the main pages up, link to them from here to get them indexed, and then after I get some articles going, link to them from PAD articles. I'm not going to do any link exchanges on these new ones.

Here's the latest, a bit of an awkward one: Nautical Museum. It's going to have facts about nautical history, historical ships, information on nautical stars and symbols, and, of course, pages for nautical products. I've always loved the ocean and just thought this would be a fun one to do.

I think focusing on certain things will really help me get things rolling again, I've been a bit lost in everything lately.

Setting Up Autoresponders

2006-06-30T11:49:00.000-07:00

This week I've been setting up a series of autoresponders for my new infoproduct that I am beginning to market. I set up eight autoresponders for my product - 2 sales letters that link to a course, and then 6 emails detailing the contents of the course. On top of that I plan to send out a newsletter once every two weeks.

Also, since Aweber lets you have UNLIMITED autoresponders, I decided to set up autoresponer-newsletters for several of my content sites. I'm going to keep working on these over the weekend and hope to have set up at least a year's worth of bi-monthly newsletters for three of my content sites.

The thought of sending out numerous newsletters each week doesn't appeal to me, so this way, the newsletters will be loaded and ready to shoot. Why not take full advantage of each visit?

Getting close to 50 fast!

2006-06-27T15:04:00.000-07:00

Whew, in the last week I've been spending a lot of time at Wordtracker getting ideas for new sites for the 50 site challenge. I figured since domains are now $2.95 at IPower, now would be the best time to do it. That coupled with the fact that I've got a HostGator hosting account that's $9.95 for unlimited domains (thanks for the recommendation, BJ), having a lot of sites is pretty cheap!

So in the past week I've bought 28 domain names (making a total of 34 since the challenge has started) and researched the keywords for them - buying all of these is really starting to seem pretty crazy! But it's also been a lot of fun. I figure this week I'll try to buy and research the rest - maybe even more than 50 total - and then next week comes the tough part - writing articles. Yes, my measly Elance budget is not going to be enough to get this beast going, I'm going back to my goal of 5 articles/day for a while starting next week, how long is yet to be known.

Six Ways to Prep for a DMOZ Submission (and improve your site)

2006-06-23T06:36:00.000-07:00

Now that I have a couple of sites in DMOZ, I thought I'd take note of what similarities and qualities they had upon getting in and summarize it in a nice little list. (I actually posted something similar in my old blog that was DELETED by Blogger, and thought it was worth reposting).

Why? Because it is worth something to get into DMOZ, it improves your trust rank with Google, counts as a good backlink with other engines, and sends you extra traffic. And might I add that the only sites of mine that are getting regular Google traffic are the ones in DMOZ.

Memo to myself: Work on these sites.

1. Make your site UNIQUE!
This is something the editors look for, so browse other sites in your category and ask yourself, "what can I do to make my site unique?" You might even want to announce the fact with a declaration like "Welcome to For the Birds - the only backyard birding site with a forum and photo gallery that also tells you how to attract different kinds of birds." (And yes, this is the topic of one of my DMOZ sites).

2. Don't just make it unique, also make it look unique.
Having a cookie-cutter affiliate site probably won't help you much, remember, many of these editors browse lots of affiliate sites, and seeing the same template over and over might just make them dismiss them immediately. I know that some have recommended that you don't add images to your affiliate sites, but my sites that made it into this picky directory were filled with a good amount of images. People like to see a good amount of graphics anyway - I'm not talking gaudy - just attractive. Now if you're worried about people not clicking on your ads because they're distracted with pictures, then just add some to your home page and not your content pages. Although I like to add nice graphics to as many of my pages as possible.

3. Affiliate what??
The sites of mine that got in are the most hobby-ish sites I have. One looks that way because it is a pure hobby site, and was created before I had even heard the term "affiliate marketing," and the other looks that way because I decided to have fun with it when I started it. With my second site, I created my own simple design for the site, added some background color to the menu, even added a little border. I was going for an innocent, even - dare I say - countrified look. Instead of making a site that looks like it was made by a savvy internet entrepreneur, you may want to make it look a little more like it was created by Old Man Jenkins. Have fun with it, but always remember - never get too gaudy, we don't want to scare away our visitors.

4. Minimize those ads
We all know that DMOZ, and Google for that matter, doesn't like sites that are too affiliate-esque. So minimize those ads, especially on the home page, you may even want to take all of the ads off your home page before submitting.

5. Personalize
I like to sprinkle little notes from the editor here and there, or feature little "editor's tip" boxes in the sidebars of some of my sites. This will make your site a bit more unique and also add a little value for the visitor. Maybe even consider putting your own picture up.

6. Quality, quality, quality.
Has this been pounded into your head enough? We all know it, but knowing and doing are two different things. So when you're writing articles, don't just give the same information that your competitor's site is giving, give a little more, then personalize it with your own opinion, it will likely be much more captivating for the reader this way as well.

Remember, human volunteers select which sites will get in, most are good, but from browsing different categories, it's obvious that some are there just to serve his or her own purposes. There are also some that take their sweet time about checking your site... and in some categories, it will seem like your site will never be reviewed. So if you don't get in right away, don't sweat it too much, there are many other ways to get some nice backlinks... but that's another post.

Cheap Domains & PPC Campaigns

2006-06-21T13:57:00.000-07:00

I went to buy domains this weekend for the 50 site challenge and realized that iPower is having a sale - $2.95 domains.

So this week I've been doing keyword research for some new potential sites.

I've also started 2 PPC campaigns for 2 of my new digital products - I'm starting at $1/day for each - not many sign-ups for my newsletters yet, though. I really can't afford much right now - so I hope this is enough to get me started!

Odd Earnings

2006-06-20T13:15:00.000-07:00

My adsense earnings continue to plummet, however, I've had a couple of pretty interesting days this week.

Sunday morning I found that I had sold one of my new digital products and made about $22.50 off of that - the strange thing was that I haven't even started promoting it - it's not linked to from the site I put it on, I wasn't running any ads, I had just placed it in the ClickBank Marketplace and voila! - someone found it! So that was pretty exciting and motivating for me to continue on with selling my own products.

Then yesterday was my biggest earning day yet - I made $76.60 off of one jewelry sale at CJ!

So maybe my total earnings for June won't be so terrible... They just confirm my suspicions that taking some new directions is probably a good idea.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results

2006-06-08T05:19:00.000-07:00

So for the sake of my sanity, I am venturing out.

Up until now, I steered clear of words like "autoresponder," and "PPC," but after putting so much into my natural search sites and watching their earnings fall each month, I decided it's time to try something new.

I finally decided to try selling my own product, and was inspired by Burke's progress. So I am working on putting together a sales page for the product I'm going to try to sell, then I'm going to sign up for some autoresponder service and also get a newsletter going for it, then do some PPC advertising. It's all going to be new for me, but it's about time I learned the ins and outs of these things.

I am still working on the 50 sites challenge, too.

Who do you want to win?

2006-06-05T13:47:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know several of us in this blogroll watch The Apprentice - so who do you want to win?

Personally, I'm rooting for the British guy, the other one (I'm terrible, I've watched every show and forgot their names) is just a wee too flighty, though he has been sensible in the past about a few things.

And for the love of Pete - what is up with him choosing such a lame team - hahaha, that's too funny...

To tie it all in - have you learned anything, business-wise, from the show? I've learned that amazingly, it IS possible to make $1000 profit from one seriously focused, hard day of work... if only I could just get the discipline to do that online...

This plane is definitely crashing - May Earnings

2006-06-02T14:50:00.000-07:00

$468.66

Not to be too dismal... but these earnings are really getting me down. That doesn't mean I'm going to stop... things are just getting really frustrating.

I may look into other online avenues as well as do content sites... I've been considering doing something with ebooks, still not exactly sure how, though.

The Increasing Need for Quality

2006-06-01T14:27:00.000-07:00

Quality, quality, quality - it's all you hear these days, from people selling ebooks about it to Google's increasing 'quality' algorithms.

So we all know to put some useful information on our pages, we all know to try to add something extra... beyond that, what can an internet publisher do? I mean, if About.com can be the mammoth site they are with fairly small articles and pages with links, then why should I worry?

Exactly, so I'm not going to worry so much, I've got informative articles, I've got extras on a lot of my sites, and other than cutting down on link exchanges, there's not a whole lot else I can do to appease the Google gods.

Of course, I will always try to better my sites, but the last few months have been so nervewracking, earnings-wise, that I just decided enough with worrying so much. Instead, I'm just gonna work as much as I can.

Which brings me to my 50 site challenge update:

I started one on Celtic Culture, and hired someone for the articles, so far: Celtic art, Celtic music, and Celtic jewelry.

I decided against doing subdomains on my big sites, so I may do 50 actual sites after all - that's one site every three days - wow, I have some catching up to do!

The Latest on Google and IBL's and OBL's

2006-05-18T08:54:00.000-07:00

This week Matt Cutts went into some great detail on Google and quality links in his indexing timeline post. What it boils down to (and what most of us know anyway) is that you need high quality IBL's to get indexed often, excessive link exchanges = bad, few IBL's = bad, and linking to non-related sites = bad. Giving people good information and linking to high quality sites = good.

Ahh, so it's probably time for me to really slow down on the reciprocal linking... good riddance!

Awesome!

2006-05-17T14:34:00.000-07:00

Okay, nothing has really happened yet... but remember that big magazine-style site I was going to do? Well I'm using a domain name that I've had for 2 years - I've been working on transferring it over to my new registrar before it expires (tomorrow!) and I just got a note that it is now transferred.

The coolest thing about it is when I look up the domain's keywords, it still comes up number 3 on Google, even though it hasn't had a thing on it for almost 2 years. AND... it has a PR 4 - weird!

So I'm hoping maybe I can skip the sandbox with this one...

Busy Busy

2006-05-16T14:33:00.000-07:00

Whew, between my two goals, I sure have been busy! I've got some new sites set up (sans articles) on garden supplies, globes, and cats. I hired a writer at Elance to do the articles for the main pages for these.

Then, I'm starting 2 gigantic sites - one will be mainly press releases - and the other completely original.

Site A is pretty general and was inspired by SheKnows - I noticed they had used an article that I had used on another site of mine and started inspecting further and realized that much of their site consists of press releases and reprint articles. I thought I could set up a magazine style site too and post only good, relavent articles and press releases (though my categories are a little different) as well.

Site B - well - this is going to be my magnum opus - the best site yet. I am going to do all of the writing myself, and it's going to take research, library research. With this site, I'm not just hoping to get into important directories like About and Dmoz, but I'd love to see it as a DMOZ 'cool site' - and there are other places I'd like to see it in but I'm going to keep that hush hush for now :)

These two sites are going to have many subdomains - and for the challenge, I am going to count each subdomain as a site.

Between all of this, I just got two articles written last week: Strawberry Shortcake Dolls and antique dolls.

Keyword Update

2006-05-10T13:38:00.000-07:00

Here's the latest update on my other goal of promoting one keyword until it gets to the top three of one of the big three:

I have done some link partner exchanges, article dist., and just submitted to more directories this week.

Two weeks ago:
MSN: 22
Yahoo!: 159
Google: ???

Today:
MSN: 17
Yahoo!: 171
Google: ???

I guess I never posted my April earnings... they're not too exciting :( It was a little over $500.

What Has Burke Been Up To?

2006-05-09T13:52:00.000-07:00

I ask myself more and more lately, and this is a question you may want to ask yourself.

Why? Because he has managed to go from $166 a month to over $2000 a month over a time span of nine months.

How does he do it? His system seems a bit complicated at first glance, but I think it's worth looking into - and he just spilled the beans telling exactly how he does it.

Sites Update:

I've got the newest one up and running: The Doll Site. In the last few days I wrote these articles for it: American Girl Dolls, Barbie Dolls, Bratz Dolls, and Paper Dolls.

Didn't get any writing done today - focused on my current keyword instead.

Free, Clean Website Templates

2006-05-08T12:27:00.000-07:00

With the 50 site challenge, there's no way I can buy templates on top of everything else, so on the new sites I'm currently working on, I simply did a 3-column setup with a header I came up with using SXC or STOCKXPERT photos and Paint Shop Pro.

But I recently found a site with some nice, free templates that I'm going to start using for the new sites, coupled with my own headers: Andreas Viklund free templates. He does require a link back - but it's more than worth it IMO.

His sites are in oswd, which has loads of free templates, but after browsing there a bit, I still like the Andreas templates best.

Challenge Update:

Last week I finished the articles for the main pages of the tea site: green tea, herbal tea, Oolong tea, organic tea, white tea, teapots, and tea cups. Then I posted some press releases and reprint articles to fill things up for now.

I also did four articles for the newest one I'm putting up... whew! This much writing is tough on my schedule! I think I'm going to post an Elance project soon!

The Latest Challenge

2006-05-03T15:42:00.000-07:00

Okay, BJ and Chrissie have come up with an amazing challenge: to create 50 sites before the shopping season! WOW! This was perfect timing for me, since I was losing focus and haven't made a new site in a while - so I decided to join in.

Recently, my main goal has been to focus on one keyword and promote it to the hilt - but there's only so much of one keyword I can handle, so this will be something else to do to balance that out. Plus it's just really FUN! I can try out every site idea I've ever had!

It's been loads of fun so far, but I'm still not sure if I'm going to go for 50 - I'm wavering between doing 20 and 50 right now. This week I'm putting a site up as quickly as I can with a FT job (this means getting up at 4 AM) as well as promoting my keyword, just to get an indication of how much time I will have.

My current plan is to write all of the product pages, and then post a few articles - which may be press releases - but I may be hiring a writer for this mammoth project soon.

Here's my first site in the challenge: Tea First, today I did articles on black tea and essiac tea. (And yes, I'm going to throw a little caution to the wind on these and put some links on here.)

Internet Freedom Under Attack

2006-05-01T14:33:00.000-07:00

Okay, this is a bit frightening, and I'm sure it will pique the interests of site owners everywhere. AT&T and Verizon are trying to manipulate their customers' internet browsing - allowing only certain sites to open, and they're pushing US Congress to allow them to do so. Here's more from MoveOn (I don't agree with all of their issues, but they hit on some good points like this one sometimes):

Big Internet operators like AT&T and Verizon want the power to decide which Web sites open properly on our computers—giving them control over what we do and where we search online. So far, Congress has caved to their demands.

But because of intense public pressure, some members of Congress are starting to switch from AT&T's side to ours! In just a week, Congress saw over 250,000 of us sign a petition demanding the Internet stay free. Joining this call are tech pioneers like Google and Microsoft, diverse groups ranging from MoveOn to Gun Owners of America, and even some celebrities.

If enough of us stand up now, there's still time for the House of Representatives to do the right thing next week when it votes on whether to protect or destroy Network Neutrality—the Internet's First Amendment and the key to Internet freedom.

I would like as many people as possible to sign this, whether I get credit or not. I do have a referrer ID (I could win an ipod) - but I'll post the non-referral link as well - it doesn't matter either way to me as long as you take action.

Join the petition asking Congress to protect the free and open Internet

Join the petition - non referral link.

It may seem like a small thing, but it does involve two very large service providers and could have a real impact on net browsing - not to mention the doors it will open.

Promoting My Current Keyword

2006-04-28T15:47:00.000-07:00

I've spent the last couple of days just promoting my one keyword... I'm thinking this should help, because before I was just doing a little bit here and there over 17 sites and I think I was spreading myself too thin.

What I've done to promote my keyword:

Yesterday I wrote a large (1400 words) informative guide for the site.

I wrote two articles for reprint and submitted them to my five favorite article sites:
http://www.ezinearticles.com/
http://www.goarticles.com/
http://www.articlecity.com/
http://searchwarp.com/
http://www.articlebiz.com/

Worked on getting partners at Value Exchange.

And, submitted to a few directories, I found a great directory listing and submitted to those with the highest PR - got to Jayde then I'd had enough.

Time to enjoy the weekend and hopefully those links will work a little magic while I play!

Major Focus

2006-04-26T07:39:00.000-07:00

Lately I've been working on the sites willy-nilly - no focus, adding a few articles here, doing a few link exchanges there, etc. Also, lately, I've noticed that a good portion of my earnings are coming from one keyword that's number one at MSN, so I thought it would be a good idea to focus on keywords.

My new goal is to focus on one keyword until it is in the top three of one of the major engines, then move on to another one. To do this, I'm going to write distribution articles for it, do link exchanges primarily on that site, submit it to directories, and maybe even look for related forums to post informative entries in with the keyword in the sig.

It'll give me some focus and a clear goal, which is just what I need right now.

Current position of keyword:
MSN: 22
Yahoo!: 159
Google: ???

March Earnings, the BUZZ, and off-site optimizing

2006-04-03T14:40:00.000-07:00

$547.54

Still lower than normal, one thing is that my visitor numbers haven't dropped, I guess there are just fewer people shopping this time of year...

Finally dropped the BUZZ!

Yep, it's been pretty useless lately, James spends more time advertising his products and chatting about that blasted Cobra than he does giving useful information lately. If things improve, let me know!

So I dropped that and got a subscription to the Webmaster World Support forums - I've learned so much in their free forums about not over-optimizing sites, useful directories, and so much more that I thought it might be a good idea. Now I have a lot of reading to do!

Off-site optimizing

I'm shifting to doing a lot of off-site optimizing rather than frantically adding articles. What first gave me the idea to do this was when I was doing some searches on some of my keywords and found that many of the top sites in G were just directories! Very little content, nothing terribly useful. Then I realized that I really haven't done a whole lot on the way of links, mainly because I really don't like gathering links... but it needs to be done.

So I've been spending some time getting link partners (which I don't mind too much), spreading PAD articles around (I can handle submitting to two or three directories but need to work on submitting to more), and submitting to directories - which I hate!! I mean, I submit a site to two directories and I just feel beat, that's torture!

But, that's my focus for April, that and de-Martelling my sites (meaning I'm under-optimizing them, mainly making sure the anchor text, title text, and H1 tags don't all match). Oh, and adding forums to a few of the sites.

Up to This Point

2006-03-24T13:11:00.000-08:00

So... in the past year I've been logging my experience starting an internet publishing business... those posts were all deleted (or something!) and so I'll try to briefly describe what they entailed...

I've been doing sites since 2002 but just started getting interested in doing site publishing full time a little over a year ago.

I hadn't even heard the term "affiliate marketing" when I bought James Martell's Affiliate Marketing Handbook, but saw it was working wonderfully for him and soon after starting making sites according to that.

Now I've got 18 sites, most of them new, 15 of them were done according to the manual. These sites currently bring in anywhere from $500 to $1000 a month, but I'm now seeing a need to increase the quality and uniqueness of the sites. Martell's book offered some invaluable lessons to me as a beginner affiliate marketer, but his methods don't work like they used to, so I'm moving forward with my sites.

And that is where I left off in my last blog...

I had the most wonderful revelation yesterday... I was chatting with someone about how one of their sites avoided the sandbox, they let me have a look at it and it was a tourist-travel-type site (I couldn't help but remember how Matt Cutts said some industries won't be affected by the sandbox), it was full of gorgeous pictures, and except for a menu on the front page, there was no other text - just those glorious photos. It was moderately optimized - nothing overdone - and had some interesting bits of info, but all the pages were not stuffed with hokey articles.

Then, I realized there there were certain types of locations that my family loves to visit, and realized that doing a site over those could be a fun and exciting project, and a great excuse for us to take more trips! So I think I'm going to do that next... and just forget about what EVERYONE has said in their newsletter wars... and also just have fun doing it.

Well I'm back now, and I must say I've enjoyed the subject matter, and I'm ready to get started... but I might put that on hold because when I got back I found that one of my newer sites has been listed in DMOZ!

And the home page is now getting Google traffic!

It doesn't have much content, though, as a matter of fact - only 3 articles!! So I need to work on that site for a while, add some good content and all.

By the way, it got into DMOZ with affiliate links and Adsense on the homepage, but the home and PP's are filled with informative information. It also has lots of images.

Thanks for all the comments, everyone, hope this blog is here to stay!

Um... wow.

2006-03-23T12:02:00.000-08:00

Looks like my blog was deleted by blogger, and they just deleted this one and not the other two I have.

Yeah... I doubt I'll be in the mood for posting for a while :(