Since I’ve been going in a bit of a different directly lately working on my own products - and having a bit more success with that than I have with affiliate marketing.  I’ve not given up on affiliate marketing - but I’m wondering if maybe I need to try things a bit differently.

Landing Pages

Yes, the almighty landing page.  I’ve actually not delved into landing pages - and I’m wondering if this might be partly the reason why I’ve not done so well with the affiliate marketing.  I know that there are lots of landing page experts out there and maybe I totally missed the boat.  My guess is that yes, I did miss the boat.  But that doesn’t mean that I can’t float a boat or two out onto the Internet and see if I can catch a sale or two.

I know that it’s going to take more than a $25 gift voucher to some PPC site to see if I can really make a go of it.  I’d been reading that one should have about $1000 saved up to use towards marketing.  Always be on top of your keywords - shuffling out those that don’t convert.  Then if needed use an A/B landing pages to see which converts best.

I swear this is turning into an Olympic event!

A/B Split Testing

I think really you do need to have a bit of money set aside if you’re going to make a go of this aspect of affiliate marketing.  If you’re hungry for the $$ you have to be willing to take some of your hard-earned savings and risk it.  Because it is a total risk - you don’t know if you’re going to make your money back and honestly if you’re new at this - I would think you would lose it the first time around.  It’s a risky biz. but it looks like there are plenty of people out there making good money from it.  So why not give it a whirl if you have the money to spare.

So the A/B Testing - from what I understand is that you don’t go tweaking the hell out of your landing pages.  If something isn’t working and your not converting there might be a very small reason why - like having a bit of red text on your page to showcase a tip or a title.  It could be too many images or not enough.  Is there enough “flare” on your page (you know those little button images you see - like “seen on oprah”, “seen on tv”, etc).  You need to instill confidence in the visitor to click - you can’t have too many distractions or choices for your visitors on a landing page - this is your way of funneling your visitors to the product for them to buy and for you to get a commission.

Seems simple enough right?

… hahaha… wait a minute

Well - I’ve yet to try the landing pages.  I have yet to come up with a $1000 to start a good campaign.  For the most part I’ve been a totally cheap bastard.   I’ve been relying heavily on keywords and organic searching.  Which I’m sorry to say takes forever in a day to accomplish anything.  PPC gets more visitors to your landing pages faster.  That’s my take on that - not to say ignore the organic search - but that would be for the long haul - for better results later on… keywords/organic search.  For the here and now I’d roll with PPC if you have the courage/money to give it a try.  And I would say research first - take those offers and know what you’re getting into.

I’m thinking of giving it a whirl… see if I can sort out good landing pages from bad.  See where it takes me - it would be the first time I’ve attempted to do it.

I’m curious what you think, so let me know what you think about landing page marketing for affiliate marketing - has it worked, am I off my rocker?  Let me know!

Popularity: 6% [?]

I have been thinking of changing a few things in the direction I want to go online.  At one time I thought that selling other peoples products would bag me some nice amount of cash - this I could do and not have to spend very much or hang onto inventory - etc, etc.  No problem right?

Well I think after a few years of banging out content, sites and all that jazz - basically busting my ass… and perhaps learning along the way that not everything I did - and the time I spent working on things was the best thing to do and I had numerous failures and some successes.   It just comes with the territory.  I do have to say that with this experience I started to realize that a lot of success could be made by marketing a product/service that I could do myself.  I didn’t have to worry about the middlemen - not getting commissions, etc.  I could do something that made me feel good about myself and help people along the way.

So it’s been a gradual shift.  It’s been really small steps - it’s been a whole world of self-doubt and “can I handle the time management” part (and honestly that part I’m still struggling with) - is now the right time?  I think I’m at a point where I can say yes.  Now is the time.  Now is the moment I can take and run with it and see where it takes me.  Take that experience I’ve learned with Affiliate marketing and run with it.

So that’s where I’ve been spending a lot of my time lately.  Working on products and services that I can provide… maybe even get to that point where I can offer an affiliate program on my stuff.  How crazy would that be?!

One project that’s kind of been sitting around gathering dust is the Niche To Riches site - it’s been pretty dead since May but I think there still might be hope for it :)  Instead of just cranking out new site after new site I’m working on a three month goal - and then flipping the site.  I’m hoping that there might be a few of you out there that might be interested in joining in and we can see what each site flips for - a bit of friendly competition. :)  Also, that would totally keep me motivated to get my head out of my ass and actually get it done!

So there you go - so far these two things are totally consuming my time.  I’m looking at getting a site setup to market a product - when that’s done I’m going to switch it up and do some affiliate marketing.  As I say - more eggs, different baskets - multiple streams of income and then find things that work and I love and hammer them out.

Popularity: 7% [?]

For the past few years I’ve been blogging about my attempts to make money online through various means - mostly through affiliate marketing.  When I started out back in 2005 it was a different world.  It seemed… easier.  Now so many people are getting into affiliate marketing that its getting harder and harder to make a few dollars from it.  Which is all it was for me - a few dollars here and there and nothing more.  I ended up getting a few cheques to come my way and I still do, I’m really not knocking affiliate marketing.  I’m just having a hard time making a go of it.

I have had a hard time for a while now.

So I changed gears.

I’m now trying to put more eggs in many different baskets so to speak.  I didn’t have the best luck in the world selling other peoples products, but I did learn a hell of a lot from it.  I still am doing the affiliate marketing, but I don’t seem to have enough hours in the day to dedicate to it to actually make a go of it.  So I am trying to think of things to do that I can do - in the few hours a day I have to dedicate to it.

You could say I’m getting frustrated.  This frustration has left me thinking about what to do next, and how to accomplish my goals.  I have so many ideas running through my head right now it’s INSANE!  So I’m starting to form a plan where I can do things that I love to do - and work towards diversifying my income streams.

(Really what I mean is actually start to make money… sooner rather than later).

So I’m sitting here contemplating my next move - I’ve got a few things in the works.  I just have to finish them.  I have to get a game plan together to make things move.  Because I really do feel like I’m just treading water and not going anywhere - fast.

So you might find a bit of a shift in conversation on this site as I start to expand my interests and start to focus on other aspects of making money online. 

Popularity: 7% [?]

… well, I did a little looking around about that domain name and this totally does it for me.  I now feel that this person has a way to figure out what’s being searched - and bought it.  It’s for sale at SEDO and from what I can tell - it’s $100 if I were to purchase it.

Yes. Mad. Now.

Popularity: 11% [?]

This afternoon I went to purchase a domain name I had looked up a couple of months ago.  At the time it was free and I felt like I needed to add it to my collection today.  Well, wouldn’t you know it.  Someone/Company has purchased the domain.  I am bummed… it was a catchy - short-ish domain name and I thought it would be cool to have.  By no means does it contain any super keywords or anything like that, but it was cool and I wanted to get it and now I’m literally a day late and a dollar short.

Now it wouldn’t really totally bother me - because there are always domain names available.  But this bothered me when I looked up who bought the domain name I realized they purchased it the same time I looked it up on June 11th - which is what I remember because I have notes!  LOL.  I wish I could remember which site it was that I did the domain lookup.  I find it very … odd.  You know how you find people purchasing domain names where they have a technology to find what people are looking for - and then go and try to resell it to them later for a crazy amount of cash.

No, that hasn’t happened.  But man - this is just really an odd, odd coincidence.

I’m ticked.

I’ll admit it.

What sucks even more is the guy who bought it has put up a super shitty landing page.  Gah.  I could have made it a beautiful place and he’s bunging it up with crappy offers from Commission Junction - hello ringtones anyone?

Gah…. what’s a girl to do.  I guess I’ll just keep looking for something else and hopefully this crappy feeling will go away.

I’m not sure if any of you have experienced something like this, because in all my years online - this is the first time that I feel like someone was tracking what I was looking for and then took it.

Popularity: 10% [?]