It’s been a month and a half since I’ve posted an update on the Go Large Project (GLP). So in a typical Monday post fashion, I’d like to detail a number of strategies that are working for my Internet business.
Specifically I’m going to detail how to build a large scale affiliate site that generates a LOT of traffic.
If you have any interest in building a profitable affiliate niche site then you’ll want to read this entire article. I’m going to discuss a lot of concepts you can immediately apply to your business. (Also, you might want to learn about Google places optimization to get additional traffic.)
GLP Results – The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
I’d like to start by taking a step back and reviewing some of what’s happened since the last time we spoke. This section is called “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly,” because I’ve had TWO major setbacks and ONE major breakthrough.
Let’s go over each in reverse order:
The Ugly: We’ve all heard how the Google Panda Update slammed a number of Internet businesses. While this didn’t affect my affiliate business, it DID negatively impact a major strategy I hoped to implement.
In the last update, I detailed a blueprint for outsourcing ezine article creation. Unfortunately the dancing Panda has squashed that plan. Originally I was going to focus on EzineArticles.com. But now this site has cracked down on a lot of content. This means the strategy of mass producing content is no longer a possibility.
Stupid Panda… How I hate you!
The Bad: Another goal of the Go Large Project was to target a specific product (we’ll call it Product X) offered through Clickbank. In the last few months, I made over $14,000 from this a single product promotion.
The problem with Product X is it has a horrible refund rate. Look at the image below and you’ll see I had 42 refunds totaling $2,426.71.
Sucks, doesn’t it?
While I think it’s a quality product, I can’t ignore refunds that exceed $2,000. I think this has to do with Clickbank’s ridiculous “no-questions asked” refund policy. So decided to promote the same product…using THEIR affiliate tracking system.
This brings us to…
The Good: The silver lining in this whole thing is I’ve re-focused how I promote Product X. In the month of March, I generated $2,400. Plus I’ve had ZERO refunds. Here’s a screenshot of my earnings:
This shows the product is still profitable. All I have to do is not use Clickbank for my affiliate link.
One thing I’ve changed is I no longer promote Product X through email marketing (it’s a long story.) Instead I use an advertisement that subscribers see on my Thank You Page.
What happens now is people sign up for a lead magnet and they’re redirected to this page. At the top, they see a text box; describing how the report has been sent to their inbox. Then I tell them it takes a few minutes to arrive. And while they’re waiting, they should check out a free video (my affiliate offer.)
Here’s what the top of the page looks like:
(Don’t mind the typo…I fixed it after I created this image.)
Like I said, this single page has produced $2,400 of income in a single month. Not a bad chunk of change for a small advertisement that took me ten minutes to create.
What I’ve Learned: In the last two months, I’ve learned a number of things:
- EzineArticles.com is no longer a cost-effective way to promote a website
- Product X should not be promoted using Clickbank
- Email marketing doesn’t work with Product X
- Product X does convert using an advertisement on a Thank You Page.
Now the entire point of the Go Large Project was to promote Product X.
So I’ve had to rethink what I want to do moving forward.
Back to the Drawing Board???
Let’s recap:
1. The product I planned on promoting is basically a failure
2. The main traffic strategy (article marketing) no longer works
Does that mean I’m quitting?
Hell no!
After a long (beer-induced) brainstorming session, I’ve decided to change the focus of the Go Large Project.
The NEW plan is to build a massive site that generates a lot of web traffic and list subscribers. These people will then put into a lengthy autoresponder sequence that promotes a variety of affiliate products.
Here’s how this works:
It’s a simple process which I’ve already detailed in previous posts about affiliate marketing. Prospects consume content posted on another site and go to your squeeze page for a free report. If they like it, they join your email list. Then they’re immediately redirected to a thank you page with an initial affiliate offer. Finally they’re presented with multiple affiliate offers through a carefully designed autoresponder sequence.
Nothing new here!
This is the same stuff I’ve talked about for months.
What’s different is I’ve {ahem} gone large with this strategy. I have a whole new battle plan that can easily turn this project into a six-figure income.
Announcing…Go Large Project (Version 2.0)
In the lengthy preamble, I explained what’s happened. Now I’d like to mention two exciting developments. These have forced me ditch the old plan and create what I call The Go Large Project (Version 2.0)
In the last month I’ve had two great things happen:
1. The Resurrection of “Blog X”
Back in 2007, I started a site in my affiliate niche (we’ll call it Blog X). Honestly this site sucked and it didn’t go anywhere. One day the WordPress platform crashed and I lost all my content.
At that point I didn’t care about this blog. So I took all the content and turned it into 50+ static HTML pages – All promoting my squeeze page.
Then I immediately forgot about this blog.
Fast forward three years.
After Panda did its update, I decided to tweak my old affiliate niche site. I immediately noticed I was getting 5 to 10 email subscribers… a day… from one traffic link. Lo and behold it was that old site I had forgotten.
Further research revealed this site averages 200 visitors a day and ranks well for many competitive keywords.
The best part?
Blog X had a lot of backlinks and a Google PageRank of 2.
Not too bad for a blog that’s been ignored for three years!
So I’ve decided to blow the dust off “Blog X” and make it the focal point of the Go Large Project.
This brings us to the next point…
2. My First Internet Business Partnership
My brother (Gene) helps out with my Internet business in a number of ways. What I like about this arrangement is he’s really good at stuff I hate (like SEO, backlinking, Web 2.0).
Now I’ve wanted to work with him on a project for a long time. But I didn’t know what would best benefit the two of us. With the resurrection of Blog X, we’ve decided to join forces and turn this into a massive content-rich site that will generate a sizable affiliate income.
We’ll both create content. Gene will take care of the technical stuff, backlinking, and SEO. I’ll focus on email marketing and lead generation. Some tasks will overlap. But overall it’s the perfect partnership because we both get to focus on our natural strengths.
So how will we make money?
Well that’s what I’ll answer here…
How to Create a Massive Profit-Generating Affiliate Site
The goal of Blog X is simple:
Build a massive affiliate site that converts free traffic into responsive email subscribers
Gene and I will create hundreds of content pieces that blanket an entire niche market. Each will target a competitive, high-traffic keyword. All this traffic will be funneled back to a squeeze page offer that builds an email list. Then we’ll use an autoresponder series to both educate and monetize the people on the list.
From my initial results, I think we can easily get 200+ subscribers a day. This is double the number I get for my six-figure affiliate business. That’s why I’m really excited about the revised plan for the Go Large Project.
To give you an idea of how to do this, here’s a rough plan of what we’re doing:
The foundation of this plan is content.
90% of the articles will be the standard 500-600 word article that targets a specific keyword.
10% will be massive “how-to” articles that provide a lot of free value. These will be centerpiece of our affiliate business and will attract a lot of interest in this niche market.
To market our content we’ll be using a three-prong traffic strategy:
#1. MWR Blog Content
Blah, blah, blah….Blogging is about building a community…blah, blah, blah.
We’ve all been beaten over the head with this statement.
What you might not know is a blogging provides the perfect platform for generating lots of email subscribers. And you don’t need to “build a community” to make this happen.
In the last few weeks, we’ve been experimenting with what I call a MWR Blog. The concept is simple. You design a blog around the most wanted response. Instead of confusing a searcher with multiple options, you give them one simple choice after reading content – Join your email list.
What separates a MWR blog from an authority blog is the design. You don’t load a MWR blog with a bunch of links. Instead you design it in a way that compels people to subscribe to your email list.
Now…a MWR blog is a concept that deserves a thorough explanation. That’s why next Monday I’ll dedicate an entire post to this topic.
#2. Video Marketing Content
Creating video isn’t as hard as you’d think. I prefer a simple strategy that mass-produces content without requiring a lot of extra work.
Here’s how it works:
First we opened a YouTube account targeting a major keyword. We use the Tube Fool tool to build up the presence of this account. Basically it helps you get hundreds of friends, subscribers, and views – All on autopilot.
Second I outsource a “voice talent” to record each blog post and turn it into a high-quality audio. I pay $5 per article. But you might get a better rate if you shop around Elance.com.
Third I use Paint Shop Pro and Powerpoint to create a few slides/images that fit each video. Each of these contains an obvious link that points directly to the squeeze page. I then use Window Movie Maker to turn the slides and audio into a short video.
Finally I upload the video content to YouTube; targeting specific keywords in the tags and descriptions.
This process is really easy to do once you have a system in place. Each video has the potential to rank well for a competitive keyword in both Google and YouTube. This will have an incredible long-term affect on your niche affiliate site.
#3. Ezine Article/Web 2.0 Content:
Yes, Google has cracked down on many web 2.0 and article sites. However you can still generate a lot of traffic from these sites. You just have to be smart about it!
Our strategy is simple. Both Gene and I will create quality content on these sites that drive traffic to the squeeze page. Some of these articles will be unique. And others will be re-written versions of content previously published on the blog.
The important thing is to create content that’s highly valuable to the reader. This is the kind of information that won’t be hurt by any sort of Google “dance,” “slap,” “panda update,” or other cutesy name people use for an algorithm change.
I’ve learned this the hard way… Search engines WANT great content. So I’m going to play by their rules and give it to them!
Backlinking and Search Engine Optimization
This three-pronged approach centers on search engine rankings. We want to dominate an affiliate niche by getting a good listing for hundreds of different phrases. That’s why it’s important to have a solid SEO/backlinking strategy.
This is an area where Gene is the expert. With that said, I’m working like crazy to catch up. From my research, I’ve learned a number of techniques that can help improve the ranking of a web page.
Right now, I don’t have a concrete plan. My initial thought is to combine unique content with a bit of spinning/automation. This plan will use a lot of what I’ve learned from these sites:
- Pat Flynn and Tylor Shum’s Niche Site Duel
- Joseph Archibald’s 40 Day Challenge
- Jeff Johnson’s Underground Training Lab
- Jason Potash’s Traffic Kaboom
There’s a wealth of information on these sites. So it’s taking a lot of time to formulate a strategy that works without incurring the wrath of the all-mighty Google.
The overall plan is to create a blog that has a lot of natural link juice in this affiliate market. Eventually I’d like to be able to write a post on any topic and have it rank well for a search term. This will bring amazing results to our affiliate business.
Putting it All Together
Well that’s the new strategy!
Let’s recap how it’ll work:
It’s a simple system that works like this:
1) Use SEO to boost the rankings of our web properties
2) Create content on these sites to rank well for high-traffic keywords
3) Convert readers into subscribers through a lead magnet/squeeze page
4) Generate income on the front-end with a thank you page advertisement
5) Increase monetization by turning subscribers into buyers
6) Skyrocket income by systematizing content-creation
I’m not going to lie to you. This is a lot of hard work. But it’s the kind of effort that will produce income for the next few years. So we don’t mind busting our butt now to reap the benefits later.
Your Thoughts?
This post primarily focused on my own business. But maybe you can extrapolate what we’re doing and apply it to your own affiliate sites.
I’m really excited about what’s happening with the Go Large Project. I hope to take what we learn and immediately teach it on the Steve Scott Site.
So I’d like to know your thoughts.
Do you have any questions about this process? Have you tried building a massive affiliate niche site? What were your experiences? Is there anything I didn’t cover that you’d like to learn?
Please comment below and let me know your thoughts.
OH YEAH: I almost forgot. This article has been posted while I’m relaxing in Belize. (Gotta love the scheduling feature in WordPress.)
That means Gene will be answering every comment and question. The Go Large Project is his baby too. So he’ll be able to handle anything you can throw at him!
Take Action. Get Results.
Hey Steve!
Just read through the article and I must say I’m impressed. It is unbelievably inspiring to see someone take action and publish everything just like this. You know, people usually sell this kind of stuff over at the WarriorForum for lots of money.
If this works, which I know it will — you should totally consider creating a so-called WSO which can be sold over at the WarriorForum for as much as you like. I’m sure you’ll make lots of money doing so if you haven’t already.
Regarding the panda update that ruined all your plans — I’m totally feeling you on that one. I had plans on hiring a few writers from the middle east. I know their content is not of quality — but it’s cheap and the sites were going to be monetized using AdSense after all.
So I did. And as of now, a lot of those websites have dropped out of the Google Index which made me get back to the drawing board.
I’m still looking for new strategies on how to make money online. And the strategy you’re talking about in this post sure seems awesome. I haven’t been collecting e-mails from my visitors before, but it sure seems like something everyone’s doing — so I’ll totally have to try that out sometime in the near future.
Thanks for everything, Steve. And good luck! I’ll be following the progress of the GLP.
/Nabil, from Sweden.
Nabil,
First off, hopefully your post shouldn’t get spam binned next time, so keep coming back.
Steve does a big post like this every monday (you can also go back a few posts and hopefully find a lot more goodness) So hopefully you will come back again.
For the Panda stuff, yeah it is a shame… but maybe good in the longrun too. The funny thing was having also done a lot of article marketing myself (actually more than my brother, I have close to 500 articles on ezinearticles) it used to disappoint me that the large articles that I though were really good had a far lower CTR than the short pithy ones that said nothing and led right to the link.
So I joined in the “game” too and started writing articles I wasn’t proud of. Those articles you would have gotten from the middle east probably would have been “great” under the old system but personally I prefer to write the higher quality stuff.
Less articles of higher quality is fine… as long as the playing field is level. Which maybe it will become.
…still it was nice to have had a system that worked.
____
As for collecting emails. It is a long-term strategy, but it is a truly winning one. Email marketing is all about building a long term customer and relationship with the people who buy from you.
It is a lot more work on your part. Mainly with providing them a good amount of free and usable content but on their part you may get multiple sales from the the people on your list over time rather than just one sale and gone.
Thanks for dropping by and commenting
-Gene
Funny thing, I just got marked as a spammer once again.
Would you mind having a look in the spam bin?
/Nabil.
Got it 🙂
Gene and/or Steve – either of you used (recommend?) articleDemon?
I am looking at it and from the point of view of allowing multiple account creation on all the high traffic authority article sites it seems worth the money. (at least saves buying a dedicated VPN or something)
But I know you were saying Ezine sux now so was wondering if a: AD is any good and B: if the whole process is worth it anymore.
I’m cancelling my UAW account because its just not worth it. Rather spend the money outsourcing article creation and then just waste my own time with the submissions parts.
Another question -sorry, I assume if I was to use something like AM that I could just outsource the access to it too?
Alex,
I have never used AD. I do use BMD and have given AD a hard look myself 3-4 times.
I agree that the whole article marketing thing seems “borderline sketchy” these days.
Ultimately I think UAW and AD work to an extent, but like you, I am leery about the “Value” of any of these in regards to the time it takes to make them work.
My thinking is that spun content is losing its value and anything unspun is working its way to worthless unless it is made to be high value through it own linking efforts.
After all, you get what you pay for with outsourcing.
My thinking is that all of the traditional AM methods are still viable but to make it truly worthwhile they need time invested in those links. IE Their own link wheels and stuff.
Nothing casual.
Personally I have been looking at “blog Blueprint” What I like about that one is that you create the same mass quantities of links easily.
But for the most part I am like you. I think article marketing has to work still “somewhat” but I am still searching for just the right system that is not all hype.
So I am still working on getting that perfect system setup.
-Gene
Thanks for the reply Gene.
Can I just add some more here: I get this response back from so many articles I submit to Ezine when they link back to niche sites of mine. The thing is, I have articles linking to squeeze pages and this was fine?!? What the?
Can you tell me what you think? Arethey just Nazi bastards?
“Your article has been placed in problem status for linking to a page consisting primarily of advertising and/or your landing page does not contain enough relevant informative content. Also, your web page must not contain more than one exit pop-up. In order to ensure a quality user experience, we can only accept links which direct to pages which are content-rich beyond advertising and products for sale, where content is relevant to the article topic, and not more than one exit pop-up exists.”
They certainly are becoming Nazi’s. And it is not equitible Nazi’s either.
There seems to be no set standard as to what they let go or hold up these days.
I am hoping they come back but lower traffic AND impossible and uneven application of standards means I am pretty much done with them for now.
For now at least…screw ezinearticles.
Wow and wow again Steve and Gene. An MVP for us on Monday eh 🙂 So much valuable content in this post. I have to bookmark and go through it all again.
Thanks so much for sharing this with us Steve. I know your JV with your brother will work well for you. Way to go Steve and hope you’re having a great time on your vacation.
Patricia Perth Australia
Patricia,
Thanks for dropping by, glad you found some good info from the post. Hopefully there is some valuable info you can get from it that you can use too! I am quite excited by thins and all the coming prospects. 🙂
Steve this is a plan that I been following for years now..it good to see other people really taken hold of these many making task..
“Black Seo Guy “Signing Off”
Yes,
It is certainly a drawn out version of the typical “solid” method of SEO. Hopefully we can add a few “ruffles” or at least give another example for those who haven’t seen it in action.
However you interlink the different sites and optimize external and internal linking structures, in the center of all you have always the quality content in order to attract returning visitors so that you are not too dependant on google traffic.
Andreas
For sure, quality content is always the warm peanut-buttery goodness inside of a Reeses Peanut butter cup.
Damn, that just made me hungry.
Thanks for dropping by!
Steve you’re living the Internet lifestyle! But wait you’re working your ass off! How does that work?! Ok enough.
Your strategy is a very sound one. I am using something very similar to it and so far am getting around 5 leads onto my email list per day now that my front page is a squeeze page, backed by an every growing blog that is climbing in the SERPs. I just had a link wheel completed so we’ll see what that does for rankings. Very exciting.
My question is around the Product X that you offer as the ad on your thank you page. I too use a thank you page and have read your posts on having a portfolio of products to offer. I have my #1 and am looking for the rest. So, here (finally) is the question: is the product you are offering on the thank you page one of your portfolio or outside of it completely (meaning wasn’t ever in the autoresponder sequence)?
Thanks and enjoy some downtime?! Don’t work too damn hard.
Robert,
Steve is sippin’ his ‘colada now, but I know enough to field the answer to this.
Steve added product X into his main list auto-responder already. Everything he talked about here is for our mutual list for GLP.
The Product IS NOT “in the portfolio”. There are a couple reasons for this. For one it leads to a video that converts really well. Since just having a link to it on the thank you page does well there is no reason to keep “pushing” it with a harder sell.
The other part of the reasoning I think does come to quality. While the product isn’t bad, it is -my- view that the guys who own it are pushy. They push upsells hard. That -could- be a big part why it has a bad refund rate.
So keeping it OUT of the autoresponder sequence also insulates it from being as “connected” to our list. IE having people mistakenly think that we are the ones being pushy.
SO we are soft selling a product that gives a hard sell.
Both of our views (I think) is that the product itself isn’t horrible, but a high refund rate is something that is concerning and therefore a product that might turn people off if it was in the autoresponder sequence itself.
Hope that answers your question.
Ah and now the brains behind the operation is uncovered! Glad to hear that Steve is getting some downtime.
That answers the question perfectly Gene thanks. I’ll look for an offer that I can use in this way as well.
As for your “ad” is it just an image that links to the other page or is it copy et al.?
It is straight image and one line opt-in. My brother split tested it and it surprisingly worked better that way for this offer.
Hi Steve and Gene:
Quality content makes Google your guest, Google has made it clear so many times and so many ways. This post is very informative for marketers too what I call it “people friendly and SEO friendly post”
Thanks
Fran A
Fran,
Thanks for dropping by and commenting.
I think what you say is key. It has always been important to have a “people friendly and SEO friendly post”. It is getting more important as technology advances and the Google algo. gets more advanced and discerning.
Mondays are always a little less depressing with these posts 🙂
Loving the idea of the ad in a thank you page. And EZineArticles did get stomped by the Panda but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it is now a bad source of backlinks. It is still a high PR site, and individual articles can still rank pretty high as long as they are well written, original enough, and keyword rich.
And I like your name 🙂
Gene,
haha, like your name too. 😉
It is so weird to address someone with the same name. While Eugene is not an “uncommon” name. There certainly are not that many of us running around.
I personally haven’t -written off- ezinearticles. I think they are still effective, but they should only be used as ‘part’ of the equation, and of course quality needs to be high…which should help for the readers and the “reputation” of those articles over time, which frankly has been slipping.
It certainly is weird. Always glad to see another one of “us” …Haha, i feel like a different species or something.
Really cool and inspiring post Steve, and Gene. Maybe you could break down your traffic strategies even more in a future post.
By the way, what sites will you be trying to get backlinks from? Also, will there be any social sharing involved?
Edwin,
We are definitely going to be going into the strategies further, as we find out what works -and what doesn’t work.
Next Mondays post is allready done and it goes in detail on how to create an MWR blog for affiliate type responses. (as opposed to blogs like this one, which is far more about connecting)
Not to get ahead, but for now we are using a pretty standard linkwheel for backlinking. Hubpages/Squidoo/Ezine/and a random article site as main “spokes”
and then all other sorts of article marketing sites, directories, Perhaps UAW or Socialmonkee or Blogging blueprint linking to those (not yet…still debating/testing)
And of course also commenting, forums and all that stuff both to the main site and the “spokes”. Once we refine it to a real “system” that will be one of the future posts.
In a nutshell it is an backlinking strategy fairly similar to pat flynns back-linking article. A little difference but more different in style rather than substance.
My brother will certainly be bringing up more of this in the future once we have more “firm” results and it is not just anecdotal
Hi Gene & Scott,
Great post btw. Quick question: the videos for this aged blog, are these screen cast (not showing your faces), are you hiring someone for them or just slides? And are you using pen names for the content? I think I found the answer, never mind.
So you are still using Ezine Articles, right?
Moon,
Pretty much yes all around. No faces. Using pen names. Slides and a paid, “voice”
I know my brother uses it somewhat still but not the the extent that he had “planned” on.
Putting them to this site might even be better though. Since the site is an aged domain, with keyword relevance and a base PR of some sort many of the (very competitive) keywords are ranking on second page of Google without any backlinking whatsoever.
Getting 25 email subscribers a day may not seem like a ton to my brother; but to me it is incredible, since I just broke a thousand for my “personal” list after months of effort and hundreds of ezinearticles.
Hi Gene and Scott,
This is one hell of a plan and a fantastically detailed post! I’m pretty much like a sponge when I’m here for a visit, got a folder where I bookmark all MVP’s or any other wicked stuff from this site I need to come back to – you know, not trying to eat the elephant all at once!
I’m loving the idea of video marketing, and you’ve given a pretty good outline of how to go about it. Any other advice about video content marketing would be a real bonus especially for a newbie like me! 🙂
Thanks so much for this whopper post! This joint venture smells of success!
Nice to meet you Gene!
Gabi,
That is the way to go about it! On-time learning. Learn things when you are ready to put them into action.
It is something I am actually bad at… I get distracted and want to know, “but why…”
But seriously it is the best way to actually learn stuff. Specifically with all of the little “tricks” out there to be learned.
____
The important thing about the video stuff is to get some content out there. We use tubefool to help drive traffic etc. But that may not be needed. Particularly at first.
Like all the other networks (twitter/facebook) get out there Nike it (Just do it). Put up lots and lots of content and connect with everyone in your niche. Subscribe. comment. friend. The tubefool thing is sort of a ‘cheat” for all that to be honest, but it is nothing you couldn’t do on your own -and likely be more effective on a per comment basis.
Here is an article that says what I just wrote a little better (to add to your bookmarking http://www.stevescottsite.com/get-more-blog-traffic-blueprint-week-13 )
Gene,
It’s like you say there are so many tricks to learn and especially on this blog, so thanks for passing the link on.
Just thought I’d mention that the Tube Fool link in the post doesn’t seem to be working for those who might want to check it out.
🙂
Thanks,
Fixed the link. It was a typo.
I don’t mind the changes so much since it means junk articles aren’t going to compete so well. That’s well deserved. It has also challenged my creativity in article writing for one of the smaller niches I work in. I’m working toward more video creation, but fitting it into my schedule has been tough.
Steve,
What a long post! Very impressed with the information there and lots of things to learn from here. I’ve taken a screenshot of the graphic for your affiliate strategy. Wanna study that method and see what I can do for my affiliate marketing business. Seems like a really long process though. Good to have your bro helping you out on this. I can see why outsourcing here is important because it will just take too much time to do everything.
Lots of valuable information here, Steve! I like the idea of an MWR site. I first heard this from Michael Ambrosio and I set up a site that way, but then I didn’t trust it would work and started adding pages and links and ads… I haven’t seen anyone talk about it lately, until now. 😉
I have a question, Gene. Steve said he refocused on how he promoted product X and “All I have to do is not use Clickbank for my affiliate link.” What does he mean? What other link could he use if it’s a Clickbank product?
Thanks,
Peggy
Ahhhh
Looking at your question i see he was fairly unclear.
The specific product has two was it is offered. The Clickbank offer has a initial sale (with a roughly 50$) commission and a very aggressive upsell. People really need the “upsell” to get full value of the product.
-That is why there is a high refund rate- AT least I think
The people that put it out also have an affiliate offer that is structured differently. It has a lower initial buy-in, but they also get the buyer into a 12 week, “program”.
-and I assume they get the person onto some sort of mailing list-
for that offer they just give the affiliate a flat 100$ commission. I think there is a lot more satisfaction with product X when people know what they are getting not from the start.
I think I mentioned in comments earlier my problems with the CB version was the aggressive up-sell.
I guess the “takeaway” of that is that some sites will offer differently structured deals if you sign up with them directly rather than through clickbank, but my guess is also that only big products have more than one way of signing up.
Edit: This is Gene BTW / I forgot to log out my my brothers account before replying
Thanks, Gene. I was going to yell at Steve for not staying away. lol.
Ok, that makes sense. Find out if the products you want to market as an affiliate have non-CB affiliate options. That’s a great point!
Thanks,
Peggy
Great content Steve! when I think about how much an e-book charges for such these tips. One thing for sure is that there will be the need of inputting of a lot of effort, however Hardwork pays off, they say!
Dang . . . now THAT was a mega post.
I don’t think you necessarily need to give up on your article project plan, just expand it out beyond EA.
My sites stayed stable or went up in the SERP’s through the craziness that was Google in the first quarter of this year, but I really mix up my backlinks.
Steve and Gene, this is a very helpful post.
I am currently doing something like this in a niche am working on. My squeeze page is on the main domain, say http://www.domain.com and the blog is http://www.domain.com/blog . Is this okay or is it better to totally separate them from each other. (I mean to have a totally different domain name for the squeeze page and blog).
Have you thought of driving paid traffic to the squeeze page to speed things up?
Another question, on the thank you page, is it better to promote a high cost product or a low cost product.
Thank you.
MK,
There is nothing, “wrong” with having your squeeze page as part of the same domain the way you pointed out. There are two advantages to NOT having it that way, though.
1. if your domain title is not keyword optimized, or even if you want to optimize it for another set of keywords having a domain title the is an exact match can help with results greatly. For instance. “Domain” for your example my be great for traffic, but perhaps the phrase, “My awesome keyphrase” will work better to get traffic strictly to that squeeze page. In that case there are distinct advantages to getting myawesomekeyphrase.com or myawesomekeyphrase.net.
2. The second reason is not a big one. But you could get more link juice from blog 1 to blog 2 if they are different domains than to what would essentially be an internal link. That is a pretty small. “plus” though.
Neither reason is one to make domain.com and domain.com/blog a “no go”
As for paid traffic. I can’t really give you a good answer. My personal experiments with PPC is mixed at best. So I tend to avoid it. I do know people that do very well with it. I would say it depends on how much $$ you have to play with and what your personal “comfort” level is with ppc.
As for the thank you page. I would say it matters more for how well each offer converts. The best way to do that is by split testing both products. If you can get a conversion to within a few % points of each other then, probably go with the more expensive offer.
Thanks steve,
my domains are keyword targeted…
Great post, now that I’ve finally had a chance to read it. I wonder if you’ve ever outlined your YouTube strategy to rank highly for keywords? I love the idea of getting a voice over for $5. But how do you get the page on YouTube to rank. Is it with the help of Tube Fool?
Rob,
Youtube strategy is something that I am still “working” on. I have had success in the distant past, and “some” degree of success in the “present”.
But it goes a little far to call myslef an expert.
For ranking keywords and articles I really do only two things (perhaps I should do more)
When ever you comment, subscribe or Friend someone it becomes an internal dofollow link. lots of these links=greater internal traffic=more views and more views beget more views
to do this i use tubefool to “friend” mass amounts of people. Ok, it is pretty spammy, but it works.
Tubfool will also mass subscribe and even comment. But that is “too much for me”
The next thing I do is try to go to 4-5 sites 2-3 times a day and leave a comment. Some of these are simple “great video” but I do this by hand and not automated and usually try to mentions something about the content of the profile page/video.
that is about it. All of the rest is simply applying “site” SEO to you tube.
here are couple of other articles I wrote a bit ago… More about youtube for increasing blog traffic..but most of the theories apply:
http://www.stevescottsite.com/get-more-blog-traffic-blueprint-week-11
http://www.stevescottsite.com/get-more-blog-traffic-blueprint-week-13
Thanks for letting me know, Steve, that’s what I expected and roughly what I do. I found a couple of sites do similar things that have worked in the past but, sadly, don’t seem to be working at the moment. One is viewtubetrain.com and the other is yt-box.com – you can put them on auto-pilot and they watch vids and in return you get your vids watched. Also I think Twiends.com can get your vids liked in return for Twitter follows, etc.
Thanks for the links. Still more to read on your site 🙂
Great article. I’ve just been looking at the tube fool that you were talking about. Does it really generate that much traffic or even creat sales like it says on their sales page?
I just saw that you commented above about it. So by friending people that have a profile with a good PR it should increase the page rank of your profile. Does this sound right? and then in turn increase your video’s PR.