As you know, my bar stools affiliate website is making me no money yet. It has been online since February and has so far made 4 sales. 1 accidental, 2 proper ones via Amazon Associates and 1 proper one with Affiliate Window. This is due to a complete lack of traffic coming to the site and to combat that, I’m going to try a little PPC experiment…
Now I’ve always held firmly to the belief that I did not want to use PPC on this site at all because the competition seemed too tough and the return seemed too low. I actually think it still is but I am at the point now where I really want to drive some traffic to this site to get a glimpse of what could be and so, with this in mind, I’m gambling on a little PPC experiment and I want you all to join me…
Set Up a High Quality AdWords PPC Campaign for Your Affiliate Site – Part 1
If you watch this and you want to add in your own tips then please do! If you think you can help, I want to hear…
And, true to my recent promise to spread my work when I’m in a good working mood, I’ve scheduled Part 2 of the “Set Up a High Quality AdWords PPC Campaign for Your Affiliate Site,” for tomorrow 
.
July 30th, 2010 at 12:10 am
No negative keywords? I would have added -parts -spares -replacement -photos -images etc as a minimum.
Also the ad isnt running? Hopefully its because you set you CPC too low and not the fact some idiot has been clicking it all night and used up your budget!
August 1st, 2010 at 4:43 am
Shane – No negatives yet, but probably should do. My thinking was to throw the net far and wide for the first week to try and generate some traffic and CTR history – also to measure impressions for related terms.
Normally with my campaigns, I’ll run them for a week or so and start adding in negatives as I discover them – I’ll continue to do this every week until the campaign gets really really tight.
Ad is still running but its way down on page 4. I really don’t want to increase min cpc on these ads because I just can’t see the site making a return. However, in the interests of testing, I might bump up min cpc to .15 to see how it plays out.
August 4th, 2010 at 2:25 am
I’ve been a frequent reader of yours via RSS and have enjoyed your posts.
One thing that I’ve been wondering is this. You seem to focus on retail affiliate projects like bar stools rather than the big affiliate or IM niches like weight loss. Why is that?
I ask because I was pushing retail stuff myself for a long time with minimal profit, but having recently ‘seen the light’ with lucrative affiliate niches, have faired a lot better. The bigger commissions really make it worth while.
August 4th, 2010 at 11:04 am
Hey Zac, great question. One that I’ve actually had to think about. I think there’s a few reasons 1) I’m more familiar with retail processes 2) When I see those other types of sites, they often look quite spammy and I can’t believe they ever convert – obviously they do though.
The markets you speak of seem very competitive and I’d feel like I was swimming with sharks or a little out of my depth going up against some of the more experienced guys in this field.
Having said that, you make a very valid point and one I should consider in much greater detail before launching into my new affiliate site, perhaps?
Would you have any pointers on where I should start looking? (please don’t say clickbank until after you’ve read this post.
August 5th, 2010 at 4:54 am
How funny that people tend to go through the same thought processes.
> 1) I’m more familiar with retail processes
This was one of my reasons for not branching out. I created a weight loss site on a whim since I had a suitable domain lying around and not thinking I’d make any sales. At the same time I poured a lot of effort into developing a protein supplements site. Made decent sales form the former, none from the latter.
The lesson I draw from that is that there’s no need to spend ages in developing a fully functional site. What is needed is niche/keyword research, enticing content, seo + ppc.
> 2) When I see those other types of sites, they often look quite spammy and I can’t believe they ever convert – obviously they do though.
True. But they do make money.
I’ve had some success with MoreNiche – A very well run network with good products to promote, great support and tracking features. I’d recommend it.
All the the best!
August 9th, 2010 at 11:58 am
Zac – Thanks for that interesting piece of insight. One question, how do you make ‘enticing content’ on a whim?
That sounds like a nice trick! (or a great outsource!)
So realistically, in terms of time (hours) do you honestly think that the site that earns you the lion’s share (the weight loss site), took you less time all in (including SEO) than the protein site?
Also, I saw your email and I hope this’ll do the trick; MoreNiche sounds like a network I shall have to look into some more, having never really been exposed to it too much in the past. If I do make a weight loss or similar site, I’ll be sure to post it up on here so that people can track it’s performance.
August 11th, 2010 at 3:47 am
WhiteKnight,
> One question, how do you make ‘enticing content’ on a whim? That sounds like a nice trick! (or a great outsource!)
It’s neither! Created a WP blog using Thesis theme and simple pleasing colours with default text header. Nothing fancy.
Then outsourced review article for $5 with TextBroker – though I would recommend oDesk now which you’re already using – and did some profile link building.
It started ranking in Bing after 2 weeks and as luck would have it, the product I was promoting got some media time and searches went up – then got sales.
It’s simpler than the websites I’ve seen you develop; that’s for sure!
It’s not how well you do something(beautiful functional webesite vs shabby sales blog) is what you do(low margins vs sales & high conversions)!
Weight loss blog definitely took me less time to develop and get initial sales. Creating the blog was straight forward as opposed to tricky layout and issues with providing content – see cheapprotein.org.uk. To date made me 50p, of which is still pending!
I’d say this – just TRY IT! You’ll be pleasantly surprised how easy it may turn out to be.
ps. Going to actually start blogging soon and will put some more of my thoughts there.