Forum

[sanninkyle]

Okay now i went on clickbank and started my own profile and made a website and all that jazz and im running completely free, my own advertising (posting on fourms and yahoo answers) not spamming it out but also giving people good advice to go on thats not on the site and stuff because i hate spam as much as the next person and i dont wanna just spam my site. And im getting good hits like close to 200 hits like every two months but NOBODYS BUYING ANYTHING. Ive been at this for a while and i have faith that one day it will work but i just need to know why they arent buying anything i mean is it the niche,or my site, im totally lost and i need some sort of guidance here. and i went on FB and i found some people who say they make a living off it and everytime i try to ask how...i get no response. its mind boggling i mean im reading about people are making a living out of this and thats all i really want. I dont want to hit it big like the google guys i just wanna have enough to pay the rent lol. This is my current site http://sanninkyle.byethost14.com/wordpress/ please any help would be GREATLY appreciated

 

[jmpruitt]

Hi . welcome to afilorama.

it can be frustrating, but it can be done. the fact that you have built a site is more than many ever do.

at some point you have to look at traffic stats, and see why it is not converting. there are many factors that contribute including the source of traffic, how well you target buyer intention, and what you are selling.

Looking at your site, the wow niche is a good niche, but your pages have no SEO on them, which means you wont get good rankings in this competetive niche.
also, you have a good call to action, but no link to the product. how can you expect people to buy if you dont give them a link?

Don't rely on your sidebar. people dont want to search for the product that you are recommending. if you recommend a product, you need a link right there. Also, use images in your posts. personally, i would change the page background to a lighter shade of gray. the dark gray makes it hard to read.
YOu have some decent reviews, that need some seo tweeking, but the ads in your sidebar have nothing to do with world of warcraft. if you choose a niche, you have to have adds targeted to those people. put ads for the guides and get rid of the ads for hosting, themes, and website building related content.

Proofread your articles. They need the keywords that people are looking for within the first sentence and at least once every 100 words on the page. Also, your grammar needs a little work, and capitalization of your I's

You need your site to look more professional, and these things will help with that.

Also, look at where your traffic is coming from Forum traffic is good, if you target your customers, and funnel people looking to buy. however, Many wow players on the forums are looking for free tips, not paid guides.

Add more content, and build trust up through your blog. Write up some articles on tips for the game rather than just the product reviews. give a little for free, then send them to a paid guide for the rest.

When I was in the wow niche, I started with professions guides, I did level 1-20 for each profession, then sent them to a professions guide to learn the rest.

this builds trust with your readers, and shows that you are willing to help, if all you have is products on your site, it looks more like all you are there for is to make money. Granted, you are trying to make money, but you dont want it to look like that is all you care about.

I find that by sending people to an article that helps with the problem they are facing rather than a product review, it gets people to trust you more and they will trust your recommendation. as it is right now, looking at your site, I have no reason to trust your recommendation. all you are doing is trying to sell me something I dont want.

These are just some basics. I recommend that you go through the training videos mark has here. ther are over 80 hours of videos, and using them, you should be able to make this site profitable.

You also need to build links to your site on other places, forums are good, but yahoo answers never did convert to sales for me. it is good for personal branding but again, the traffic is not targeted to buyers.

write articles on the game and syndicate them to article directories, web2.o sites like hubpages, and free blogs like multiply and blogger.com. each one of these should link back to a related page on your own site, helping to get you more traffic and seo.

your focus needs to be on getting links, then traffic, then sales. i fyou are getting 200 visitors/month that is good, try to build it up to 100/week then 100/day. if you are getting 100/day, and you properly monetize your site as stated above, you should be making some sales.

Good luck and ask if you need help. YOu can make money doing this if you do it right.

 

[sanninkyle]

INCREDIBLE!!!! Thanks a lot James i had NO idea there were so many things wrong i guess it just goes to show how much of a novice i am but im going to work on the site right away and fix these issues!!!

 

[jmpruitt]

Thats ok. also the age of your site will play a lot into it. it takes 3-4 months to get trust from the search engines going even with the seo and link building done properly.

One thing that I have done in the FFXI niche back when I was playing, was writing a blog, where everything was written first person point of view, from my character.. I shared my adventures, and was able to give detailed walkthroughs in a way that was fun to read, and write. Then when people would ask questions, I shared the site with my LS, (guild in WOW) and they started reading my adventures, as well as sharing it with other newbies when they asked questions. I didnt do any product reviews or anything, just recounting my daily adventures and experiences with a couple of ads in the sidebar for game guides.

In game guilds will not like it if you are sending people to a product review, but if you have a detailed walk through of an instance run, or a step by step guide to leveling mining in Elwyn Forest, people will love it, and promote your site for you. think WoW wikki. it is the biggest site in the niche, and they make money off the ads on their pages. they aren't product reviews, they are walkthroughs and help guides. you could even focus on horde, or alliance, professions, different races or classes, and have highly targeted site to a specific group of people. If you do it well, and share it on forums, and other sites as well, people will start reading your stuff, and recommending it to their own guild mates in game.

I quit playing the game, and that blog was not really run well, due to not understanding how all this works, so I let it go, but it was fun, and i did make some money from the guides in my sidebar. that was how I paid for Mark's affiloblueprint which really taught me how to make money online.

 

[tgo57]

Dude I am with you...........I have put up 3 websites, two from CommisionJunction(cj.com) and 1 from clickbank. I was sending traffic via targeted keywords that the seller recommended I use plus my own. I put videos on the site, clicks to the sellers site on every paragraph. ADWORDS, 7Search, Yahoo I was able to cheaply send 100 clicks a day to each of my websites. I used the travis tool and my website scored an A+ on the keywords I was using. I did tweets, forum postings, facebook postings, articles, and lots of other crap that took a lot of time to produce! My website was a professional looking template.

You know how much on made on all 3 of sites? Nothing, zero, nada.

People would land on the paypal page and would refuse to buy it. The e-book was selling for $27 and I was making 75% commission. I looked at amazon.com and the book was selling for 99 cents! Of course nobody mentioned that on clickbank! It seems like everytime I start a website its always something hidden that I didn't know about......and people aren't stupid.

So I feel exactly they way you do, however, I am hoping by now you have finally been able to break through and perhaps you can share with me the so called *BIG SECRET*? Oh wait a minute once that happens then you cross over to the other side, where people start their own guru website and start charging everyone money for their "expert knowledge" with a video and a cadillac Escalade in the background near the beach.

To answer your question, does anyone make money, no...I think the moneys all been made by the 300 other people that already affiliated with my clickbank seller!

Am I giving up? Ha! Never, but making money in affiliate marketing seems like a pipe dream that only the very very rich can have and enjoy!

 

[elj]

Hi, I have only just purchased the package and not got the website up yet. I have found this interesting and look forward to following sanninkyle's progress.

 

[sanninkyle]

so i re-did some things on the site and im looking for more criticism lol i redid the theme and added a preview of the product is it any better?

 

[jmpruitt]

Looking better.

1, check out the affilaites area for each of those guides, I know those have one because I used to promote them. anyway, grab some of the images to break up the black monotony you have going on.

also, you need to break up your text. single blocks of text are really hard to read.

I would pick 3-4 guides, and put an add for them in the sidebar where you had other ads before, but make sure they are for the WoW guides that you are promoting.

You need to do kw research and properly optimize your site. search is going to give you a lot of traffic if you work for it just a little. your kw should be in your title, the first sentence, the last sentence, and every 100 words in your article(average).

also, I still recommend adding some articles to thes site over time. since you are doing a blog, maybe post one article a week, on a different aspect of the game.

 

[smuigal]

Hey JM,

Just reading your post here and saw that you used to play FF. Me too! Back when I was in really bad physical shape and couldn't hardly do much more than laundry for my fam, I played that game. I miss it sometimes.

Anyway, I wanted to also add a thought here...

Don't be afraid to copy Marks style "exactly". Look really close at how things are formatted. Subscribe to his WoW newsletter to get the feel of how he talks to his subscribers. This is what I did when I created my wow site. I also hired someone who played the game so that the articles that were written would ring true to the readers.

Also, this is a repeat I think of what James said but it's really important.

Visit Site - Click Here to Watch the Video Now <<---- This is the type of call to action links I put on my sites. You have to really tell your readers what to do. Adding links to the content is good of course, but you can make your links bold and bigger than the content.

When reading content people can get lost in what they are reading and not think about visiting the site you're talking about. Which is why you need reminders - CLICK ME, SEE THE DETAILS HERE... GET IT NOW!

also, adding things like - "After you buy the guide".... be sure to check out the section on... bla bla... This is a technique used to help move your readers mind onto the "I'm going to buy" thinking mode.

There is no question you have the right niche. Before selling my WoW site it was earning $400.00 give or take a few a month. It's still earning that so you KNOW it's still a great niche. Don't give up, you're almost there.

:)
Chrisi

 

[jmpruitt]

LOL Chrisi... you may get a laugh out of this then... my character that everything was written by was a taru taru pally....:D

 

[smuigal]

Hehe... I don't wanna hijack this thread but those guys were so cute!

so, in order to be fair I'll add this...

I have recently had several PM's by people struggling with making money on their sites. Sometimes the issue is as we've discussed here. The goal for US is to get them to buy, but if we don't make it clear to our visitors what to buy, then we're working hard for nothing.

Be clear in what you are selling. Go back over your website. Pretend you are a visitor. As you visit each page thing, "What is this page about? What is it telling me to do?"

We don't want to be pushy, but we can lead them in the direction of a purchase.

So, what is the goal? To get them to buy. How do we do that?

Example:

While playing Warcraft today I was so frustrated with the dude with the bla bla... jealous that he had bla bla...". I decided to reread the gold guide. I remembered something about the seasonal auction thingy bla bla.... After about an hour or so of research I hit my target and Viola! Another 500 gold in my bag. it's not hard guys, check it out... Click Here, once you have the guide, check out the tip on pg 40, awesome stuff.... bla bla...

Just a quick example. I'm talking about my own experience and leading the person to the guide along the way.

If you don't play this game, hire someone who does and get them to write the latest things that are available. You can also request a copy from the authors in order to post tips that are based on the guides. Sometimes these guys will give you the guide free if you show them you are serious and have a quality site set up. Not every time, but many times. I actually paid for Dugi's guide so that my writer could play the game and use the guide for tips in the articles she wrote for me.

Don't give up. There are so many great tips in this forum, just keep working at it. You'll get there.

:)
Chrisi

 

[jmpruitt]

using the products that you promote is one of the best places to get tips for your articles. great post Chrisi

 

[sanninkyle]

lol u guys can hijack all u want :) . Im reading everything you guys are saying and putting them to use and taking them to heart. You guys are helping me out so the least I can do is let u guys get off topic and reminence lol my next step, adding videos to the site and pics too cuz I agree its lookin kinda......drab lol

 

[smuigal]

Hey Sann,

I have a promotion going on right now for video creation. I can create a really snazy video for you cheap. $12.00 if you collect the images. There are tons of images floating about on warcraft. You can use some of the guide images too.

If it were me I'd collect some images of gold, maybe a guy in jail with texts that says don't get caught up in paying for gold with real money online. Then use images of characters that are near or holding gold bags, and continue with the idea that you can do it yourself.

Then upload to youtube and other media sites.

:)
chrisi

 

[sanninkyle]

lol no thanks perhaps sometime in the future thou....i wanna learn for myself rather than relying on others constantly...its just harder than expected lol. Im thinking of adding pics of WoW into my sites header...and ive painlessly added media on the site thanks to the videos on this one lol

 

[esolutions]

Hi tgo57,

You are *almost* correct in that MOST people never make money online. You have taken action, you have created sites, sent traffic, etc. and while that's great, if you haven't made money yet, it's because you haven't done enough. Sorry to put it bluntly, but money can be made, you have to be willing to work your ASS OFF, learn, improve and have patience. It took 2 years for my first site to make the first sale, but now it makes consistent income. 2 years of persistence, learning and faith.

It can be done, but CANNOT be done if you give up.

Keep on!

 

[sanninkyle]

hey guys! i just updated the site again and they banned my acc off of the forum i was posting on so my site views are tanking. Does anyone know of how to go on about doing free marketing? meaning NO cash whatsoever? ive already posted on squidoo and hubpages but idk how they help any? does anyone know more ways?

heres my squidoo and hubpage links tell mi watcha think

"http://www.squidoo.com/world-of-warcraft-tips-and-clever-tricks"

"http://hubpages.com/hub/World-Of-Warcraft-Tips-And-Clever-Tricks"

 

[abeja_reina_1989]

Hmm.. I wonder if maybe you're marketing to the wrong people?

 

[jmpruitt]

sanninkyle, there are loads of ways to get free traffic to your site. posting to just a few wont get it done, and it takes a lot of work doing it all manually, but it can be done.

usually the only reason a forum will ban you is because you are spamming them. stop spamming forums, unless you want to ruin your reputation with your customer base.

Especially in a popular game like WOW, people talk, and a bad experience will travel 100 times faster than a good one.

I recommend that you learn article marketing. Start writing articles and posting them to article directories.

 

[sanninkyle]

lol thats all well and good but wat got me is the fact that i WASNT spamming i hate spammers and im not gonna become one. i was actively engaged in the conversations and all i had in refrence to my site was "for additional tips go*here*" no spam VERY light advertisment and i got banned and i was HELPING people

and what to u mean im "marketing to the wrong audience"? can you please elaborate?

 

[jmpruitt]

it also depends onthe forum. many of the wow guides have a bad reputation, they may have banned you for promoting them on your own site if the mods checked out your links. also where you linking in post or in sig file? that could make a difference.

 

[sanninkyle]

im linking in my sig i have linked in my post like mabye twice

 

[jmpruitt]

hmm. not sure. some forums will ban you for linking once. really, what it comes down to is they make the rules, and not really anything you can do about it. that is why i dont rely on any one method of traffic. I use some forums, some blog commenting, social sites, article directories. etc...

some people say I am scattered, but by doing it that way, I get traffic from multiple sources and if something happens with one, I get traffic from another. it may hurt my traffic to to lose some of those sources, but I will still be in business.

I try not to rely on any one site for more than 30%of my total traffic (that includes google)

 

[sanninkyle]

how about if i make diffrent lenses on diffrent subcategorys and link em to my site not spam links but like a hub for each problem

 

[jmpruitt]

I always create multiple squidoo lenses and hubpages, the more the merrier. like i said, don't rely on one source though. use different sites and set yourself a system. it can be tricky but you want a system that is a logical flow for you but will look randomly natural to the search engines.

For example, I have accounts at about 100 different social sites, and 20 different article directories, but not every one of them is used for every article. I actually only syndicate each article on about 50 different sites. I randomly post each article to make my link building look more like natural links. I also do 2-3 guest posts on blogs within my niche every month.;

 

[sanninkyle]

well here i am several months later and after a lot of stuff tht went on like made squidoo pages and hubpages that never took off mabye like 5 clicks EVER i feel like calling it quits but i wont. I REALLY beleve this can work and im getting good comments and feedbacks on the site but absolutely NO sales. I dont want to give but i just dont think free marketing can compete with the pay per variety of marketing

After google anay. put me in debt for debts i paid already i dont want to go back to any ppc or anything paid at all. so does anyone have any advice or tutelage? Or mabye its time to find a new niche?

 

[faradina]

I am into several niches myself. Some are working out and some are still not. And there are some niches that I have given up on because I did not really have much interest in them and thus I could not come up with very good content to put up. But that's just me. I know other affiliate marketers find other ways to create content when they have little or no interest/knowledge in a topic.

Maybe you could do with additional keywords to target, ones that are "buying" keywords. I use only SEO for my sites and the "buying" keywords are serving me well. That's because people who type in such keywords are ready to buy and just need a little more information, if they need anything else at all.

 

[jmpruitt]

There could be a lot of reasons why you aren't seeing sales. took over 3 months to see my first sale, and 6 months before they were consistent. it takes time dedication and a lot of work to make it in this business.

Perhaps if you share your site, some of us could help you see what you can do to make it better. If you don't want to share it publicly, send me a PM and I will look at it and see what you can do,. it may just be a matter of giving it time. Some keywords take longer than others. also, if you aren't targeting the right keywords, you will get lower conversions.