Diversifying Your Niche Site Income
For those of us who have made money online, we have the tendency to stick to one area that does very well for us. “Stick with what works” is a great motto for a lot of things, and it can be a good motoo for niche marketing as well… but it can be just as dangerous. A better cliche would be, “Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket.”
As I mentioned in another post, I love the Amazon Affiliate program. I made quite a lot of money last year, and I’ve continued to make a lot already into this year. In short, niches are easy to pick, sites are easy to create, links are easy to build, and Amazon is great at upselling products, meaning more money for me.
But what if Amazon reduces their affiliate commissions? What if they begin to start delaying their payments? What if they start skimming some of the sales and not crediting me with all of the earnings I deserve? If all of my sites are Amazon-based sites and something goes wrong, a huge portion of my online income is gone. I don’t expect that to happen, but you never know.
There’s many different ways to earn money online with affiliate commissions. Here are a few of them:
Amazon sites – Picking a product-based niche does well for Amazon. If people are searching for a product, they may be looking to buy that product, and Amazon probably sells that product.
Adsense sites - Information based sites do well with Adsense. Keyword selection is very important. Whereas “hypertension reduction” might be a good Adsense niche, “blood pressure monitors” are a product and would probably work best for Amazon.
Clickbank/PayDotCom sites – If you want to provide information about a topic, and then sell software or an ebook related to to that topic, then selling Clickbank or PayDotCom sites can do very well for you. I know some World of Warcraft sites that sell Clickbank WOW Books that do very, very well.
Your Own Information Product - Taking the previous section a step further, you can offer your own information product. The downside is that you either need to spend time or money to get the product created, but then you’ll be able to keep 100% of the profits of each sale, instead of splitting profits like you would with Clickbank. You can also receive the money instantly through Paypal or another payment processor.
Membership Sites - One of the best affiliate models. You get to keep 100% of the commission as with your own information products, but you can also create the site so that you can get recurring income each month.
Whatever methods you choose, be sure to diversify. Don’t put all of your hope into one membership site. Don’t create all Amazon sites or all Adsense sites.
For me, I am stepping out from under my Amazon rock, and starting a Clickbank website and an Adsense website. It was hard coming up with the right niches for these types of sites (for me at least) but I found some, and am going to go hard at it.
Leave us a comment letting us know what types of affiliate programs you use to monetize your sites successfully… We’d love to hear.
How to find Affiliates
Paying affiliates to promote products or services on your website will definitely get you more visitors. The real trick is getting those extra visitors without spending more money than you’re earning. You never want to just throw money in to advertising to “see if it works” without doing your research first.
For example, if you choose to use Google Adwords to advertise you’ll be paying for every click you receive. Now just because you’re getting clicks it doesn’t necessarily mean that these visitors will complete offers, produce sales, or make you any money at all. It’s easy to lose money with pay per click advertising so be careful.
In the last few years Pay Per Action (PPA) marketing has gained a lot of ground. Instead of paying affiliates per click you pay them for every email submit, offer completed, or purchase. This way you ensure that you’re only paying affiliates based on quality traffic.
There are affiliate networks out there that have hundreds or even thousands of affiliates. These networks offer their affiliates the opportunity to promote products for a variety of advertisers without signing up for each advertiser individually.
In order to promote your product or service with an affiliate network you must first signup with the network as an advertiser, submit your application and be approved. Once you’ve been approved by the network you must setup your advertising campaign. They usually help you with this and they provide their own link redirects.
Most affiliate networks will require that provide your own html text, html links, banner images, and any other marketing material. You should be able to set your own conditions on what methods of generating traffic you allow affiliates to use. For example, if you don’t want any affiliates using email marketing to promote your website, product or service you’d set that condition. The affiliate network would make it clear to their affiliates that email traffic is not approved for your campaign.
Here are some affiliate networks that have worked out great for me in the past:
Clickbank
XY7.com
Silverinet
MaxBounty
No matter how many affiliates these affiliate networks may have, in order to have these affiliates promote your product or service you must have an attractive payout (affiliate commission) and a campaign that converts.
large affiliate networks
