Daniel Felice

Choosing Affiliate Ads for Your Blog: Part 2

// December 22nd, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Making Money

For those of you who read “Choosing Affiliate Ads for Your Blog” I wrote last week, I have just had another idea so I have created this post as an add on. For those of you who haven’t read it, then read it before you read this one so it all makes sense.

As you may have noticed I have changed a few of my ads around today just to try and generate some more revenue for myself as the previous ads weren’t getting any clicks, let alone making me any money.

As well as the steps I wrote in the earlier post, I also tried something I haven’t done before. It is a bit of an experiment I guess, but I thought it might be worth a shot.

I visited a few other blogs that are similar to this, but are successful. I won’t mention the names of the blogs, but if you know of a similar blog to yours that actually makes money you can do the same thing.

I went to the other blogs just to see what kind of affiliate advertising they have, just so I could get some ideas and try to figure out what I am doing wrong. I decided to click on one of the ads just to see what the landing page was like. I noticed that the advertiser had an affiliate programme so i decided to sign up and show their ads on this blog.

So the end result was that I am advertising exactly the same product as the more successful version of this blog.

I decided to do the same thing with a few other blogs that I know make good revenue each month and again I signed up to the affiliate programmes. I think all in all I signed up to 4 new programmes and now advertising the same products as the “competition”.

It will be interesting to see the results, however there is more to affiliate marketing and advertising then just showing a bunch of ads on the blog – traffic is a major part of it and I don’t think I get the traffic to make enough revenue to live off just yet. At this stage I’ll just be happy to make something!

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Make Money With PerformancingAds

// September 28th, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Making Money

I recently signed up to PerformancingAds after reading good things about them on other blogs. PerformancingAds is a 125×125 advertising network which is one of the most popular advertising banner sizes among bloggers.

After running a private beta for a few months the network has now become open to all publishers. Most ad networks will only approve your application if your website meets their certain criteria, however PerformancingAds are accepting all types of blogs, no matter what size it is or how much traffic it receives.

As a publisher you are able to add as many blogs you wish. Once you have setup all your sites, you can set the price that you wish to sell your adspace for per month. I suggest starting small and working your way up as you start selling space. I am currently selling a 125×125 on the sidebar for 50cents a month.

Potential advertisers can search the marketplace and find blogs that would suit their product. If your blog suits them and they are happy with the price you are selling your 125×125 ad space, then they can buy your 125×125 slot for the asking price and starting show their ad on your blog after you approve it.

There is also a free banner exchange program between other publishers in order to fill your free ad slots and also earn credits. The credits can go towards buying similar ad space on other sites.

Like most ad networks there is also an affiliate program. As an affiliate you can earn yourself $10 for referring a publisher or advertiser to the network and also 5% commission on any ad sales generated by your referral.

The site is very easy to use and it is a great way to advertise your free ad space. If you are looking to make money off your blog and have a few 125×125 slots available then this is a great way to bring some revenue to your site.

If you sign up from the referral link below I will happily exchange ads with you for a month!

Make Money With PerformancingAds.

Are MMO Blogs Just Sales Sites?

// September 5th, 2008 // No Comments » // Making Money

I have been looking at a lot of “Make Money Online” blogs lately to try and see what they are doing and I am not. A lot of these sites claim to teach other bloggers how to make money online, but are they just self serving or do they really teach us bloggers how to make money online?

If you look at all of the popular make money online blogs, without mentioning any names, you will see that most of their posts are just sales advertisements promoting products that they hope you will purchase so they can make money from your sale.

If you look at their monthly earning reports, most of these affiliate sales are their primary source of income and the reason why they are so successful. They do promote the likes of Google Adsense and other ad networks, but the majority of their income comes from you.

These bloggers tend to promote a particular affiliate network, telling you how great it is and how much money they made last month from it, so that gets the readers thinking they are able to do the same so they sign up using the blogs referral link.

For each user that signs up to that particular network using that referral link, the blog that promoted the network receives a percentage of each sale make from that user, contributing to their income and helping them make money online.

MMO blogs also promote certain products, especially e-books, which are all aimed at making a sale. These products and e-books are normally a great read and do teach you a thing or two about making a successful money making website, though if you buy it you are still contributing to their income.

Are these types of bloggers just the new age of sales representatives? They are no different to the Avon lady turning up at your door step at dinner time trying to sell you face cream, or the sales man at your favourite electronics shop trying to sell you a home entertainment system. They all work on commission, and an affiliate is just another word for a sales rep.

I do promote some products on this blog, however everything I buy and recommend to you I have tried and tested and I wouldn’t tell you to go and buy it if I didn’t think it was worth it.

I wonder sometimes how many of these other bloggers try the products they are promoting. Surely if they post about a different product every day they cannot be trying all of them and they all cannot be fantastic and make they hundreds of dollars a month. How come we never read a bad review?

What do you think? Do you think MMO blogs actually teach you how to make money? Or do you think they are self serving and hope you contribute to their income?

ClixGalore

// July 19th, 2008 // No Comments » // Making Money

I have spent most of this week trying to find another affiliate marketing network. Results from my current two – MarketLeverage and Commission Monster have not been that great, so I was on the hunt for a network that was more suited to my audience.

My blog audience is currently split about 50/50 between the USA and Australia, and Nameseek’s mostly Australian. With MartketLeverage ads mostly being aimed at an American audience, and Commission Monster ads not really specific enough for my type of websites, I needed to look elsewhere.

I eventually signed up to ClixGalore which I think has the best collection of advertisers I have seen yet. Signing up is a very easy process, just a matter of filling out the form and you should get an e-mail confirmation shortly after.

I actually got denied the first time as I put down my main website as Nameseek.com.au, but my e-mail address was from my danielfelice.com domain. If the domain name is different to your e-mail address you may have some problems, so just make sure that you use the e-mail address from the domain name you are using.

What I like about ClixGalore is that there is a selection of advertisers who pay revenue per click (PPC). Most of them don’t pay anymore than about 10c per click; however there are a few who offer 20c. As well as giving you money for clicking on the ad, those same advertisers will pay either per Lead, Sale or give you a percentage of any sales made.

The Member Home area can be a bit confusing at first. There is an option to switch from a basic menu to an advanced menu, I prefer the advanced as there is plenty more options for searching the right ads for your viewers, and it also makes it easier to customise your reports and statistics.

Searching through the ads is very very easy. You have the ability to search on categories or the type of program you are looking for – such as Leads, Sales, Per Click or % Sale.

I added two ads to Nameseek earlier in the week and results have been fairly good to begin with. I have received more clicks in the past two days than any of my other ads have received in the past month. Still no sales, but it is looking more encouraging than it was a few weeks ago.

I am still using MarketLeverage and Commission Monster ads on this blog, but will most probably replace the 125 x 125 ads over the next few days as they have not been generating enough clicks.

I am impressed with ClixGalore so far, and hopefully the stats continue to improve. So far so good!

Click here to join ClixGalore!

July Mid Month Update

// July 13th, 2008 // No Comments » // Making Money

We are nearly half way through the month of July, so I thought it would be a good time to asses how my attempts at making money online are going for this month.

Based on danielfelice.com, this month has started strong. Hits are up by about 130%, and revenue so far is already way beyond what I made last month.

I have not changed that much so far this month. I am still using MarketLeverage and Commission Monster as my two main affiliate networks, as well as adding Domaining Manifesto and Blog Mastermind over the past week.

I have stopped using Bidvertiser as my main PPC provider, which I replaced with Google Adsense half way through June. Google Adsense hits have been fairly good in July, but is on track to be about the same as June if things don’t pick up for the remaining half of July.

I have not been happy with the quality of ads from both MarketLeverage and Commission Monster lately, so I am on the look out for a new network. The problem with MarketLeverage is that most of the top performing ads are restricted to an American audience, where as the Commission Monster ads are mostly aimed at an Australian audience. Hits are about 50/50 between users from Australia and the USA, so I need to advertise products and services that cater for a wider audience. I will continue to use Commission Monster for Nameseek as 98% of the audience are Australian.

I find that ads showcasing products based around blogging and domaining are bringing in the most hits, so if there is a product that I use and am willing to support, then I will look for an affiliate program related to it and blog about it to promote it. I am not into recommending products and services that I have not tried – and I would not recommend something I have not and am not using.

Hopefully things will continue to improve over the remainder of the month, and a few more affiliate sales won’t hurt. Hits are constantly on the rise, which is great to see – I must be doing something right!

First Affiliate Sale!

// July 8th, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Project Blogger

After my post yesterday, it really does seem that hard work is paying off! I checked my e-mail this morning and got notification that I have made my first sale from my blog!

I made US$13.50 from one of my affiliate ads over night, and along with Google Adsense being fairly decent this month already, I am up to about $15 this month alone!

I am in the process of looking for some more ads, so the 125 x 125 ad spaces are likely to change over the next few days as I try to generate better performing ads for my audience.

It is true, you really can make money off the internet! I am still in the red, however if this month keeps going the way it is, I actually might start to make a profit soon!