Posts Tagged ‘Monetising’
How Can I Make Money From My Blog?
April 16th, 2008 | 
Author: Is this the question you have been asking yourself? I asked myself for a long time, but now have the answer, I think 
Before I go any further I just want to say that this is based on my experiences and I strongly advise you to only have a blog about something you know about and care enough about to keep writing to it. A dead blog is no use to anyone. Look at me as an example, I had a site up on this domain, but it was doing nothing. Now I take the time to write as often as I can about things that are going on in online marketing or wordpress as these are the two things I enjoy learning and writing about. This ‘blog’ is more sucessful that the site ever was and that makes me happy.
Think of making money from your blog as a process or a flowchart that needs to be worked through. You need to do the following, preferably in order;
1) HAVE TRAFFIC - Sorry, but first and foremost you need traffic. Without people coming to your site all the affiliate links in the world cannot help you. (I will leave the traffic is a topic for another day as it is quite ‘long-winded’ so for this post I will presume you have some and any is good)
2) THINK ABOUT WHO YOUR READERS/VISITORS ARE - What age are they, what sex are they, where do they work, what do they do in their spare time. All these questions need to be asked as it will change the next step. If you don’t know, ask them. They are normal people just like you so don’t be afraid of them. Most of the time they come to a blog to see what is going on or get the information that you are offering.
3) THINK ABOUT WHT THEY MIGHT NEED/WANT - for example if your blog is about fly fishing (I know this example is used a lot, but tay with me here) offer them related books, dvd’s and/or articles/tips you have written in the form of a paid ebook. You could have a produc recomendation/review page and then offer it for sale through your affiliate link underneath. This is not an exhaustive list, just a few things to get you going. The reason I used the fly fishing example is that your readers may prefer books to dvd’s as they might be able to read while they are fishing. I am just guessing here as I know nothing about fishing, but the point is that you should ask them. There are lots of poll type plugins for wordpress you could use, try this search (opens in a new window).
4) TAKE YOUR TIME BROWSING - There are so many affiliate programs on the internet today that you could get lost in the, so take your time and do a google search for yor niche i.e. fly fishing affiliate programs. Something coming up in this search is going to be your best bet as they will have researched the niche. If that turns up nothing then make the search wider i.e. fishing affiliate programs.
5) DON’T GO MAD - Don’t pick every one you find. If you go from nothing to madness your readers will notice. Put up one at a time and see how they do (tracking - see number 6). If there are no clicks/sales change it. If there are choose a different one andput it somewhere else. You can keep going with this and have a different promotion for each post if you like. Just don’t have too many on one page as people will get distracted and not click on anything.
6) TRACKING - I will post more about this later, but you must track your adverts. whether they be adsense or affiliate links, you can only improve on cliks/ales if you know what is happening. Never rely on someone else’s tracking of your clicks, always do your own.
I hope you found this useful, please let me know either way by leaving a comment below.
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Posted in General | 
Tags: Adsense, Advertising, Affiliate Marketing, Banners, Blog, Blogging, Monetising, Monetizing | 
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404 Errors And How To Make Them Work To Your Advantage
Image from Wikipedia
A 404 error is what you get when you look for a page on a website that does not exist. It may have been there once upon a time, but the website owner may have moved it or changed the name. The page will normally look like the image to your right.
On a static website (a website that consists of set pages) if there is nothing in place for these ‘missing’ or ‘moved’ pages the user will have no option but to click their back button or try someone else’s website for the information they were looking for.
If you use Wordpress on your site (which creates a non-static website) this should not be a problem as if what is typed into the browser does not have a page then Wordpress automatically re-directs you to a 404 error message. You can see what I mean by visiting this link http://www.onthenetdollars.com/my-404-error-message (it opens in a new window so you will not loose your place) which is not a real page on my site. Any pages visited on my site that do not exist will look like this & I can change it any time I like through Wordpress or in my html editor.
If your website is static there are some scripts available that will ebable you to create a 404 error message of some description. I use and highly recommend ScriptSmart as there are lots of other cool little scripts included for a very reasonable price. ScriptSmart will also send you an e-mail telling you what page the user went to, which is useful in many ways. One of which is that you coul create a page for that url with related information on to keep people from leaving your site.
Some hosting companies let you customise your 404 page and upload it to your server, but you need to check with them ans ensure you use the right format for them to serve it when necessary.
If you are using Wordpress and would like to be informed of the url’s people are visiting on your site there is a handy plugin called 404 Notifier that you can download from the developer’s site here.
Posted in Tutorials |
Tags: HTTP 404, Monetising, Monetizing, Plugins, Tutorial, Tutorials, Wordpress |
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