Am I doing ok?

new to affiliate marketing

[tryingtosucceed]

Hello all. I am new to the AM way of life. I am doing this because all else has pretty muched failed -but I learned along the way:).
I started with buying ebooks on AM, adsense,adwords, all kinds of areas. I bought one package that has all kinds of stuff Im not even 5%through with it. Alot of the stuff I have noticed was out dated, but still gives a good foundation.
I have been trying to do everything Im supposed to, but I keep feeling as if all the stuff Im reading is BS to some degree. What I mean is everything I keep reading has all these wonderful amounts of income being made. My degree is in electronic media and public relations so I understand the hype needed to get someone like me to buy an info book, however are these just rare exceptions to the rule? Are most people just supplementing their income with AM or are they actually earning a self sufficiant living off of nothing but AM. Im confused?

I have followed the advise of many of these ebooks, but adsense for instance (6 months= 70 dollars for me).
And promoting products with adwords (297 clicks=1 sale) Is this an average ratio for AM?
I graduated from college with high hopes, but the economy makes my degree pretty much useless to employers other than fast food.(thats right 4yr degree...would you like fries..) So here I am trying to find that light in the tunnel to guide me to the correct way to be my own boss and make my living online.
Im pretty much tired of listening to the now "numbing" speeches of I make thousands daily. Id be happy with 400 dollars weekly at this point. Right now I have invested 7 hundred dollars(sold my own valuables on ebay to help fund this) and have made 268.00 in 6 months running various info AM products from Click bank. Im a member of CJ and link share but to date do not have any sales there. I concentrated on clothing stores and apparently I failed miserably at those.Im just really lost here and would greatiously love some true assistance in finding a living through the web.I enjoy AM but what am I doing wrong and is it just only for a select few to live off the internet or do I actually , really have a chance? Im running out of extra cash to use honestly. Thanks for leting me vent everyone LOL.

[buckworks]

Promoting merchants directly via Adwords etc. can be profitable if you know what you're doing and manage to find a niche that's not already crowded, but a major disadvantage is that your efforts only build the merchant's brand, not yours.

What have you been doing to develop and promote a website of your own during the time you've been working on this?

[ronin]

IMHO you're better off not listening to the shysters who peddle e-books. If they were half as successful as they claimed to be they wouldn't have either the time or the inclination to research and write an ebook.

And if the information in their ebook was worth anything it would be published as a real book and on sale in the bookshops. The only reason I can imagine that most of these so-called "gurus" choose to write an ebook is that they know that there will be no editorial quality control applied to what they have written.

And real books with genuine, edited, checked information - how much do they cost? Usually about $20-30, right? And the unchecked, unedited e-books? Most of them it seems, sell for double that.

So where are these shyster gurus making their money? It seems a fair bet that they are not making it through the methods they claim to be teaching.

Imagine a gold rush where a tool store sets up in town purporting to give the best tips on where to find the gold. Everyone flocks to the tool store. As the store owner gives advice to prospectors on where to dig, he usually sells a shovel or two to each one as he's passing on the information.

But think about it. If the store owner knows all the best places to dig for gold, why is he down in the town, selling shovels?

[FourDegreez]

Success in AM is kind of like hitting gold, so that's a good analogy. I think there's a lot of luck involved with picking the right niche, getting links or SE traffic, having the right advertisers.

I'm not making bazillions, but definitely more than $400/week. But I had the benefit of having a high traffic hobby site that I've turned into a money-maker (I've also built several other sites that are 50/50 hit or miss). If I started from scratch with this AM stuff, like many people do, I doubt I'd be where I am now.

[ronin]

But I had the benefit of having a high traffic hobby site that I've turned into a money-maker

I think this is a solid strategy.

There seem to be a lot of people who start off choosing a sector where they could potentially find reasonably good rewards. And then build a site. And then start thinking about where they are going to find an audience for their site and how they are going to grow the audience.

Much more sensible IMHO to work on a site in lots of innovative ways until the audience is growing at a sustainable rate and only then think about possible revenue streams.

But, granted, this is not the only way to go.

[tryingtosucceed]

I have been doing blogs with quality content, I even purchased several advertising softwares (all white hat...scared to try any black hat), I post to forums and have my link at the bottom, I have sold stuff on ebay and let the email any questions email be one with my domain in it, My link is always in my email, adwords, keeping fresh content updated, rss feeds, and word of mouth are some of the ways I have been promoting my sites.

I get some traffic but it isnt steady. I have had one thats (1) person come back to one of my affiliate sites and purchase and item after the initial visit. I guess because I didnt have a high ranking site to begin with that has hurt tremendously- but I got to start somewhere. I just hoped it would be taking off a little faster. I am not impressed at all with adsense. By far the best sucess rate has been with adwords.

How many adwords campaigns should I run at the same time, or better yet whats a good number in your opinions to safely control and promote with out losing quality and time. Right now my budget for the week (7 days) is 30 dollars -120 a month. Would some of you share with me the number of adwords campaigns you currently run so I can get an estimate.

Your also right about the quality of the ebooks. By far the best information for SEO came from a book purchased at the book store. I just figured I would use all those ebooks as freebies when my opt-in list started taking off.(pretty much 90% of them gave me resell or give away rights). Thank you for the replies

[skibum]

I'd start with anything other than clothing. Maybe it's just personal bad luck with it but aside from shoes which do really well (though they usually have pretty high returns), clothing is tough and I suspect lots of people browse online and buy offline if it is something they haven't purchased or tried on before. Clothing payouts tend to be pretty low and average sales probably aren't very high.

Try things that people are more likely to know will be a good fit so to speak like brand name non-clothing products. The whole lead arena can be good too - credit cards, loans, other financial services but with the increased earning potenial comes a lot more competition.

IMHO, AM is best suited for part time while you have another job. Get it ramped up and then think about making it a full time gig after there are some building blocks in place to work with.

[JollyK]

tryingtosucceed: I hear ya. I haven't found an ebook yet that wasn't 90% outdated stuff or stuff I already knew and 10% trying to sell you the more expensive ebook package or "system." :-)

There is SO much good information on this site (WebmasterWorld), it's worth it to take the time to browse through it.

From what you've said, it sounds like you're doing okay. These things can take time. You need to find your niche(s), find what works in your ads and your copy and so forth, and build traffic, but it can take awhile.

Yes, you can still make thousands with affiliate marketing,and yes, there are people doing it ... BUT! It is a lot harder nowadays due to the competition and everyone and his brother trying to Google their way to Gazillions or what have you. (At least, for me, it seemed like it was a lot easier a couple of years ago to make a lot more with less effort than it is now in the whole affiliate marketing thing. Other people may have other experiences.)

It's kind of like those weight loss ads: in big letters it says "John Q. Public Lost Over 123 Pounds with our Sure Fire Secret!" then in small letters it says "Results not typical."

I totally agree about getting a "day job" for awhile as you're starting out, though. Anything to supplement your income. As a side note, for an alternative to the selling of fries, your current web work in AM might even be a qualification for some kind of web job you hadn't thought of. Remember: You don't have to know more web technology than the professional web designer -- you just have to know more web technology than the guy who's hiring you.

(Hoping I don't get flamed for that last sentence ... :-) )

JK

[ccam96]

I agree with the earlier post. Clothing is too low of a margin business for the merchant to allow them to pass on a decent commission to the affiliate.

I would also stay away from Clickbank as their sales are impossible to track. No impression, click statistics make comparing programs basically impossible. (.. I'm sure there are many out there that would disagree with me , however, i have had miserable EPC's and ROI's with Clickbank..)

I would HIGHLY RECOMMEND that you, as an AM beginner, start with a pay-per-lead program either through CJ or directly with an in-house program and build a simple website (not too flashy) with links to relevent information and articles that YOU write as original content. Most pay per lead programs are in financial areas which are difficult to compete with in Adwords ,but it can be done! Just search on Google under several keywords related to your topics and get some ideas for how some of these AM'ers are doing it. DONT COPY THEM.. however, they can act as inspiration to build your own ideas.

AM can be a full time business , but it takes time. I started out with the same Adwords budget that you have and now I spend 1000-1500 monthly and get a 400% return on investment. (.. I'm sure this is small to many on this board ..)

Keep at it!

[tryingtosucceed]

Thanks to everyone for the "real" truth to AM. Im glad you can make money and its nice to know what I CAN look forward to instead of those "billion dollars in a day ebooks".

As we speak I am retiring my clothing review site and am looking for a better narrowed custom fit product or lead. I still have my adwords campaigns working and while they are doing there stuff I can concentrate on a new ninche. I like this forum, thanks everyone for the encouragement.

CCAM96 how long did it take you before the profit to cost started working solid in your adwords campaigns?

[sore66]

For heavens' sake...

Write an interesting site or blog first. With conversions of 1:500 (for example) you need to entertain the other 499 people to come back another day.

[ccam96]

It took a few months before I was able to get the returns I'm seeing now. I started doing the direct to merchant method on Adwords which taught me a lot about minimizing CPC's on Adwords in order to squeek out a profit. I got my website rolling and started to search for new avenues to bring in traffic to my pages via PPC that weren't as obvious as they may be to the masses. Remember, you don't have to send them to the homepage. In fact , this will always give you a lower ROI. Think outside the box!

My site is very seasonal as Q1 is much better than Q2 through Q4, however, each quarter has been higher than the previous years quarter and this trend continues. I continue on focusing on three tasks on a regular basis..

1. Research more 3+ word phrase keywords (3 words and up give you the cheapest cost with lower traffic. However, if you have hundreds or thousands of these 3+ keyword phrases, then it really adds up)

2. Come up with original content daily, if possible. Try to integrate this content into your affiliate programs and always add AdSense to these pages. If you can't make the new page work with PPC, then it's still OK since it may eventually get picked up in the free SERP's

3. Always split test my ads in AdWords and keep the winners. This will slowly increase your overall CTR which will slowly increase your rank on the page. Any winning ads I transfer to Yahoo!SM and MSN Adcenter.

Either way, good luck and always have fun in this business. If you're having fun, then you'll succeed.

Keep at it!

[skibum]

Once you have a site up, just leave it there to draw in some traffic, maybe collect some natural links over time and use it to link to new stuff you build. Even if a site is never updated, it can still come in handy along the way.

[Beagle]

Write an interesting site or blog first.

If your degree is in something you're still interested in, there's probably a way to turn the topic into an interesting site - you'll have more knowledge in the subject than most people out there. If it's in a more "academic" area, you can do some outside-the-box thinking as to how it might be made useful to site visitors. And there are probably affiliate programs that would do well in the niche.

[LanaST]

I think you are focusing too much on the AM before evaluating your content. It's easy to make money off your traffic once you have it. and in order to get quality traffic you have to give them something to come back to. Always pick something you are passionate about and know a lot about. this way you can keep your site fresh and updated and people will constantly want to visit.

Then you can add the AM. There are so many things to promote, I'm sure you will find plenty to fit your niche.

Most people go backwards on this. focus on building a quality site first!