Forum Moderators: skibum
Depending on your industry, site's scope and mix of programs, target groups etc. how did you get to blend programs and what's your success (or not so successful) story?
My world:
1. I am running highly targeted content sites that are very dense. There are not too many affiliations possible so I just figured to enrich the theme with AdSense and it rewards me with extremely targeted ads and nice CTR as well.
Those ads blend into the content nicely and the whole thing is really perceived as value added by the users.
Whenever I see fit I would try to include text links picked from some network and include, blend into the page copy.
2. My portal-like sites carry a mix of 50:50% in AdSense (as sponsored links) ads and network affiliates (mostly graphical to enrich the clean, almost boring layout a bit).
3. The third type site are the ones that I built with and for affiliate partners that even granted me parts of their content to use for the sites. There I would just go with the partner's material to remain in a special contractual situation with them. Anything goes wrong with them you just offer the next competitor in the row to work with you and the established site, most of the time they are happy to open that door and offer a great commission base.
What's your mix look like if you dare to share? What's your ratio and reasoning?
Cheers, Jens
I also have some Linkshare and CJ text links mixed in with Amazon links, but this is a small percentage of affiliate links, perhaps 5 percent at most. I tried AdSense and it was a total flop on my site, but I've kept it on a tiny percentage of pages where the ads do match my content.
I've tried several Linkshare programs and only found one that earns for me. I've had more success with CJ, belong to a couple dozen programs and have made money from most of them, not a lot but it all adds up.
Most of my earnings these days come from Fastclick. I am moving away from my focus on Amazon since it no longer earns as much for me as it once did, but it still brings in about half what Fastclick does, sometimes more, sometimes less. I plan to keep my Amazon links because my visitors rely on my site for book information, but if I could find a better book affiliate program I would switch.
I could do well with highly targeted advertising since my visitors have very specific interests, but I have not been able to find ads/programs that match my visitors well. Sometimes I'll find a suitable product, but the banners or text links offered are not what I need, and I have not found affiliate program managers helpful with this. I had high hopes for AdSense, but was disappointed by miserable content matching. There's still a lot of potential on my site not being tapped, I think, but I am working on it and learning all the time.
Adsense is also positioned to flow with the site and makes it an appealing option when visitors want to leave :).
One thing that REALLY increased revenue was when we implimented the Webtoolbar.com program and placed our affiliate links in it. (It is this little toolbar that shows at the bottom of a page and we set it to display after visitors leave the site.) I have to say it increased revenue from those affiliate programs big time and it also gently leads people back to our site:).
I was wounded in a drive by browser spawning spamming as a result.
