$$$ How is it done - 6000+ visitors a month $5/month - Help

I have almost figured out this thing

[sdbphoto]

I am a photographer, with a good website, adsense, and some affiliate links. I am getting 6000+ visitors a month. none of the affiliates are converting, not even Amazon for which I have very targeted links. Cameras?
Now this whole thing here about people making $100+ a day. Ok I admit, it is all a big mystery to me. If anyone would be kind enough to fill me in on the niceties of this, I would be happy to return the favour in some way.
Or if you can point me to info on how it is done...

[Zygoot]

AdSense revenue may be boosted by improving the position on your site. Take a look at the AdSense heatmap, [google.com...] , it may help you.

Maybe your low earnings have something to do with the topic of your site. Is most of your content text or photographs?

And also keep in mind that the people who make $100/day have lots more visitors than you have; 6000 visitors a month isn't a lot.

[dave741]

I think that only on your homepage is AdSense on the "right" place. On the other pages it is "too hidden".

Did you try to move the AdSense on top on other pages?

Do you measure (by using channels) if the home page is doing better?

[sdbphoto]

Thanks for the comments, I just checked my index page chanel and have 133 impressions and two clicks, I earned $.33 yesterday, yipee...
So am I to know that you guys are making $100/day from Adsense?
Should I write an ebook on "101 Real Life Professional Photographers Tips."
What works? What brings in the big $$$...
Cheers

[voices]

The key is to sell what they search for. Are they coming to your site because they searched for a product or for information?

[sdbphoto]

I am a photographer so i assume they are coming to look for photography services or to look at nice pictures...

[onlineleben]

...so i assume they are coming to look for ...

Maybe you should have a look at your logfiles to determine what they are really looking for.
Selling cameras via amazon is dificult because it is a segment where price change every day. So most people looking for cameras do price comparisons or are looking for reviews (and buying at the cheapest place afterwards).

[sdbphoto]

Ohly shti ... ok so this works... I moved my adsense to the HOTSPOT on most of my pages and we have earned $1.72 in about three hours since i did this... Thanks guys...

[Soso]

Another hints:
1)the background on the page is too dark - I can barely read the ads.
2) overall, the font on the pages is too small, so the people with poorer eyesight may not be able to read your pages at all.
3) I noticed that in the Google ads themselves, the URLs are not displayed! But I don't know how this affects the CTR.

[sdbphoto]

Hum, thanks for the comment, but I don't want the ads to be too intrusive as the sites first purpose is to look good and to focus people attention on the photos, so that they see what a great photographer I am... Earning $$$ from Adsense is kind of secondary to this. But what I want to know is what is the system whereby people use PPC to attract visitors who then turn into affiliate sales? How does this work?

[Nefig]

Personally, if I wanted to monetize a photography site, I'd look for:

1. Printhouses and photo restoration companies to make private advertizing deals with
2. Aff. merchants who sell nice accessories for pictures themselves - albums, frames, etc - you get the idea; I'd probably even made a separate page with your favorite accessories and picture frames, people who like photography should get in the mood of buying something nice and small after looking at good shots..
3. Probably each week or so I'd write some really short tips for your best pictures, describing what you did and how and put 3-5 links to best Amazon books with similar tutorials; Imho it would increase CTR on those pages as well as AdSense would show very targeted ads...
4. I might be wrong, but I'd experimented with orange color for the Adsense links to make them stand out more;
5. If you spend a day or so, you could also make nice previews of photos in frames and put an ads of the merchant, dealing with those. In my opinion, you could significantly increase your eranings that way and attract more visitors by making your website look more sophisticated yet clean and topic-oriented.

Hope this helps; those are my general thoughts as I like photography and would visit such site again and again, I know I could definately buy something if I got really impressed with art and site layout.. It gets you in the mood, doesn't it? :)

[sdbphoto]

Nefig. Thanks for the great comments. I like you suggestions very much. So stay tuned while I implement some of these.
I have already increase my CRT from .01% to 2.0% so that is a great thing.
Cheers

[suzyvirtual]

Adsense is generally more suited to written content. If you want to beef up your adsense earnings, you could write articles on your site having to do with photography. Surely, these would attract the right users and the right ads and start making you some more money. Articles wouldn't have to be about actually photographing, but could even be for the consumer: "how to choose a wedding photogrpher" etc.

[Nefig]

There are actually a lot of topics you could write articles on; how to store printed pcitures, which paper to use to print them, what programs to use if you want to organize your digital collection, even which CD blanks to choose - most brands don't live more than 3-4 years, by the way.

Adding 2-3 desriptive sentences to each pciture can dramatically increase your CTR and target your Adsense, so if you concentrate on that, you will eventually bring more traffic, people will enjoy browsing your site more and you will make more money from Google. Keep us updated! :)

[roldar]

Sites optimized for anything larger than 800 by 600 drive me nuts. I like to have everything on the screen, or be able to see it quickly just by scrolling vertically. How long does the average user view your site, and how many pages per session on average?

[sdbphoto]

Sites optimized for anything larger than 800 by 600 drive me nuts. I like to have everything on the screen, or be able to see it quickly just by scrolling vertically. How long does the average user view your site, and how many pages per session on average?

† Thanks for all the great comments. I have my site so that it autostreches to the size of the browser and the content stays in the middle. I like the look and feel of it as I want to concentrate the attention on the picutres, thus the small text, I have had a few comments from other people (my mum) saying the link text is to small and hard to read, I guess the easier it is for people to navigate a site the longer they will stay, hey?
As for writing articles about things, well I have my blog, which since its inception three months ago has increased my traffic and brought my PR up one point. I continue to blog at least once or twice a week. The longer the blog the better,yes? Would it be a good idea for me to put some of this blog content onto the main site?
Anyways thanks again for all the great comments, lots to work on...

[sdbphoto]

$1.41 and 2.9% CTR so far for today...
A big thanks to all that have posted here...