[Making Money] Making money off a blog

[berserk]

What's your guys opinion on adsense? I know its gone downhill, is it still even worth using? I don't have much luck with it but curious if others do. The one other thing that botheres me about adsense is they have not only a strict TOS but also super vague there's really no determining factor of whats family or workplace safe and what will get your account shutdown forever, oftentimes it's very trivial things.

I know alot of you guys have great blogs but probably stuff that would violate adsense TOS if there's any mention of sex or heck you may even get people complaining for anything guy related but just curiuos if you don't go the adsense route whats the best way to go selling your own ebook or prodcut or other pay per action affiliates or ?

Not worth it, you have to compare EPC - earning pr. click. I've very rarely had a click in Adsense over $1, while I have frequent EPCs for affiliate programs at $2 over a long period. The average click in my Adsense account is nothing but 0.3-0.5$.

Then you have the need for a person to click an ad, which is generally not happening very often, a good CTR is 5-10%, while a targeted affiliate link can be much higher.

You also lose your visitor with Adsense, while you can keep them on your site using "_blank" and opening a new tab with a normal link.

Adsense also looks bad, because the strategies to maximize Adsense clicks (basic design of webpage, obtrusive ads in content etc) make the site look unprofessional and cluttered. Any time I see an Adsense block on a blog, I hit the back button, because it's become such an indicator of low quality content.

The only time I would use Adsense was if I had a lot of traffic that was difficult to monetize such as free games, a very popular poll that had gone viral or generally anything 'free' where people are not looking to buy a specific product. And even then, it would be better to just grab the email and send some offers later.

You can get some really cheap clicks from buyer side though and if you use placements you can greatly improve the relevance of the clicks.

 

[MikeCF]

I took a shower today and brushed my teeth before doing a YouTube video.

According to WWT, this is internet marketing because I want to be clean for my video in hopes people watch it and share it.

You can't reason with people like WWT. They get caught up doing sleazy tactics and try rationalizing it by saying everyone is doing some sort of the same thing.

"The lady doth protest too much, methinks."

 

[MikeCF]

Write it well. You'll make typos, but correct them when you see them. Don't be afraid to change a page after you've published it.

Great post man.

This is a great point as well. I used to devote 4 hours a week going through old posts and re-writing them. Now I just clean up the posts that are performing well in Google for whatever reason.

I also find posts that have individual page rank assigned to them and use that to pass SEO to other posts.

Since I've been doing YouTube videos, I now embed those in posts that have page rank to boost the SEO of the YouTube video.

None of those techniques fall under the header of "Internet Marketing."

 

[worldwidetraveler]

ha! Well, I can't say I didn't expect a more personal response even when the discussion wasn't personal in nature. I guess it is much easier to make it personal when you don't really understand what you're talking about.

Everything sleazy is internet marketing and if you don't agree you must be a sleazy internet marketer. haha Brilliant.

 

[MikeCF]

That said, blogging is hard work and there's a lot of survivor bias. I think a real issue is having something to say, and a novel way to say it. The funniest example I can think of in recent times was a post that Victor Pride did. I don't know Victor in any capacity, but people vouch for him being a helpful fellow. He posted saying, "I'll critique your blog idea and help make it happen."

I re-read your great post and saw that, and it's a fair point.

How do you know if some guys just get lucky at blogging? (More on survivorship bias.)

I have had 4 blogs. All were successful. There is a method to this stuff.

If Gio started a blog where he writes about he writes at RVF, it would be successful.

I 100% guarantee it.

 

[MikeCF]

ha! Well, I can't say I didn't expect a more personal response even when the discussion wasn't personal in nature. I guess it is much easier to make it personal when you don't really understand what you're talking about.

Everything sleazy is internet marketing and if you don't agree you must be a sleazy internet marketer. haha Brilliant.

You follow me around the forum and make passive-aggressive snipes because you're not a man who will call me out on anything.

Here's a link to some more of your links.

http://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-33432-post-789331.html#pid789331

Put me on ignore and get over your obsession with me.

 

[worldwidetraveler]

So now it come down to accusations of stalking.

Sorry, dude, but I have always been posting in threads about internet marketing or whatever you want to call it since being on this forum.

One post here that I started with advice that you even liked.
http://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-20832.html

Another about cashvertising. Hopefully I won't be called a shrill for the author
http://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-8239.html

Like I said, you can try and make this personal, which seems to be a common theme when you disagree with someone, but it isn't personal.

Trying to twist things around to make yourself look better is what jezebel does. I wouldn't expect that behavior here.

 

[Chaos]

Gio, you should definitely start a blog.
I would read it with great pleasure and I dare to say that many others will too.

-----
There are so many bloggers out there today and MikeCF brought up the interesting point of that some bloggers are blogging and pretending that they are the only bloggers out there. Like they are afraid that their readers are reading some other blogs than their own.
This is not a good thing.

The same goes with copying or "stealing" stuff from other blogs without giving any public credit for it. Readers will notice these things anyway and it might put you in a light of disadvantage.

I think there is nothing harmful with linking to other blogs that you like or getting some useful knowledge or information from.

 

[lovejoy]

I've been online since 1996 and Content/SEO has always been king. Well written articles about subjects people are interested in will eventually get you traffic. I always check to see what the trend is, there is not much sense to writing articles only 500 people a month search for.

The real money on lower traffic blogs made by selling your own product, affiliate market or adsense is a high numbers game with very often less 3% converstion rate. There are a couple of blogs that deal with this topic of Niche Blogs with actual examples with monthly sales and analytics from day one, for anyone looking to start a blog that would be my best suggestion

 

[good looking loser]

By "marketing", Mike is saying that Roosh doesn't advertise I believe.

Which he doesn't.

 

[good looking loser]

Hey fellas,

Been doing quite alot of research lately on blogs and ive noticed that a bulk of the income is via advertising.

I have noticed that roosh's second blog (return of kings) does have advertising, but other sites like Christian Mqueen's Blog and Good Looking Loser have none?!?

Anyone got any ideas?

I have advertising. I was a sponsor on ROK in July. and Matt Forney.

Here's where we're advertising now- (its funny, have a look)
http://www.menprovement.com/ass-pictures/

edit-----------
ohhh you mean advertising on my site. yeah, I don't.

Advertising is good if you have a lot of traffic by sheer numbers --- like ROK, Vitaly, Jenna Marbles.

advertising on a small(er) blog who don't yet have a BRAND looks tacky and turns off people that would otherwise read the site

 

[good looking loser]

Gio, others - listen to this-

http://boldanddetermined.com/2014/03/11/2-good-looking-winners-discuss-business-podcast/

 

[memcpy]

delete

 

[RXB]

The odds of anyone doing that are almost nonexistent.

Look at all the backlash that Return of Kings got this week. People were posting death threats and going crazy. Yet no one messed with the site by sending bad links or anything.

Worrying about bad backlinks is like worrying that some angry reader/customer is going to jump out of your closet and murder you.

Is it possible?

Yes.

Is it probable?

No.

Goodluck disavowing links if I send 100k viagra and payday loan backlinks to your site. It would be impossible to fix.

Great work diversifying the traffic though less than 25% from google is great, so not relaly a problem for you, but guys starting out could get wiped out early. You seem to be well past that threshold.

 

[Glider]

Only because your offended audience has no idea.

I and many people I know have had targeted negative SEO attacks on smaller sites ranked specifically to make money. These copped an almighty hit that was not recoverable.

The reasons why it would not affect the ROK is its a large authority site with tons of link variation.

But i think I am going off topic.

 

[jamaicabound]

I've got several websites, but is it necessary to use my real name? It seems like lots of people are going that route.

If you're comfortable using your name your better off, part of blogging or having a youtube channel etc is that readers or watchers, your audience, they can connect with you. THey almost feel as if they know you or you are a friend. If you choose to remain anonymous you can still do well but its going to be hard to make that connection and blogs are all about return visitors and people sharing so you really want to have that connection. At the very least I would use a persona or pen name so there's something people can identifiy you with.

Its like youtube videos. People who make vids of a black screen or just their chest and not face you probably woudln't watch those. I think not using your name comes off as if you wont show your face can you really say you stand behind your product or are proud of what you do?

Don't get me wrong, I get that people are sometimes shy about their writing, I am a bit too. I get some people prefer to remain anomymous but you will probably have more success if you are willing to put yourself out there.

Lots of people like to essentially turn their name and themselves into their own brand and establish themselves as an expert. If I were doing a blog on SEO or something I may want to use my own name if I plan on trying to build up an SEO or consulting business off of my blog.

 

[Beyond Borders]

Anyone got any ideas about building traffic to a website that doesn't have constant blog post updates?

Advertising. Guest blogging. Running an affiliate program (obviously depends on your marketing funnel and budget).

 

[jamaicabound]

Anyone got any ideas about building traffic to a website that doesn't have constant blog post updates?

Advertising. Guest blogging. Running an affiliate program (obviously depends on your marketing funnel and budget).

You really need to be constantly or at least relatively frequently updating content, otherwise you will never get return visitors. Yeah you can advertise but once someone has seen your site or read your site why come back to read the same stuff over again.

You want to post regularly not only for search engines because they like it but also because you need fresh content or someone will look at your site once and never come back. I would compare it to youtube. I'll find a great station, subscribe and check regularly for updates. Now if they are doing at least a video a week I'm like cool I check back for new videos, if theynever put up anything fresh I will unsubscribe as I have seen everything they ahve to offer.

 

[M3B]

Cheers for the replies. It's an information website, so the need for frequent posting isn't required, hence my original question.

I suppose advertising is one way to go.

 

[Afarang]

Good read.