How I Got Rich

Google AdWords vs Google Keyword Tool part II

Just a quick update about this topic. According to AdWords, yesterday my campaign got 197 impressions. Bear in mind this wasn’t campaign wasn’t running a whole day but during that period my site got five hits.

So five as a percentage of 197 is 2.5%. Now I know my site is only at number two but that is a pretty poor showing. Needless to say no one has clicked on my ad.

I will wait and see what the stats are like for the next few days and report back.

Google AdWords vs Google Keyword Tool

My regular readers will know I often like to grumble about the lack of accuracy of the Google Keywoord Tool.

Getting a site to number one in Google usually gives me about 2-4% of the number given by the Google Keyword Tool for exact search in hits per month i.e. Google Keyword Tool says 14,000 exact matches for my sites main keyword but my site will only get about 500 hits per month making it completely unprofitable.  Either no one is clicking through or the Google Keyword Tool is well out.

So to find out I have just setup an AdWords campaign for one of my sites main keyword.  The Keyword Tool said there were 12,100 exact searches for this keyword last month but my site at number two in Google only got 140 hits in that month (1%).

Lets see how many impressions my ad gets (and lets hope it doesn’t cost me too much!).

Anyone want a niche?

It’s not going to make you rich but could be a good start for a newbie just to get stuck in with: multi tool / org / uk.

Competition doesn’t look too stiff with amazon in number three – should be easy to get top three without too much effort.

If you believe the Google Keyword Tool multi tool gets 14k exact matches and multiool gets 6k exact so if you ranked for both you would be getting a few hits a day.

Items sell for around 25 quid which should bring in about 1 pound per sale.  Its a good item to sell online as you don’t really need to see it in the flesh in a shop to decide if you want one plus you won’t have to look like a deviant buying a knife in shop either!

I would take it myself but my days of buying domains are over for now.  At least until the backlog has cleared.

Let us know if you take it and if it does anything for you.

£1 a Day from Each Site

I was just looking through my list of sites and I have around 40 sites that are up and running.  Some are more up and running than others but all of them are in a position to make a sale at some point.  After seeing this it occurred to me that if they were all making £1 day I’d be bringing in around £1000 a month which is pretty much my main goal in affiliate marketing (and life!).

Most of my sties promote low cost items so for the majority of them they would need to make around 1.5 sales a day to get £1 in commission (I learnt my lesson and no longer promote such low cost items).  Some of my sites however can make around £20 a sale so that would even things out a bit.

But alas I am way off this target and am nowhere near £1000 per month.

But is £1 per day per site too to ask?   It doesn’t sound like it but it obviously is.

Today I’ve been mostly wasting my time reading affiliate marketing blogs as I thought work would be closed tomorrow due to the red shirts but our boss knows better so we are back in work tomorrow so no Internet marketing for me.

Looking for a UK host that…

• …will let me pay by Paypal
• …doesn’t require a UK postal address
• …will let me do a whois opt-out on .co.uk
• …has fantastico and CPanel
• …doesn’t cost an arm and a leg

I’ve tried signing up with a few but due to my location I never get past the final stage for reasons related to my location.

Feel free to post affiliate links to your recommendations.

Cheers.

What I done did today

After work and between the gym and my Thai class I wrote a few more bits of content about an older site which is finally climbing the Google tree and is at number three.  These were two 250ish word product reviews that I have done as separate Wordpress posts.

I’ve also decided to split apart my big site I am working on into two smaller big sites as the two areas are not that closely related.  After deciding this I spend some time looking for a UK based host I could host the site with as I want to move away from having all my sites on one server based in a different country to the one I am targeting.

After I’ve picked the host I will look for a WordPress theme that meets my needs and get cracking on the site.  I want it ranking well for at least one product before Easter so I’ve not got long to get something up.  Hopefully I will have a quiet weekend and get some work done.

One of my newish sites made its first sale netting £10 commission which was nice.  A few more of those this month will make me happy.

Price Tapestry

I heard about Price Tapestry a long time ago but after a quick look I decided it was a bit too advanced for me and I left it alone, especially after Easy Content Units came out and did what looks like something similar much easier.

However, I am sure there is much more to Price Tapestry than I am aware of and as I start my ‘big site’ it is probably something I should investigate to see if I could be of use to me.

So before I do do any of my readers use it or know much about it?

Does anyone know of any sites that use it they wouldn’t mind linking to?

Is it easy to use?

After work today I wrote up two 200 word product reviews for my ‘big site’ and spent far too long tinkering with the placement of product images on it wasting valuable time.  The rest of the evening was spent at language class and then stuff for work tomorrow.   Roll on the weekend when I can spend a good chunk of time on my sites.  It’s a fun life!

Monthly Round-Up: February 2010

February was a poor month for me and I only made about 300 pounds and I had to spend about 80 quid on AdWords to get there.  This was my worst month for probably about six months and the first real big drop in profit.  But onwards and upwards as they say.

I have started proper work on a ‘big site’ but am only focusing on one type of product for now and will then start adding in more products once I am ranking ok for the first product type.

I’ve started paying for content and reinvesting some of my earnings from affiliate marketing now I am working full-time again.  I’ve been buying content in lots of 500 words and having the content focused around my niche keywords.  I had a site that had been at the bottom of page one in Google for ages and after adding the content it moved to number three in Google so hopefully I should see a return on that investment shortly.  Before that the site was languishing on page two and sometimes further out but after moving it to WordPress and separating each product review/description into a separate Wordpress post it moved to the bottom of page one in Google.  So moving to WordPress plus adding good written content can equal a decent jump in the serps for a site.

As for my big site I am having trouble finding a decent WordPress theme that is suited to an affiliate site.  I’m using a magazine theme at the moment and I do like it but it doesn’t quite meet my needs and I am having trouble deciding how to structure a site that is bigger than my usual one type of product site.

Can anyone recommend a good WordPress theme, free or otherwise, for a decent sized affiliate site?

How was February for you?

That Sunday Night Feeling

Now that I am back working full-time some of the things I’d left behind are returning.

The main one is that Sunday night feeling where you know you have work the next day which is even worse after having some time off.  Last week I was off from work and was on holiday and today (Monday) is a public holiday so I am getting that Sunday night feeling a day late but it is just as strong if not stronger.  I am really fired up to do some affiliate marketing work but have lots of planning and preparation to do for the day job so can’t even do that!

I’ve set myself another goal which is to be earning £900 a month by the end of June which is about four months time.  This should be enough for me to quit the day job and go full-time again.

I plan to do this via my existing sites and the addition of one big site which I am yet to start.

Can it be done? Watch this space.