Can’t Even be Bothered to Check Sales AKA post-Christmas Blues
After such a great month in December 2010 has got off to a demotivating-ly slow start. I left most of my PPC campaigns running that did so well in December but they hardly get any impressions and very little clicks and even less sales so I have stopped them. Other sales have been pretty slow too.
Its hard to get motivated when things take a turn for the worse even though it was expected after the Christmas rush. I looked at my array of sites and can’t really pick a winner out of them to focus on. Some make a fair few sales but they are of low cost items whilst others make little sales but they are of higher priced items getting more of a good amount of commission. None of them really stand out and look like they could be scaled up to bring in more money. Most are ranked well but still don’t get much action.
I’ve just bought a new domain for a popular and competitive niche that I am temped to solely focus on for a month or so and try and get a good, big site up but what if it never outranks the big boys and I just waste my time?
Should I just focus on what I have already and try and get all my little sites up to date and firing on all cylinders?
How do you stay motivated when things slow down?
Buying a new domain used to always work wonders when I was bored… But these days the much more sensible approach would be to concentate on some valentines day stuff.
You could view everything as inspirational. Reading the paper should bring you ideas for products that sell now, TV ads are worth paying attention to as well.
Inspiration is all around you.
True, but depends where you live I guess!
Just keep plugging away and writing content. I’ve had a few different businesses over the years and January is always a tough month. I have had loads of traffic but sales are down by quite a bit. Most people are skint after xmas.
Here’s one of the disadvantages of building a large number of niche sites. All to quickly sales dry up and without scalability you’re left to start a new site that you need to get ranked all over again (unless using PPC of course)
If I was you I would start a bigger site for a month like you say and see how that goes, and who knows, you’re small sites might pick back up and you’ll have a big site, being supplemented by your smaller ones. Then if the small sites dry up again, you have you’re big site to keep you going. Sounds all too easy on paper though doesn’t it?
For motivation I often read peoples success stories on blogs etc, that often gets me going.
Oh and you said, “but what if it never outranks the big boys and I just waste my time?”. There’s only one answer to that…
…you’ll always miss 100% of the shots you don’t take!
Hi Joe,
I know exactly how you feel. I had a good December but since then I have hit a brick wall! It doesn’t help that I finished my full time job in December and am relying on AM for my income.
I might be moving to another country in May and I need to try and multiply my earnings before then! Going to be very hard I think!
Big sites do seem the way forward but it takes so long to get them ranking well and getting large amounts of traffic.
Good luck!
have you got msn? if so add me , max99( a.t)hotmail.co.uk
Got something may be interested in
Take a day off, take a walk, I bet a few ideas will pop into your head whilst you are walking.
Alternatively start planning for the seasonal niches that are comming ahead of you, valentines day, mothers day, easter etc.
You could also try something you havent tried before, use a new ppc network to try and build a list. Do something new that will get you excited, test some unknown waters. Expand one of your sites into a new product area, ie review a tv on a dvd player site.
Doing the same thing over and over is what is getting you down. Just try to mix it up a little.
Or I could be way off the mark.
January is always a come down for me after the last quarter of the year, but then I always think about trying to make those sites even better for next christmas time, for example in natural search position and this in turn has increased sales in the other months, so even working on your smaller sites would not be in vain
Cheers Max, I think I have you added already, my msn is j-ldn – .co.uk but I’m having trouble signing in ATM. I’ll keep trying.
I must admit 2010 started off a little slowly for me too. But I’m starting to get motivated again and have a few ideas for bigger sites. I’m looking at the long term view now – a site I created towards the end of 2009 should be in a fantastic position for Christmas 2010!
Thankfuly my smaller sites are bringing in enough per month for me to outsource all my content the only hurdle I have now (apart from coming up with original ideas) is building links – anyone know where I can outsource this to?
What are you outsourcing? Content writing? How much are you paying? I used one but it is now about £30 for 500 words. Seems quite expensive considering how many words you’d need for a site.
I’ve found a few good writers on http://www.freelancer.co.uk/ through a combination of posting projects and contacting some of the members via their profiles. Prices vary wildly but I’m paying around £4-5 for 250 words.
I had the same problem with motivation but decided to give my blog a make over and focus on bigger more generic sites, I just wrote a blog about how my latest “big” site is on page 1 for its key word.
Check it out here http://www.succeedandinspire.com/2010/01/first-generic-affiliate-site-launched-and-ranking-well/