A beginners journey to earning $2000 per month

LouisJoliet1 said:

Would the fact that there are no other affiliate sites in first 2 pages and only big box stores and authority sites (Amazon, HGTV, etc) mean that there is no competition or that it's simply too hard to rank well for the niche?

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It's a pretty bad sign unless whatever keyword/products you're targeting are also poor ones. Not that one couldn't rank but it would require some real SEO skills that you don't have at this point which is why I recommend targeting lots of long tails.

OldFatGuy said:

It's a pretty bad sign unless whatever keyword/products you're targeting are also poor ones. Not that one couldn't rank but it would require some real SEO skills that you don't have at this point which is why I recommend targeting lots of long tails.

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Thanks again. So, for example, if you were trying to rank for "feather mattresses" and experienced the big box and authority sites, you would be interested in long tails like "feather mattress covers" or "best feather mattress pad", right? This isn't my niche just an example I'm using.

LouisJoliet1 said:

Thanks again. So, for example, if you were trying to rank for "feather mattresses" and experienced the big box and authority sites, you would be interested in long tails like "feather mattress covers" or "best feather mattress pad", right? This isn't my niche just an example I'm using.

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Yes, more along those lines and even more so.. like "king size feather bed mattress toppers".. But good lord. That entire niche would be impossible to break into. Watch the ads as well. If you're seeing a ton of ads, yeah it means it's probably profitable, but it also often means it's hard to rank for. For that particular niche, if I was dead set at doing it, I'd probably think about alternate ways to get traffic to the site.. like a boat load of things like "how to clean a feather mattress topper" and hopefully have cleaning products that could be promoted. But even those ones didn't look all that easy.

So yeah.. If you're seeing results like that, it's probably a really good idea to stay away from that niche for now.

Keep in mind though that you're going to be doing product "reviews" as well. So you need to look for various products and check out the results for them to also get an idea of how you'll rank for them. I checked a couple out and I did see some affiliate sites on like page 3 etc. It's not important that the site ranks, it's important that you can get enough pages to rank.

Depending on your niche, look for other places to find potential search terms. For example, I was reading someones seo blog and he was doing headphones I think. He joined some applicable redits and came up with products that people were discussing and that were wide open in the rankings.

OldFatGuy said:

Yes, more along those lines and even more so.. like "king size feather bed mattress toppers".. But good lord. That entire niche would be impossible to break into. Watch the ads as well. If you're seeing a ton of ads, yeah it means it's probably profitable, but it also often means it's hard to rank for. For that particular niche, if I was dead set at doing it, I'd probably think about alternate ways to get traffic to the site.. like a boat load of things like "how to clean a feather mattress topper" and hopefully have cleaning products that could be promoted. But even those ones didn't look all that easy.

So yeah.. If you're seeing results like that, it's probably a really good idea to stay away from that niche for now.

Keep in mind though that you're going to be doing product "reviews" as well. So you need to look for various products and check out the results for them to also get an idea of how you'll rank for them. I checked a couple out and I did see some affiliate sites on like page 3 etc. It's not important that the site ranks, it's important that you can get enough pages to rank.

Depending on your niche, look for other places to find potential search terms. For example, I was reading someones seo blog and he was doing headphones I think. He joined some applicable redits and came up with products that people were discussing and that were wide open in the rankings.

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Thank you yet again. That's the ticket, finding the perfect keyword. I keep finding a great product on Amazon, it checks out on Google Keywords, then I google the niche/product and bam - Wal Mart, Home Depot, and Lowes are taking up the front page. I need to keep digging deeper. While that's actually the problem with the niche I chose it's looking good for "how to" articles and "reviews". The numbers are there on Google Keywords for the terms I'm searching and there's not much competition on the first page of Google itself.

Another question for you - How long would it take a brand new site to start seeing traffic? 3-4 weeks? Overnight? I plan on posting an article every day for a few weeks and if nothing happens I will move on. I've ready varying accounts but I'm interested in what you have to say about it.

Quick Update

I got another order on Fiverr for content and I already finished that and delivered it. $8 earned on Fiverr so far which is sweet.

I wrote the 2nd article for my affiliate site, checked the keywords, and posted it. I'm going to look into how to improve my articles for SEO.

I've done 6 or so hours of keyword and niche research and have 50 or so article ideas for my affiliate site and probably over 300 unrelated niche ideas.

I've submitted the proposals for 3 jobs on both Elance and Odesk and I'm hoping one of those will be accepted so I can build some more capital. I have about $2000 to spend on my IM venture but I don't want to start throwing money away just yet.

Right now I'm going to write an article to submit to Constant Content. I've found the topic I'm going to write about and I'm going to set the price at $25. CC takes 30% so if my article gets purchased that will leave me with $17 or so.

I haven't done the ebook niche research yet but will be completing that shortly after I submit the CC article.

LouisJoliet1 said:

Thank you yet again. That's the ticket, finding the perfect keyword. I keep finding a great product on Amazon, it checks out on Google Keywords, then I google the niche/product and bam - Wal Mart, Home Depot, and Lowes are taking up the front page. I need to keep digging deeper. While that's actually the problem with the niche I chose it's looking good for "how to" articles and "reviews". The numbers are there on Google Keywords for the terms I'm searching and there's not much competition on the first page of Google itself.

Another question for you - How long would it take a brand new site to start seeing traffic? 3-4 weeks? Overnight? I plan on posting an article every day for a few weeks and if nothing happens I will move on. I've ready varying accounts but I'm interested in what you have to say about it.

Click to expand...

Doing thorough keyword research, spending a boatload of time doing that upfront, is where everyone typically fails. So yeah, spend days doing that if you have to.. You might need to narrow your niche if you're still having problems. But there ARE niches out there with little competition.

Google is a bitch. Sometimes you'll put up a new site and it, or some of the pages, will rank right up top. Then they might drop down. As time progresses, they climbs back up to it's "real" spot. Traffic can be overnight pretty much depending on whether or not some of your pages rank and stick. There's so many factors that there's no way to predict what will happen. "Typically" by the time 3-4 months rolls around, the site/pages will be ranking where they should be. Of course things can be forced by some aggressive link building but then you also take a risk.

If you notice in that other post of mine, I said basically to focus fully on the site for a month adding lots of pages (do a bit of basic link building as well) and then schedule your time to keep dripping a new page daily while starting to work on more link building and getting another site going for a different niche. That way you're not waiting around because you won't truly know whether it's going to be successful or not for several months. Of course that all depends on how much time you actually have to dedicate to this.

OldFatGuy said:

Doing thorough keyword research, spending a boatload of time doing that upfront, is where everyone typically fails. So yeah, spend days doing that if you have to.. You might need to narrow your niche if you're still having problems. But there ARE niches out there with little competition.

Google is a. Sometimes you'll put up a new site and it, or some of the pages, will rank right up top. Then they might drop down. As time progresses, they climbs back up to it's "real" spot. Traffic can be overnight pretty much depending on whether or not some of your pages rank and stick. There's so many factors that there's no way to predict what will happen. "Typically" by the time 3-4 months rolls around, the site/pages will be ranking where they should be. Of course things can be forced by some aggressive link building but then you also take a risk.

If you notice in that other post of mine, I said basically to focus fully on the site for a month adding lots of pages (do a bit of basic link building as well) and then schedule your time to keep dripping a new page daily while starting to work on more link building and getting another site going for a different niche. That way you're not waiting around because you won't truly know whether it's going to be successful or not for several months. Of course that all depends on how much time you actually have to dedicate to this.

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I think choosing the keyword/niche is the hardest part. I don't feel like I rushed my first site but I wanted to get something up so I could learn the process of creating a site, how Wordpress works, picking a theme, etc. I'm looking for a good static homepage theme right now since those seem to be the way to go for affiliate sites vs blog style themes. I actually enjoy the keyword research and like I said earlier I've already found a bunch more that I could pursue. I realize getting hung up on the "perfect" keyword is a waste of time since it doesn't exist.

My goal is to make my first affiliate sale around the beginning of September. If I'm unable to make a sale by then, on any site, then something is obviously not working out for me. I checked out the other threads you linked about link-building and that's something I will have to put a lot more effort researching. I have all the time in the world to dedicate to this project. Nothing on my plate (job, school, relationships, family) until December so I plan on being profitable well before then.

You've been a great help already and I'm just getting started.

Great work. 2 orders on fiverr in such a short time Things snowball once you get some thumbs up and maybe a positive comment or two so you are already well on the way there. Well done and reading makes a pleasant change from a lot of the stuff on here....following this.....

I have a question. What are some typical themes for an affiliate website? I've found a few online for around $50. Is it worth it to pay for a premium theme or are there decent free ones available?

Day 3

Off to a late start today since I had to take care of some things. Beside grilling burgers for dinner I plan to be working for the next 12 hours or so.

I've received 2 more gigs on Fiverr and will be completing those today. That will bring the total amount I've earned on the site so far to $16. It's easy for me to write and both the articles I've completed have received perfect reviews.

The article I submitted to Constant Content hasn't gone through the review process yet but I will be submitting another one today.

I will be writing a review article for the Amazon product I chose for my affiliate site. I'm aiming for 2500 words. I haven't placed any affiliate links on my site and looking at Google Analytics it hasn't received any traffic. I checked a site that says if your website has been indexed yet and it's telling me it hasn't. I'm not worried since it only has 2 posts. I'm still in the process of looking for a good theme. Magazine themes seem the way to go and I've been browsing through them looking for an appropriate one.

I've found another niche I plan on making an affiliate site for so I will be purchasing the domain and getting that online as well. That could be too much on my plate at once but I have literally nothing else to do and I'm looking forward to the learning process.

I'm going to be submitting the site to some free directories and attempting some of the other beginner link building methods. There's a lot of information here on BHW regarding link building so I will be re-reading those threads and seeing what happens.

I wrote around 1100 words last night for the first few pages of my eBook. The eBook is in the economics niche and I will be releasing it on Amazon Kindle once it's 30,000 words or so. I'm in no rush to finish that but I plan on writing another 1,000 words today.

I haven't heard back from any of the proposals I made on eLance and oDesk. I'll submit more proposals today and hope for the best. I think for those sites once I get the first job and a positive review things will start to change.

Time to get to work. Here's another quote to motivate me for the day.

"Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time". - Thomas Edison

gluck man, more doing, less listening to podcasts and reading

Quick Update

I've got some good news. I was accepted for 1 of the jobs I applied for on oDesk yesterday. The work involves writing articles for $15 each. Considering Fiverr only pays $4 this is a big step in the right direction. I'm hoping everything works out and I can get a positive review for my oDesk account. This will help immensely in the long term if oDesk becomes more lucrative for me.

Looking forward to this journey. Wish you best of luck.

Its going very well, best of luck...

Good luck with your journey man. I wish you luck.

Thank you everyone for the support.

Here's what I accomplished today.

I wrote a review for my affiliate site. It's around 3k words. I've gotten some traffic to the site but I'm not sure if that's just me checking it out. I'm still not sure if it's even on Google yet.

I completed all my Fiverr gigs but haven't gotten any new orders all day.

I wrote and submitted a new article to Constant Content and charged $25. They still haven't accepted the one I submitted yesterday but the website says it takes a few days for them to review submissions.

I wrote another 1k words for my ebook and hope to have it released on Amazon by the end of next week.

I didn't get around to creating a new affiliate site because of the good news I got from Odesk.

Someone on oDesk accepted one of my proposals and I wrote 3 articles for them and will be earning $45 for the content. To me that's pretty incredible. The guy I'm speaking with has said he has 100s of articles he needs written about a topic I'm personally interested in so I'm looking forward to that. I'm not worried about burning out with writing since before this I wrote Copy for a company in my city and would write 20k words per day on average on the most boring topics imaginable.

I'm still going hard with the affiliate site and my goal is still to make my first sale by September 1st. If my current site isn't receiving traffic or clicks by the end of next week I will simply cut my losses and pursue another one. I worked maybe 10 hours today and feel I accomplished quite a bit. I'm still doing a lot of research and taking notes because once you stop learning you fall behind.

I'm pretty tired so I'll keep this short but I'd like to end the day with another motivational quote. I love checking them every so often because they keep me motivated and encourage me to work harder.

"Be so good they can't ignore you" - Steve Martin

Wish you the best. and keep us posted. it is inspiring when reading someone start from nothing and finally achieve something in future, and we can learn a lot from the do's and don't (if OP share them). Keep it up pal.

Day 4

Good morning everyone. I just woke up and now it's time to get to work. Here's what I have planned for the day.

I'm going to write an article for my affiliate site and finally sign up for the Amazon Affiliate website. I have enough content now so I'm going to start adding the relevant links from Amazon.

I'm going to keep practicing methods of driving traffic to my affiliate site. I created a Facebook page and I've submitted it to a few free directories online. I'm going to make a Twitter account and possibly a Pinterest account for it as well. I'm also going to comment on relevant blogs and websites for more direct and targeted traffic. More research in regards to improving traffic and SEO will be done as well.

I'm still in the market for a good affiliate theme for my website. I'm going to look at more Magazine themes and hopefully decide on one today.

I might or might not create another Amazon Affiliate site today in a more targeted niche.

I woke up to another order on Fiverr so I will be completing that shortly after this post. The Fiverr gigs are easy to complete and are helping me build some start-up capital. I will have earned $20 on Fiverr after I complete the gig.

My client on oDesk is going to need 3 articles today, which I will deliver before dinner. I haven't gotten paid for the articles I've completed yesterday. I'm going to email him after this and bring up the payment. I won't be delivering the next 3 articles until I actually do get paid, and if he doesn't pay me I will simply submit the articles to Constant Content. I'm not at a loss yet for anything I've produced.

I'm going to write another article for Constant Content and submit it. My first still hasn't gone through the editing process but I'm not counting on anything bad to happen there. The editors must be swamped.

I will be submitting 3 more proposals to both Elance and oDesk.

That's everything I have planned for the day. It might be an early night since I am going out with friends in 12 hours or so but I will try to get out of that to keep working.

Here's a motivational quote to keep me going through the day.

"Chase the vision, not the money; the money will end up following you." - Tony Hsieh

Good luck, you seem dedicated

My eyes are bleeding. I've been sitting at the computer for 14 hours. I ditched my friends to keep working and I'm finally going to get out of this office chair and relax.

Here's what I accomplished today.

I spent the majority of the day doing keyword research and I've found a much more targeted niche for an Amazon Affiliate site. It's truly a goldmine and I feel I'm pretty close to developing a good keyword research technique. Everything checks out of this newest niche. The prices on Amazon are great. There are thousands of reviews for the best selling products and no authority/big box sites in the top 2 pages of Google. The first hit is an affiliate page with the most recent post from 2013. I'm hoping to hit it big with this one. I'll be adding content first thing tomorrow.

I wrote another article for my original affiliate site and after checking analytics I seem to have gotten a tiny bit of traffic. Wordpress Dashboard also showed the traffic and it was from a Bing search. On Bing my website is actually on the 2nd page of search for my main keyword but I have no idea how that happened. I must be doing something right. It's still nowhere to be found on Google but I'm sure that's going to change.

The sites need to be optimized properly and I'm still not sure what to do about the theme. I chose and configured a free magazine theme off of Wordpress but I'm in the market for something premium.

The guy I was in contact with on Odesk emailed me once today but that was it. He has yet to pay me for the 3 articles I've written for him but it hasn't been that long so I'm not worried yet. Even if he doesn't pay me I won't be worried. Every failure means I'm one step closer to success. As for Odesk and Elance I spent 45 minutes or so browsing the job but there weren't any I was interested in. No proposals on my end today. I was contacted by someone on Fiverr as well but they failed to place an order so I didn't have anything coming in there.

I wrote an article for Constant Content and submitted it. The others I've submitted are still under review by the editors. A quick search of the content available on the site revealed quite a few niches to me that are in desperate need of content. Even the saturated ones have the potential for profit, I just need to get the articles live. Again, that's out of my hands now and in the hands of the editors.

I didn't work on my eBook today. It's only midnight here and after I relax for an hour or so I might write 1k words. I don't "feel like it" right now but I know if I don't do it I'll feel like a loser tomorrow.

I'm quite proud of what I accomplished today and I happy I found another niche. I was approved by Amazon Affiliates and I hope to start putting links on my first site tomorrow.

As always, here's a motivational quote to remind myself to keep moving forward.

"If you hit an Oak tree 1000 times, in 1000 different places, what's going to happen? Absolutely nothing. But if you hit an Oak tree 1000 times in the exact same spot what's going to happen is you're going to knock it down" - Eric Thomas