Module V: Monetizing Your Site

1. Finding and Applying for an Affiliate Network

You’ve built your site and the traffic is starting to flow in. How do you make money off your website? Easy – you apply for an affiliate network and place affiliate links within your content.

VOCAB WORD – Affiliate Network
An affiliate network acts as an intermediary between publishers (affiliates) and merchant affiliate programs. It allows website publishers to more easily find and participate in affiliate programs which are suitable for their website (and thus generate income from those programs), and allows websites offering affiliate programs (typically online merchants) to reach a larger audience by promoting their affiliate programs to all of the publishers participating in the affiliate network.

Traditional affiliate networks enable merchants to offer publishers a share of any revenue that is generated by the merchant from visitors to the publisher’s site, or a fee for each visitor on the publisher’s site that completes a specific action (making a purchase, registering for a newsletter, etc.).

VOCAB WORD – Affiliate Links
In affiliate programs, it’s a special URL that contains the ID or username of the affiliate. This URL is used by the advertiser to track all traffic the affiliate (you) sends to the advertiser’s site as a part of the affiliate program.
Source: Webopedia

The affiliate is ultimately paid for the traffic sent to the advertiser, given that certain actions are taken – i.e. a product is purchased, or a inquiry for the advertiser’s services are made.

There are many affiliate networks out there, and even more individual affiliate programs. A quick Google search for “affiliate network” will bring up hundreds.  Affiliate networks are categorized directories of individual programs.

Some popular affiliate networks are:
Commission Junction – www.cj.com
Share A Sale – www.shareasale.com
Google Affiliate Network – http://www.google.com/ads/affiliatenetwork/

Affiliate networks are useful because you are given centralized access to many different affiliate programs. Also, networks often give you access to centralized performance reporting tools for the programs you belong to.

You can also skip the network route and go straight for an individual program. For example, if your niche website specializes in car insurance, Insurance.Com has an affiliate program that pays you for every visitor you send to their site that requests an auto quote.

If your website niche is extremely specialized, you may need to go this route. However, the major con to this method is that you’ll have to manage multiple accounts at the different affiliate websites, and you’ll won’t have access to a centralized peformance reporting tool.

Once you apply for an affiliate program or network, they will evaluate your website and accept or deny you. If your site looks clean (which it does, if you’ve followed my directions) with good content (which it should), you’ll be accepted. Once you are, login to your affiliate program’s administration panel and locate the links section.

2. Adding Affiliate Links to Your Website
An affiliate link usually contains your affiliate ID in the link. This is how the traffic you send to the merchant is tracked. Usually, you get your affiliate links from the affiliate program’s administration panel. If you can’t find the links, contact the affiliate program’s support.

Most affiliate programs give you a choice of text links, banner links, and even video links. You’ll have to embed the link by copying the code the merchant gives you, and pasting it into a blog post.

The type of link you’ll choose depends on the situation.

For example, if your blog post is on the rising costs of insurance in the United States, you could choose a banner ad to embed at the end of the blog post, and include a caption that reads something along the lines of: Click the banner below to visit Insurance.Com and compare hundreds of auto insurance prices.

The video below will show you how to embed the links into your blog posts or pages.

[Video on embedding links]

3. Google Adsense
Google Adsense is another popular way of monetizing your website. Basically, Adsense allows you to sell webspace on your niche website by simply inserting a piece of html code supplied by Google. The Adsense code will scan your website and display only ads that are relevant to your content. If your website’s niche is video games, the Adsense code will show ads for video game merchants and companies. You are paid for each ad click.

You apply for Adsense at Google’s website. The Adsense team will review your website. Once you’re approved, you can login to your administration panel and choose how much space you’d like to devote to adsense.  You’ll then embed the code by copying it from Google and pasting it into your own website – the same method as embedding an affiliate link.

[Video on embedding links]

4. Selling Ad Space
Another way to monetize your site is by manually selling ad space. This method is very versatile because you get to set all of the terms. It’s also somewhat restricting, because tracking, support, etc. for your clients usually falls on your shoulders. An example basic package I regularly offer ad space for a banner ad at the end of each blog post. Set the price for the adspace at 10% to 15% of your monthly traffic. If your website is only receiving 1000 or so visitors a month, charge around $100/month for the banner ad.

This space may seem steep, but remember, if your client is selling a product, only a few people have to go to their website and purchase it to make up the cost of advertising.

5. Blogging for Profit
Once your site becomes popular, you may be asked to blog about a product or service by the company that creates/offers it. The company will often pay you for your time, either with cash, or a free product. I’ve heard of major tech companies receiving upwards of $10,000 to give a positive review of a product, and they were able to keep the product for free, which they sold immediately afterwards.

Contact the manufacturer’s media or public relations specialist and offer to review their product for free. They may give you a review version of the product, and ask for it back after you’re done. The next time around, tell them you’d like compensation for your time and be ready to prove visitor traffic to your website.

6. Putting it all together – the Plan pt. 2
So, now your website is ranking fairly high on the search engines.  Your website is receiving a decent amount of traffic, and you’re monetizing your content by placing affiliate links and selling ad space to advertisers, and enlisting in Google Adsense.

Now you need to take your website to the next level by pulling in as much traffic as possible.

Remember, TRAFFIC = INCOME. The more traffic you bring in, the more money you’ll make.