Yesterday’s link post was about Pulling Back the Curtain on Internet Marketing. In case anybody missed the subtext on the sites I linked to, I wanted to share the main lesson I’ve taken away from reading these sites …
If you’re blogging about Blogging, Making Money Online, Internet Marketing, SEO, etc.. (unless you have some sort of unique expertise) …
You’re Probably NOT Going to have an Easy Time Making Money
Don’t get me wrong, just like many people, when I started blogging the first thing I did was slap up a few ads, and start anxiously watching my bank account, waiting for the inevitable money to come rolling in.
Fortunately, by the time I switched over to wordpress earlier this summer, I’d figured out that this blog was never destined to be a big money maker. I’m treating it more as a “better” version of what I used to use my facebook and/or myspace profiles for …
As a good way to Network, and Connect with Interesting People.
I do have (and intend to keep) a few ads on here. But realistically, any money I make from this blog is going to go right back into offline advertising for my candle business. (where I really do earn enough extra income to make the effort worthwhile)
All that being said, after reading Court, Vic, Grizzly and Josh‘s blogs, I’m definitely setting up a few niche sites for the New Year. I’ll keep blogging here … because it’s FuN. But when it comes to Making Money, it just makes more sense to …
Work Smarter rather than Harder.
Keep havin FuN!
Todd
p.s. Merry Christmas … it’s almost present opening time!
Hi Todd, wishing you a wonderful holiday season and a safe and happy New Year!
Shine on,
Aaron
Aaron Cook Dot Com™
Aaron Cook’s last blog post..Happy Holidays from Aaron!
Hey Aaron,
Right back at ya buddy!
Todd I did a quick look up at the searches on your candle site and it is a really great traffic heavy niche.
Last Month Searches:
candles: 146998
scented candle: 26958
These are just 2 keywords and you already are at 150k searches now this goes for US Google only so if you add the rest of the organic traffic and all the keyword combination you are easily looking at 2.5 million searches. Now many of the same things I teach for niche blogs apply to your commerce site. Try to go for 2 specific keywords now the most searched is candles and in first place in Google is Yankee Candle it is a PR6 but a way week PR6 so you can actually go for position one. Now I would use a combination of the tools I mention at BU to try to get as many links as possible with anchored text then go on a link run on the d-list try to find craft blogs and go deep in the archives and find solid post that actually have a PR the higher the better.
Now that is one way, second way go and buy a pre-owned domain with solid pr like I talk about and work it backwards. The important thing is that the basics apply not only to blogs but also to any site you just have to make some modifications.
To your success buddy.
Vic
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Hi Vic,
Thank you very much for the advice. I already own several candle domain names that are a couple of years old … which unfortunately, I have not used very wisely at all.
I set them up like a normal “dumb” network marketer, and focused primarily on telling people about the business opportunity. “Candle Business” only has about 50 searches … and I’d be willing to bet that a fair percentage of those are people who are already doing what I do; searching to see what other people’s websites look like.
For 2008, my candle sites are going to get a whole lot more generic, and a whole lot more focused on targeting specific key words.
I am planning to try the AutoSocialPoster plugin. But, BookMarkingDemon and BloggerGenerator look a little too “sneaky” for my tastes.
Looking forward to learning more from you in the New Year.
Catch up with you again soon.