Article Mix - Keywords for Money vs. Content

[OKFarmgirl]

Hey all - I've been writing 3-5 articles a week for my farm website, and I've had pretty good luck with traffic and SERPs for a number of them. I've gotten over 750 visits this month, which I don't think is terrible considering I only really started putting anything on there about a month ago.

Here's the thing: I want my site to be mostly informational, so people can learn about organic gardening and chickens. On the other hand, my goal is to make money on the site. I've taken to adding articles here and there about gardening gear, attire and garden decor, but I want to avoid articles that are clearly there ONLY to make money.

How do you finesse an article to not seem like a big ad? How do you convert visitors to clickers on articles that aren't particularly product-driven? I noticed that on my chicken and egg articles (they're getting the most traffic) that the links ARE appropriate to the genre (I've moved from text/image ads in the body of the article to link ads) but still, no clicks. I'm lucky to make a few bucks a month. Also, I'm not sure if the payout is the same for generic links and specific text/image ads.

So - just some advice on how to best monetize the site. Thanks!