Confused: What Should I do? Please Help

22 replies
Hi,

Here is my long story short. My sister is a doctor of naturopathy and is running a diet and yoga center. I want to help her make some money online with her skills. I know that the health industry is where the money lies and also has a lot of competition. But, with the credibility that my sister is a doctor, I think she can break into the competition with an edge over others. Here is my idea

1. Create a blog. Let teh traffic grow naturally. Money will slowly come in. She has agreed to write around 3-5 articles/day in her spare time. I will also have a optin page where we will give out a free ebook by collecting emails.

2. Create a squeeze page alone. Drive traffic to the page through guest blogging. Build a huge list and promote affiliate products to the list.

3. Create a static 25-50 page diet website and use optin+guest blogging to drive traffic.

Which is the most effective when you are looking to make money? Shes not interested in making money at the cost of other peoples health. So we will promote products that we will buy and she will read it to ensure its of quality.

Any thoughts on this? We have around 500$ to spend at the start and around 100$ to spare each month.
#confused
  • Profile picture of the author affilorama-portal
    Hi remsleep,

    Of the three strategies that you mentioned, I believe that the first would be the most effective. Search engines like blogs a lot, most likely because of the steady flow of fresh content as you add posts to it.

    Your sister does not have to write and post 3-5 articles a day. 1 article posted each day would be good to start with and when you already have lots of posts there, you could actually space it out to 1 article posted every 2-3 days.

    While you would like to have lots of content in there, you would also like them to be of very high quality so that people will come to trust your site. When they trust your site, they are more likely to sign up for your newsletter and act on your recommendations.
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    • Profile picture of the author remsleep
      Originally Posted by affilorama-portal View Post

      Hi remsleep,

      Of the three strategies that you mentioned, I believe that the first would be the most effective. Search engines like blogs a lot, most likely because of the steady flow of fresh content as you add posts to it.

      Your sister does not have to write and post 3-5 articles a day. 1 article posted each day would be good to start with and when you already have lots of posts there, you could actually space it out to 1 article posted every 2-3 days.

      While you would like to have lots of content in there, you would also like them to be of very high quality so that people will come to trust your site. When they trust your site, they are more likely to sign up for your newsletter and act on your recommendations.
      Thank you for your quick reply. The reason I am a bit worried about starting a new blog is because the diet industry is highly competitive (as everyone knows). So writing for such a market to generate a profity will be diffiicult as I see it.

      I know many bloggers tell to write top notch contents, dont blog for money etc etc.... I have been a blogger for the past 3 years and I have blogged in both competitive and non competitive niches. So I know the ins and outs.

      Now why I am planning on this is because my sister does have a lot of spare time which she wishes to utililize in a productive manner. So in the long run, even if it does not generate any money, it shouldnt be a big problem for my sister. However, being a business minded person myself, I do not like to waste my time and not see any profits coming along.
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  • Profile picture of the author webapex
    I think the main product that should be ultimately marketed, is an original title or service created by your sister. Building on her name may be more valuable in th long run than the typical opt-in article site that uses cheap content primarily as search engine bait. If the video production process goes well, you would be in a good position to create a video baed product.

    The best selling clickbank titles are first test marketed by the author, so work ad copy and conversion statistics can be provide to affilites.


    If she's videogenic, a weekly podcast would be more powerful than text, though articles too are important for search engine ranking.

    Again, it doesn't make sense to me to write an article series demonstrating one's authority, then steering your followers to some questionable diet product written by some questionable character.
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  • Profile picture of the author FirstStopIM
    Banned
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    • Profile picture of the author Marian
      She's a pro... she can answer some questions in Yahoo Answers with a link back to her site/blog in the source space. The result is that she would help them and also attract the people to her blog where they find related articles and recommendations.

      Marian
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      • Profile picture of the author copylicious
        Originally Posted by Marian View Post

        She's a pro... she can answer some questions in Yahoo Answers with a link back to her site/blog in the source space. The result is that she would help them and also attract the people to her blog where they find related articles and recommendations.

        Marian
        that sounds realistic!
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  • Profile picture of the author AbleSmith
    All these strategies are terrific. you have one more option of doing social bookmarking if she is well in doing
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  • Profile picture of the author remsleep
    I was planning on releasing a product. Then thought not to as she has not established herself online. My plan was this

    1. Write several guest posts and point people to a free ebook (optin of course)
    2. Once we build a huge list, then package all the articles she has written till now into an ebook and sell it for a very low rate opf 9$ or something along those lines

    So do you suggest building a product and selling them straight without havign to establish credibility first?

    What is your take on a forum where you can ask her questions directly (charged per question)?
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    • Profile picture of the author remsleep
      Which do you think is a better strategy?

      Blogging+lead capture+affiliate marketing
      Blogging+adsense
      Squeeze page+lead capture+affiliate marketing
      Squeeze page+lead capture+selling own product
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  • Profile picture of the author tamalanwar
    Hi remsleep

    Video marketing is great; what you do is create a blog that highlights your sister as an expert in her field. Blog and use video to fill up with content, side by side you put opt in form there to collect emails.

    For the revenue, offer consultations services & affiliate products. As you grow your blog, search engines will send you traffic over time.

    Since you have a real expert (your sister) put the content in her name in one blog, rather than couple of affiliate sales pages.

    If you need help in design/ squeeze page/ aweber form design, you can take my help.
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  • Profile picture of the author remsleep
    The problem with consultation services is that medical advice shouldn't be given on guesses. She needs to physically see and examine them to make a decision. So consulting is very difficult online. But I think she can prepare custom diet charts on line
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  • Profile picture of the author remsleep
    Right now I am planning to go the blog route... Any advice or suggestions would be great
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    • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
      Originally Posted by remsleep View Post

      Right now I am planning to go the blog route... Any advice or suggestions would be great
      Slow down. Trading on your sister's name and reputation to flog affiliate products, even ones she's vetted in advance, could harm her name and reputation.

      What happens when a respected doctor starts looking like a shill by promoting a bunch of affiliate products on yet another diet blog?

      Another red flag is saying you want to target the "diet industry"...

      What part? Gaining weight? Losing weight? Kids, young adults, seniors? Men or women?

      Better to have a grasp on this before charging off to start another generic blog in a crowded space.
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  • Profile picture of the author iceman365
    Out of all three I believe all three would be a good option because it is always good to have as many exposure as possible and it gives you the ability to test these option, however if I had to chose an option I would chose number 1. Because a blog helps me build a relationship with my list it gives me the ability to establish trust which help me sale products..
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  • Profile picture of the author rickfrazier1
    You might want to consider a fourth approach:

    Go ahead and create a blog, but provide fewer, shorter articles on the blog. Monetize it by selling memberships to a more detailed series of articles.

    Yep, a membership site. Membership sites can generate a lot of ongoing income. If your sister is willing to generate 3 articles a day, that's a LOT for most topics. Perhaps a single article a day would work well. If she really has the time to do three a day, then she could do two membership blogs, and a free one.

    The membership sites could be either in blog format (the member goes to the site each day to read the posts and signs in each time) or in newsletter, email format (this one sounds best to me so far).

    --Just my 2 cents...
    My wife and I are planning to set one up for her once she finishes her PHD.
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    • Profile picture of the author remsleep
      I registered a domain. Have the thesis theme. Going to get a coder to make the necessary changes.

      Planning to sell her own ebook in a year or two. We will be targeting diet for women.

      I am planning to consider membership. But I will have to see how this goes
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  • Profile picture of the author remsleep
    Now... I am planning on either a diet blog for women or a free ebook alone. The free ebook will serve as a list builder while she works on her own diet ebook which I will launch later. I will do guest posts with the articles my sister writes to drive traffic to the squeeze page.

    But my question is, do squeeze page alone work or do I need a blog???
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  • Profile picture of the author remsleep
    Finally decided guys.. Decided to launch a product in a months time.
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    • Profile picture of the author ambercoco
      I didn't see any mention of Facebook. Build a nice Welcome page on Facebook and encourage visitors to "like" her page. Advertise intro yoga, weight loss, good eating habits classes/seminars etc. on her Facebook page. Build your list and keep everyone posted about special events, promotions, etc.

      Make sure to set up to have her blog to post to her Facebook wall and twitter account automatically.

      I'd also check local print or electronic publications - perhaps they are looking for an occasional guest author for health and fitness issues?
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  • Profile picture of the author remsleep
    The problem is- promoting without credibility established first. Will a video sales page breathe more credibility?

    Also does guest posting on other health and fitness blogs help make sales?
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    • Profile picture of the author Kaete
      Thesis theme is a great beginning! Learn about all the helpful plugins, including pingomatic, google analytics, etc.

      Bogging is a great way to get noticed and, yes, drive organic traffic to the site by posting articles. Post to Ezine Articles and Go Articles to create quality backlinks to your site. Set up a Lens at Squidoo to create more quality backlinks.

      Find quality blogs to comment on for even more quality backlinks. To find quality blogs, type the following into your search engine (one at a time - there are four, each looking for different endings dot-com, dot-net, dot-edu, dot-gov):

      site:.com inurl :blog "post a comment: -"comments closed" -"you must be logged in" "ADD YOUR KEYWORDS HERE"

      site:.org inurl :blog "post a comment: -"comments closed" -"you must be logged in" "ADD YOUR KEYWORDS HERE"

      site:.edu inurl :blog "post a comment: -"comments closed" -"you must be logged in" "ADD YOUR KEYWORDS HERE"

      site:.gov inurl :blog "post a comment: -"comments closed" -"you must be logged in" "ADD YOUR KEYWORDS HERE"



      Since this is a medical niche, you can probably find quality government and educational blogs to get backlinks from, which will greatly help your seo.

      After commenting on each blog, make sure you copy the URL (with your comment already posted, along with a backlink to your own site) and ping it. That will send the search engines to the page, where they will find your backlink and will send them looking at your site.

      Tell your sister to write that eBook. Visit my site TheEssentialeBooker (link below) where you/she will find tons of information about writing, publishing, marketing and selling eBooks (sorry if this sounds like self-promotion, but the entire site is about eBooks so you will find helpful information there).

      Good luck!
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  • Profile picture of the author rashlan1982
    I think you need an experienced person to help you gain more traffics to your sites.

    I personally recommend Dan Brock. His tutorial can help you a lot converting traffics into buyers.

    He going to teach and show you how and where to find your potential traffics and start earning on the spot...
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    • Profile picture of the author remsleep
      Hi all,

      I am planning to get profit launch formula to help me out with the sales process
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