Seeking Warriors' Help in Monetization Ideas...

You could expand physical product offerings (as an affiliate) outside of Amazon. You could try Commission Junction, Shopzilla, Ebay (although difficult to get into).

You could also poll your visitors, find out what type of photography problems they have,and create a special report for them with solutions that you sell or give away with affiliate links.

One of the main things I suggest to people that are already running popular sites, but monetizing with ads/affiliate links doesn't seem to be working is to turn it into a service. The people are going to the blog to find out about photography which means they are trying to learn (I'm guessing you have tutorials or examples there).

You could either offer photography services directly on the website or make it easier and just providing professional consulting / online training to people interested in photography. This is just an opinion based on other people I have worked with - I have never been big into photography so I'm not sure how hard either of those things would be especially when dealing with professional photography. But, if it isn't that hard to teach online, there are tons of people who would be interested in paying a bit monthly to learn, something like private access to special tutorials and one-on-one training from you.

David:

Why not ask your blog readers what they want? You have a good number of visitors to your site and they are the ones you're trying to "extract" money from. You could do this by placing a survey on your blog with multiple choices.

Incentivize your request with a freebie for everyone that responds. It doesn't have to be a physical product. It could be a list of tips or a short report that you put together. Or you could offer a drawing for a free consultation with you.

Another idea would be to check the stats of your blog and see which posts are most popular. Which have the greatest feedback? Which topics seem to generate the most buzz?

Another thought would be to check Amazon and Ebay in your niche and see what are the most sought after or popular products. You probably won't be selling them, but you could produce "how to" material around those products or short reports or tutorials on how to be use the products.

Steve

One thing I did just notice on your site, do you sell in stock photography? There are large marketplaces across the Internet where it can be sold or you can sell directly on your site - or put links on your site to your products listed at the other marketplaces.

Here's the photography marketplace I was referring to: High Quality Royalty-Free Stock Photography From $1 - Stock Photo | PhotoDune

Chase: Part of my 'thing' is I don't offer physical services, I'm out of that game already and no plans of going back... I make good money shooting but I'm not into the project-for-income thing, it's not worth my while. Stock photos are out because the income is 'adsense-like-small', been there 7 years ago...

I'm very interested with online courses or membership-type of classes, but there really are A LOT of good ones out there but they don't have affiliate programs to offer... Maybe I should do a market response test as well to see if it's worth my time to create my own program...

Tom: Yes, I'm quite interested with CPA and I really need to learn how that works (I have zero clue)... Thanks for the lead, I'll look for visual arts/photography related networks.

Steve: My most popular posts are my most popular Amazon earners (my reviews), I get over a hundred bucks in Amazon earnings from them monthly... But the problem is, they are quite fickle and hard to plan as a business. They're like 'nice bonuses that you don't expect' for my site and not something I can bank on pocketing month-in/month-out.

I will do what you suggested (starting a poll or at least as my mailing list) on what they're interested in... Thanks

I appreciate all the quick inputs guys.

Oh, the site is David Simple Photography - Simple Photography Tips for Parents & Hobbyists. Camera Reviews and Photographer Promotion if you guys are interested to check it out

Hey there
you are missing out on a great seasonal opportunity!
Amazon etc may be fickle, but people buy cameras at Christmas, so do a GIFT special, review a number of products, BIG push for this time of year and review several products and go see if any of the big suppliers in your field have affiliate programs, they will view you favourably as you have a lot of traffic.
The other thing to do, find a complimentary product and a blog selling it, see if they would pay you to advertise on your site.

However, long term your visitors will tell you what they want and the easiest way to do this is to do a survey in survey monkey(free) and see what they want.

My advice...stop putting yourself down! So what if there are other membership sites..your visitors come to YOU not them..so take the plunge..it does not have to be expensive membership fees..just commit to a newsletter, and hot off the press reviews..and yes, video instruction is very hot at the moment!

Another idea..if you have seen it, some IMers use a "Buy me A Beer" button, which is basically a way for your visitors to give you a thank you donation for some advice you have given.

Hope this helps!

sarah

Chase, that's a great idea about just pricing it 'right'...

Serendipity: Thanks for your response. I've the the donate button route for almost 8mos before, didn't really work that well (I guess the crowd that visits photog blogs are cheap hehe)...

I am expecting a spike during xmas, I have a couple of 'xmas special' promotional items ready in aweber to send around mid-november, just in time coz a lot of new cameras that were announced a month or so ago will only be available during that timeframe.

I've already started seeing some 'holiday shopping' trends this month. But none of them were digital camera/photography related sales (but are still sales through my site) such as pots and pans ($80up) and kids stuff (i got like 2-3 halloween full costumes commissions hehe).

Great advice... Honestly, I'm not 'down' or anything, I just want ideas so I can move to the next stage of monetizing the site. I think with my traffic and amount of original and useful content, I should be making more than what I'm making now (greed maybe, but it's hard work haha).

I'll run the survey and let you guys know what happens. THANKS!

Sounds great! I look forward to seeing the results of the survey and feel free to PM me directly if you have anymore questions.

I appreciate the offer Chase

No problem, we are all here for a reason - it would be nice to think that everyone was willing to give and get a bit.