Just built my first affiliate mini-site.

Your graphics are all of terrible quality. And your theme is horrendous. Try a new theme and get your graphics remade. Brutal, but honest.

It's clean, but on my IPhone its distorted.

Not much content, or really anywhere to navigate to.

Why would you want to make a mini site? They get slammed by google every update.

I would get rid of the site because: iHeater is copywrited, and you probably don't have the copywrite.

If the owners find you, you may be sued.

They're gonna banhammer you if that's a trademarked name. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

Before proceeding with anything, ask yourself this:

'Is this the kind of site where I could kill a couple of hours figuring something out or be entertained.'

Producing anything less than that isn't going to bring you results you desire.

Hey Will,

First off, well done for taking action.

I think there have been some valid suggestions above. Whether you keep the site or not because of copyright issues or move to another domain, one positive is that your content layout is pretty good.

In terms of constructive criticism, if you are going to put in the effort of seo and presumably try and rank the site, here are a couple of suggestions:

1. Add contact us, sitemap, disclaimer, and privacy policy page. An absolute minimum even for mini-sites.

2. Add navigation so all parts of your site are able to be reached.

3. Content...you need more of it. The SEO guru's seem to be advocating sites with multiple pages/posts of 1000+ words. Even with reviews or mini-sites, by looking at the product pages from manufacturers, review sites etc, it's not hard to top out a thousand words for a post.

4. Get someone to make you a logo and header, you can get it done on fiverr for next to nothing. Twentyeleven is not a horrible theme in terms of freebies, it can be glammed up to look pretty neat and functional, but at the moment it's quite bare and screams promotional rather than helpful.

5. Social signals, look for some plugins which enable people to like or +1 your site.

Not sure how much of this is covered in your course but that's just scratching the surface. Best of luck.

I gave them the url when I applied as an affiliate and there didn't seem to be a problem with any copyright issues, but I'll call them tomorrow and look into it further.

The other critiques are appreciated as well.

The design needs a lot of sprucing up. When you get a new domain, id recommend either using another theme or modifying the Twentytwelve theme so the header is smaller and remove the padding so it looks tighter and neater so the header and banner aren't taking up nearly the whole screen above the fold.

Have you recently checked your affiliate link at your end? When I click on one it says in the browser window HTTP 403 Forbidden and this in IE;

The website declined to show this webpage

They normally don't look at the URL given, it's normally a fast process just to stop spammers. You are forgetting one thing though, minisites generally don't work anymore. The technique has been outdated for almost a year now, so look into new type of sites.

Hi.

Honestly you need to improve the website.
All of the stuffs there. from header to footer, graphics to theme, everything.
This will not make any sense in the future, even today.
I am not planning to make you angry or making you hate me, but the work seems no effort at all. Even the comments above said that this site is terrible and needs more time and effort to make it beautiful. Hope that you will work on this seriously and professionally. Hope my HONEST comment will wake you up and make some urgent move.

Don't worry I'm not gonna cry. I just started the site and knew it was just bare bones right now. THAT WHY'S I ASKED FOR SOME CRITIQUE ON IT.

As for the url issue, I will look into it further tomorrow.

If mini-sites don't work anymore as a couple of people said, then I should get my money back from Unstoppable Affiliate. I'll look into that further as well.

Thanks.

Just wanted to say that based on suggestions I received in here I've already improved my site considerably as you can see here: iHeater Infrared Heaters.

I appreciate all the suggestions.

As for the copyright question, I spoke to the affiliate provider on the phone today and they insist that my url is not a problem, so I'll take their word on that.

the link "CLICK HERE If You’ve Decided To Buy The Official iHeater" does not work in my country. It says 403 - Error Invalid Country

Sorry to reiterate what others have suggested but having dealt with using a trademark domain when I first started, I was asked to turn it over to the original product owner. Although im sure you have great intentions on promoting a product and making the original seller some money, you still might be presented with a damages fine... Learn from my mistakes to save yourself the headache.

Mini sites dont stick around for long in the serps, should you find yourself searching for a new domain, make your brand and become an authority in googles eyes.

first off, this type of site used to work back in the olden days. it won't work now as far as getting traffic and seo.

This type of page might only work by doing pay per click. I'm just pointing that out, i know you said you have more work to do on it.

I would suggest you dump wordpress and use something that you can make a mini-site with.
It would be better for a mini-site to use various brands and models of infrared heaters. you could then look for videos / articles for each model and embed it on your site with the affiliate link beside the video / article.
Amazon has an affiliate program and they have lots of models / brands for infrared heaters.
You could also sum up multiple reviews on each product and create your "own review" highlighting the pros and cons.

I checked the keywords and there aren't any longtail keywords for iheater that gets a substantial amount of traffic.

hope the above has helped you in some way.

This is a good site actually when you need to overview a product make sure write in detail to let more customers to buy Keep your navigation down and try to change to a small font, maybe try to check my affiliate link and make it like your own if you like Linkedin Training With LinkedInfluence

Most affiliate programs offered by companies like this usually must approve the site before you are allowed to go ahead with it. Did you get approval from the company and affiliate network you maybe using?

If you are physically selling the product yourself I can see having a contact and support page but if you are not and you are just using an affiliate link where the actual purchase is made out of your control, you may want to rethink having support and contact options.

I am not exactly sure the purpose for this site coming to it as a visitor. I understand it is an affiliate site but to me it looks like it's designed more for adsense than actually selling that particular product.

You give the impression with that site that it is somehow associated with the product in more than an affiliate relationship. I didn't see anything that tells me you are an affiliate so from a visitor stand point they may assume this is the authority on that product. The manufacturer may have something to say about that if they ever come across this site. Something to be aware of anyway.

SEO is another issue I see alot where companies don't want your site to out do their corporate site. Yeah it's stupid but manufacturers want their site in the SE's and not your little mini affiliate site posing as them. Comes back to whatever approval process you had to go through to be able to be an affiliate for this product. Many people don't know that even Amazon wants approval on your site before you market products through them, not sure how well that is known around here on WF though.

I am not so much hung up on the look of the site as the actual impression a visitor gets. If I were in the market for such a heater I would read through the site and try to get as much information as possible about the product. I want to buy it but the feel of your site seems rushed to me and it does not give me a feeling of assurance with the positioning of the product. I want to know I am safe ordering from your site and it just doesn't give me that safe feeling.

When it comes to affiliate sites I disagree with the suggested advice above about adding contact and support pages. I am not sure what is being taught now a days about how to build affiliate sites but a lot of advice I read here is plain wrong and if this is an example of the kind of sites this program you are going through is teaching you I hope you have other options you are also pursuing to make money.

Per the advice about redoing images, sometimes you are only able to use the images and graphics the affiliate program provides you. So the advice about having better graphics made may not be an option in this case.

I would go to the manufacturers site and look at how they built their site and what they are doing. A lot of manufacturer sites are designed from a television stand point where traffic is being directed from offline direct from tv ads, maybe online commercials from sites like hulu.com etc... I find building sites that leverage what is currently being done by the manufacturer helps a lot more with getting sales and converting more than building sites like you did there.


With that said a simple one page affiliate site if done right can bring in quite a lot of cash. If you spend more than 5 minutes on it. Make it look like professional marketing piece. Go look at print ads and other sources for this product and get some ideas there.

Though if you don't want to spend more than 5 minutes on it then I don't know, just keep doing what you are doing I guess.

I hate it and manufacturers and affiliate networks can get in the way with marketing but if you haven't gone through any approval process I would stop what you are doing and go get the go ahead before doing anything more. Also if you are using an affiliate network contact your rep and ask them what is currently working out there because they have all the stats of what is going on through their network and can give you tips and pointers that can help greatly.


- T

Will inbox me and I will help you out with a new design free.

Great to see you taking action that many others wouldn't, hope they get back to you and say the domain is OK, I cant understand why a company made a product without claiming that.

Try to use Amazon Gold Rush Theme. I think is this best theme you can use for your current niche site.

Your site looks good,looks like you already have taken action from other warriors advice on the thread.

clicked on the link, it said

403 error - invalid country