1st page on Google, ranked #5, NO SALES.

14 years ago

Originally Posted by YaniB

Hi all,

I have this wordpress site that I've been putting some work in for a few months now, and I managed to get it on the first page of Google to #5 (actually two spots, 5 & 6; the sixth spot is indented).

It's a bit of a hodge podge site; I have alot of stuff on it to get my content (Caffeinated Content, Deep Link Engine plugin, and SEO Linkvine). I wrote some of the content myself as well; which I have as sticky posts on top. It doesn't look messy though; I think it looks pretty good.

The weird thing is, the keyword I'm targeting (which is also the domain) gets 40,500 Global searches monthly (according to Google's Keyword Tool) and I can't seem to make a sale. I have affiliate products on the site; and I get hops every day when I check my CB account, but nothing to show for it.

The only problem I have is I haven't figured out how to get my analytics to track this site properly, so I have no idea how much traffic it gets. The code for the theme is kinda weird; I tried putting in the analytics code but it isn't working properly. But even so, with the amount of people supposedly searching for this term, I should be getting sales because of my high rank.

I've gotten to the point that I just want to sell it out of frustration, but I just know that it's a potential goldmine, and I don't want to just hand it over because I can't figure out what to do.

Ideas, anyone?

YaniB

Join the club of failures.

I too am ranked high, great traffic and yet no clicks = no sales

What I have learned as the grasshopper, think targeted marketing:p
at least for me.

The next set of campaigns for me is all about ultra, ultra, niche, targeted campaigns with great content. The stuff I learned with my failed campaigns, I hope will translate into sales. I have nothing but up to go, literally.

So don't get discourgaged. Learn from your mistakes and move to another campaign if your current campaign isn't working. :p

Thanks

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JayPeete

14 years ago

The keywords that it ranks for needs to be buying keywords vs. browsing keywords.

You might try Adsense to bring in some revenue since no one is purchasing through your affiliate links.

If you are getting sizable traffic and begin to get Adsense revenue you can sell the site for quite a bit in 2 or 3 months.

Just a thought...

Thanks
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YaniB

14 years ago

The keywords that it ranks for needs to be buying keywords vs. browsing keywords.

What I have learned as the grasshopper, think targeted marketing

Well that's just it. It's a niche site; and it's one of those 'desperate for a solution' keywords. I would have thought that it would get a better response because I'm targeting people who need their problem solved as soon as yesterday.

The Adsense idea sounds great; should have thought of that before

Did you do your keyword research using broad match? Often times broad match and exact match are drastically different. I have found with many of my niche websites that exact matches are much more accurate for predicting the amount of traffic that you will get per month.

I actually DID use exact match as well...the search amount is 12,100; which still isn't bad.

Thanks for the encouragement though; I will keep working on the site.

YaniB

Thanks

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mlord10

14 years ago

Did you do your keyword research using broad match? Often times broad match and exact match are drastically different. I have found with many of my niche websites that exact matches are much more accurate for predicting the amount of traffic that you will get per month.

For instance, the word keyword elite (Just an example) gets 60,500 global searches according to the Google Adwords Keyword Tool using a broad match. However, when you enter the same term using the exact match feature, you only get 9,900 searches.

Now, if you are ranking 5th for that keyword, you would probably only get 8-10% of the search traffic (Don't have my stats in front of me, just an educated guess).

Keyword research is vital, but you must also make sure that you do it properly in order to keep realistic expectations. With that said, I would not give up on the website, because you have worked hard on it and chances are it is also ranking for some other long-tail keywords.

Do thorough analysis, update your blog weekly, get high PR (dofollow) backlinks, and you will start seeing more traffic.

Thanks

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Aj Wilson

14 years ago

Can you check cPanels AWStats? See how many clicks you're getting...

If you're not getting clicks from the search engines to your site,
then it might be the quality of traffic.

Check your Description in the search results.

Does it make you want to click on it?
If no, you might wana think about changing it and give your prospects incentive to visit your website.

Then once you know you have traffic to your site.
Focus on converting them.

just a few thoughts,
all the best

- aj

Thanks

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reynoldscorb

14 years ago

Can't tell you how many times this has happened to me. I've got one website in the #1 search of google with 20,000 monthly searches and I can't remember the last time I made a sale. Problem is my keyword isn't a "buying keyword." Before you build your next site be sure to do some good research. If you have a website in the 5th slot for a buying keyword with 40,000 monthly visits, you will be making sales no problem.

Thanks

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Mike Antoni

14 years ago

For tracking you probably know you can use clickbank tracking ID's. There's also a whole area in there for seeing your hops. You just add ?tid=CODE to the end of the link.

But one thing I do now for tracking affiliate banners and all that is to use OpenX software. I learned about it from Jeff Johnson. Pretty cool. It tracks impressions and clicks and you can then sync that data with sales or leads.

I think the site is OpenX.org

It's free if you install it on your own server.

Other cool thing with it is that you can run multiple ads across multiple sites and easily change them in openx.

You can even track your adsense ads though google does this for you. You can test what earns more the affiliate banner or adsense over time by having them show evenly.

Just some ideas to get you thinking.

Thanks
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YaniB 14 years ago

For tracking you probably know you can use clickbank tracking ID's. There's also a whole area in there for seeing your hops. You just add ?tid=CODE to the end of the link.

Actually I was talking about tracking the actual amount of visitors the site gets; not so much how many affiliate link clicks. But thanks for the idea about OpenX.org. Will check it out.

Can you check cPanels AWStats? See how many clicks you're getting...

I wasn't aware of AWStats before now...I just checked it; thanks for telling me about this. For June, I got 477 unique visitors. Pity none of them were buyers

YaniB
- Thanks
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cswjohnni

14 years ago

We all know that sales = traffic x conversion. It looks like you got the first part, but the 2nd part is not working. I'd suggest you to re-think yourself as a buying customer of your niche and do what a targeted customer would do. You could also go to Quantcast and input your affiliate site to check the demographics of your targeted customers, and maybe re-write some articles with call in action in the end. Well...just my suggestion....

Thanks

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Rich Struck

14 years ago

One thing you need to know is that the #5 spot on Google is going to get very little traffic compared to the #1 spot. Very little. Google traffic is awesome but it should only be part of your mix.

Thanks

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Rob Howard

14 years ago

And to add what Rich said...

and let me bold this...

It's not all about the traffic!

There are SOOOOO many factors that goes into a solid converting campaign. Targeted traffic is just one factor.

You need to have a good landing page that pique's the interest of the user.

You need to have a well laid out site that draw's people to either opting in to your list or clicking on your affiliate link.

Your product you are promoting needs to line up with what the customer wants AND is well written (meaning good copy).

See, here is what I think your problem is, based on your post:

It's a bit of a hodge podge site; I have alot of stuff on it to get my content (Caffeinated Content, Deep Link Engine plugin, and SEO Linkvine). I wrote some of the content myself as well; which I have as sticky posts on top. It doesn't look messy though; I think it looks pretty good.

I think that it's probably unfocused. You are getting visits (which you aren't tracking, so you really don't know) and they are getting lost.

You need to have a PRECISE plan on how to get them from point "A" (SE's) to point "B" (your vendor's sales page) and then you need to implement it AND track the results so you know how to improve it.

Rob

Thanks
1 reply

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YaniB

14 years ago

I think that it's probably unfocused. You are getting visits (which you aren't tracking, so you really don't know) and they are getting lost.

You need to have a PRECISE plan on how to get them from point "A" (SE's) to point "B" (your vendor's sales page) and then you need to implement it AND track the results so you know how to improve it.

Rob, I think you definitely have given me something to think about. I'm going to start tracking the visits now (using AWStats) and I will remove some of the stuff that could be distracting to my visitors. Hopefully taking out some links wont make me drop my rank. I need to make the site cleaner, and more straightforward. Thanks for the advice!

YaniB

Thanks

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alniches

14 years ago

I have used 'Mint' in the past and it has helped in showing google/search engine searches' most common/most recent/found that brought a visitor to the site.

Hope that helps.

Thanks
1 reply

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Martin Avis 14 years ago

Turning visitors into buyers involves several processes.

1. The keyword that you are ranking for must be one that a buyer will type in, and not a mere browser. This has already been said in this thread, but can't be overstated. I get a lot of my mentoring clients asking me why their page #1 on Google keywords aren't turning into sales and this is usually the reason - not all keywords are created equal!

2. How focused is your landing page? Way back in 2001 Ken Evoy wrote in 'Site Sell' that every selling website must focus on its 'most wanted response'. Nothing has changed. If at any time on your page the visitor starts to think 'I wonder what I'm supposed to do now?' they won't do anything.

A lot of landing pages have all kinds of affiliate offers for all kind of related (and sometimes unrelated) products. Those pages rarely sell as well as a clear landing page that effectively pre-sells a single product.

3. Which leads me on to the next factor that stops pages from selling: they try too hard to sell. Unless your landing page is a dedicated sales page, don't sell on it. Warm up your audience and make them keen to learn more - but remember that the sales job is not yours - it is the product's owners' job.

If you do do too good of a sales job, you will get your visitor to click a link to another page where they will be sold to all over again - and that's often why so many people end up walking away.

4. The sales page you send them to is no good. If you don't own the sales page, there isn't much you can do about this one except monitor the situation, and if you find you are getting very poor conversions from the traffic you send on to the sales page, find something else to promote.

Martin
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Bish

14 years ago

Perhaps your trying to sell too many different things in the same area?. You could try focusing all your attention on one product, maybe split test different products to see which converts best

I always find focusing on selling 1 product to be more successful otherwise people get confused (unless your offering reviews etc).

Thanks

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chandan_dutta

14 years ago

It happens to me many time as well and believe me there are a lot of difference between ranking in #5 and #1. More over many product conversion is very low. Install Google Analytic and you will come to know all traffic details. Installing Google Analytic is easy. Go to Google Analytic and add your site details. It will ask for verification. You need to copy few tracking code in your Blog. Make sure to add before </head> tag. Once you done that you will be able to track your traffic. More over you can try changing the product.

Thanks

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crystalq

14 years ago

Its sound like the product you're promoting is a flop or their stealing all your visitors via their opt in form and are not crediting you. Like others have said replace it with adsense or even better Amazon.

this plugin for google analytics is easy to use and install on wordpress
WordPress › Ultimate Google Analytics WordPress Plugins

Thanks

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JoshBrown

14 years ago

What's your site URL, bro?

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JackPowers

14 years ago

Clickbank products do not sell themselves. You have to do A LOT of preselling.

Put some CPA or Adsense on instead.

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bioss

14 years ago

Traffic is only one thing in ecommerce on site.
you need to do A/B test to the page.. mybe you dont have good UI
Good Luck...

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YaniB

14 years ago

Thanks for all the input....I'm making some adjustments to the site to make the buying process smoother and not so distracting. I definitely will be putting some Adsense on it as well.

I really didnt want to display the URL on this thread; if you want to take a look at it and give me some more tips, PM me.

YaniB

Thanks
1 reply

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StacyHolmes

14 years ago

Clickbank products do not sell themselves. You have to do A LOT of preselling.

This is exactly right. And congrats! You're headed in the right direction.

First of all, I would figure out what is up with your Analytics. Without it, you're blind.

After that, you need to start testing. You need to see how your visitors are reacting to the page and any changes you make. There is a lot more to getting people to click and buy from your site than just presenting a product. But getting traffic to convert is a science in and of itself.

But I wouldn't do anything until I got my Analytics straightened out so you can watch the results of your efforts.

My two cents. :p

Oh! One other thing. How stable is your position? Sometimes you'll shoot up there temporarily and then bounce back down. So if that happens, don't be discouraged. You just need to continue with your content and link building activities.

Thanks
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YaniB

14 years ago

Originally Posted by StacyHolmes

First of all, I would figure out what is up with your Analytics. Without it, you're blind.

After that, you need to start testing. You need to see how your visitors are reacting to the page and any changes you make. There is a lot more to getting people to click and buy from your site than just presenting a product. But getting traffic to convert is a science in and of itself.

But I wouldn't do anything until I got my Analytics straightened out so you can watch the results of your efforts.

My two cents. :p

Oh! One other thing. How stable is your position? Sometimes you'll shoot up there temporarily and then bounce back down. So if that happens, don't be discouraged. You just need to continue with your content and link building activities.

Thanks for the feedback, Stacy!

I'm monitoring my AWStats, and I installed an Analytics plugin. So I'm in a better position now about knowing what my traffic is doing.
I've been on first page for almost a month now, though. And yeah, I'm still getting content and backlinks for the site, too.

YaniB

Thanks

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24kWing

14 years ago

Congrat on reaching first page of "G". Search Engine Rank=traffic & traffic=sales. Be patient, the money should come if you maintain you high ranking.

Nice Job!

Thanks

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rahulr

14 years ago

Do people buy in your niche.
Do you have a squeese page,most people would not purchase the first time.

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1st page on Google, ranked #5, NO SALES.

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