Small Affiliate Site: Ranking for Best "Insert Product Here".

So you're saying that review sites are a bad idea because there are too many of them? Or because they don''t convert? They never rank well?

My niche involves consumer products that sell for $150-400ish and are usually replaced every few years. Would products like these be good candidates for review blogs? They are expensive enough that consumers generally want to read an in-depth review before purchasing. A lot of the individual product search queries ("Brooks Speedia Trail") have a few hundred queries/month with very little content dedicated to them other than ecommerce sites trying to sell them directly.


Also, nobody searches for "Best running shoes"? Huh? Am I missing something here? Ubersuggest tells me that that query alone gets 60k/month. Now obviously, I wouldn't try to rank for something as broad as "Best running shoes".

With respect to getting a job: I already have one... I don't know why you assumed that I didn't? I am really just looking to blog about a topic that I know a lot about, while learning a new skill (internet marketing, and marketing in general). I'm not looking to set the world on fire.

So lets add onto this... If we are to step back a moment and look at the buying cycle, in regards to search on the internet it looks like this:

Investigating - they have an interest in "running shoes"

Defining the purchase - this is where they see there are a ton of different running shoes and they refine what it is they are looking for "for flat feet" "for marathons" "for track" "for cross country" "for cross training"

Comparison - they have done research, they have defined the show they want.. now they are looking at different Nike models or Nike Vs Adidas etc

Buying phase - this gets very specific... "red and blue size 12 mens Nike <insert model>"

Lastly there is after purchase support.. how to care for.. how to lace... how to do this and that.

So now you want to sit down and create content based on INTENT. and this is very important for those that create content. INTENT is what Googles AI ( Rank Brain ) attempts to deliver. Based on a users search.. what results best fulfill the users intent. A good example to use is the search "Wedding Dress" the top so many listings are basically pages with links to obviously related terms that refine the intent. "Cheap wedding dresses" or "what color wedding dress?"

With this in mind.. I would pick 3 to 5 running shoes that are in the same category - say "cross training". I would then create 10 to 20 pieces of content in total. 1 for each shoe in regards to detailed information.. a comparison page placing all the selected head to head. Content related to "Cross training" etc.

Big picture... I would look at the investigation stage and develop across say 5 different categories of 3 to 5 shoes. "Cross Training" "track" "Walking" whatever... and create a page that defines "Intent". From there you then have the 5 pieces of Category content.. you have the 3 to 5 individual shoe detail content.. the 5 pieces of comparison content.. pages built to list each size or color of shoe to refine that search even more.. and then a care page for each

5 categories and probably a build out of over 50 pages in total.. all interlinked accordingly, using navigation to create depth of site, and if you were really ambitious you would have some amount of silo structure built into this.

A PAGE on a site trying to get the SEO effect you are wanting, is simply not going to happen... its the collection of pages that internally build link strength and create CONTEXT of a topic based on the 5 phases of INTENT that does the trick.

Hope that Helps!