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Thin Amazon Afiliate Site

by interwebbuzz
10 replies
If I have an amazon affiliate website revolving around say 2 keywords, it is a good idea to create 2 sales pages each of which may comprise of a 2000+ word article reviewing the products concerned. Or is it better to split the 2000 word into say 4 Ã-- 500 word articles? In addition to the 2 x 2000 word articles there will probably be some articles just to flesh the site into say a 10 page site.

Is this the way to go?
#afiliate #amazon #site #thin
  • Profile picture of the author danieldesai
    While I can't tell you what kind of results you will get specifically for whatever it is you're promoting, if you're looking at the statistical likelihood of how well your content will perform, I'd recommend you do one 2000 word article as opposed to 4 x 500 word articles.

    Reason being is that Google tends to rank in-depth content higher, usually because it finds more "long tail" search terms on your page (in addition to other important factors), typically giving you more traffic.

    More on that here (not my site):

    How Content Length Affects Rankings and Conversions

    Regards,
    Daniel
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    • Profile picture of the author Wile E Coyote
      Originally Posted by danieldesai View Post

      While I can't tell you what kind of results you will get specifically for whatever it is you're promoting, if you're looking at the statistical likelihood of how well your content will perform, I'd recommend you do one 2000 word article as opposed to 4 x 500 word articles.

      Reason being is that Google tends to rank in-depth content higher, usually because it finds more "long tail" search terms on your page (in addition to other important factors), typically giving you more traffic.

      More on that here (not my site):

      How Content Length Affects Rankings and Conversions

      Regards,
      Daniel
      Keep in mind, his reasoning and source is 3+ years old.

      This suggestion also fails on the 'statistical likelihood' because statistically speaking, you'd have a better chance of being picked up at all with 4 articles. Not sure how you'd quantify the chance of Google liking or not liking your content though.

      If you actually look at Google as more of a process than some superhuman being, it's checking things like bounce rate, time on site, CTR %s and engagement in general. If a 500 word article is getting their users to interact, that means, to Google at least, the content was relavent to the user, and thusly will be ranked higher.

      Just because you have more words does not mean that you get more long tail keywords in it.

      To the OP: There is no reason it should be an either/or scenario for you. Why don't you get a longer article written, and then post the long article and then get that same article shortened and slightly editted and test the shorter articles as well?

      Test, test, test.
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  • Profile picture of the author kilgore
    The way to go is to write for human beings, not for Google. Humans are the ones who are going to going to do the buying after all -- not search engines.

    So if you need just 100 words to get your point across do that. If you need 1000 do that. If two articles are what your customers need, write two. If they need 2000, write 2000.

    If the content is outstanding, humans will link to it on their own blogs and on social media -- which will have a bigger impact on search engine rankings than trying to get the optimal amount of articles of the optimal length for Google. In other words, it's a win-win as you get happier humans (meaning better conversions) and better search engine rankings (meaning more traffic) just by having great, human-readable content.
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    • Profile picture of the author xnice
      I prefer to 2000 words article. And I will also add more articles, it will make your site legit and more authority.
      In the 2000 words articles, you can divide it to 4 or 5 parts ( each parts use a long tail keyword). You may get traffic and earn money from these long tail keywords before rank in main keywords.
      Good luck.
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    • Profile picture of the author Sojourn
      Originally Posted by kilgore View Post

      The way to go is to write for human beings, not for Google. Humans are the ones who are going to going to do the buying after all -- not search engines.
      A million times what kilgore said.

      To me, one of the biggest mistakes affiliate marketers make is forgetting the customer.

      Keywords can be important but once you know you want to write about one, the questions after that should be about how to create valuable content that will really help the person who enters that phrase into a search engine.

      If you were that person, what is it you'd expect to find? What questions are implied by the keyword that should be addressed in the content? How can you assemble the content that will address those questions? Would you want to find that content all on one page or would it be easier to digest on multiple pages?

      Suppose your keyword is "best RC cars for kids".

      We can assume from the keyword that the searcher is a parent/grandparent/adult that wants to buy the best RC car for a kid.

      What we don't know is if the consumer wants one for indoor and/or outdoor use, the age of the child, the gender of the child, or the budget they have in mind (if they have one).

      But that gives us some categories to write about in the post:
      • Toddler (you could do some research to find the average age ranges mentioned on products on Amazon and use those cutoffs for the breakout by age - if it looks like there's lots of toddler options and then there's a bunch that are for 5-8 ages then you could use 5-8 as a category instead of 5-11, for example) - I've left off indoor/outdoor subcategories because most toddlers are probably going to use one indoors and not a rugged, complicated outdoor RC car)
      • 5 -11
        • Indoor
        • Outdoor
      • 12 and up
        • Indoor
        • Outdoor
      • Under $100 (go to Google and type in "best rc car under..." and see what Google Suggest says is the most searched ending to that phrase)
      • Over $100
      • Most Rugged (touching on what boys might want most)
      • Best Pink RC Car (touching on what some girls might prefer)
      You could change the order of the categories so maybe the dollar breakout categories are first and/or put a table of contents in the post so the reader can jump to what section they want to read first.

      Then, do some homework. Don't just pick the top seller from Amazon. What ones REALLY are best in each category and WHY? Explain exactly why each one was chosen as the best.

      If you've used an RC car or given one to a child you know what a parent wants to understand about the toy before they buy - will is it sturdy, is it easy to control, does it really drive over mounds of dirt, will it get hung up on furniture and frustrate the child, is it affordable, how much value do you get for your money, will it break easily, do the parts come off, what's the recommended age range, does it do anything cool like make sounds or have flashing lights?

      If you don't know what the consumer might want to know about the product, find out. Read posts on a parenting forum where people have discussed what they like or don't like about certain RC cars or toys. Ask your friends. Read reviews on Amazon. Find YouTube videos of children using RC cars.

      Now, you have an outline of what you want to cover, an idea of what product is going to be in each section of the content, what you want to mention in each section, and how your content will address the needs of the consumer behind that search phrase.

      Send the outline and your notes for each section to your outsourcer along with some range of words that you think is going to be necessary to cover all of that or ask the outsourcer for an estimate. The word count defines itself based on what you want to cover in the post to help the consumer.

      To your question, though, that same topic could be covered in multiple articles. You could expand it over several posts like this:
      • Best RC Car for Toddlers
      • Best RC Car for 5-11
      • Best RC Car for 12 and Up
      • Best RC Car Under $100
      • Best RC Car Over $100
      • Best RC Car for Indoor Use
      • Best RC Car for Outdoor Use
      • How to Choose the Best RC Car for Kids (more of a buying guide with links out to the above posts)
      However, unless you have a lot of other content to balance out a string of "best" post titles, I wouldn't use that approach. By touching on all of those topics in one post you'll have a single resource that helps no matter the age range or type of use the buyer has in mind and the single post *can* rank for all of those phrases if it's done well and includes acceptable on-page SEO.


      [edited to add!] I just reread the question. Are you saying you're going to do a site with just a page or two of content and no more? It can be done but it might not have the shelf-life you could get if you built up one site with a lot more content vs building a batch of thin sites.
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      • Profile picture of the author interwebbuzz
        Originally Posted by Sojourn View Post

        [edited to add!] I just reread the question. Are you saying you're going to do a site with just a page or two of content and no more? It can be done but it might not have the shelf-life you could get if you built up one site with a lot more content vs building a batch of thin sites.
        I am doing both thin and "thick" websites. It seem most people are effectively "content aggregators" who just scrape content from amazon and other places and put it into their own words. I suppose if someone is able to put together content that is "easier" for the consumer to find, it serves a purpose.
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        • Profile picture of the author Sojourn
          Originally Posted by interwebbuzz View Post

          I am doing both thin and "thick" websites.
          That will give you a great opportunity to compare results over time and analyze data that can help you with either model.

          Originally Posted by interwebbuzz View Post

          It seem most people are effectively "content aggregators" who just scrape content from amazon and other places and put it into their own words. I suppose if someone is able to put together content that is "easier" for the consumer to find, it serves a purpose.
          Sometimes, what looks like someone getting results ranking scraped or rewritten content is really a site that's buying backlinks. A little digging will usually uncover if that's the case. (I'm sure you've run into some of those already. We all do, I imagine.)

          I've had questions from others where they show me a site that's ranking well and explain they're trying to build something similar in a different niche using that site's approach and can't figure out why they're not ranking well at all. I find lots of affiliate sites still, very obviously, buying high PR links to boost their rankings. In those cases, one can't assume the approach to content has any role to play in the rankings.

          Certainly that's not all that might be going on - a strong social presence, quality links, some other unique value added into the site could be driving success - but it's a trap beginners can fall into easily when they see a thin quality site ranking well and think they can do the same by just mirroring the content style.

          Reverse engineering a site that's ranking can uncover some interesting things - both good and bad but an interesting exercise all the same.
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  • Profile picture of the author Lucian Lada
    What you should also asking yourself is if "thin" websites will get you conversions. If people google a term and land on your website, but only see promotional stuff and a few other articles clearly written to conceive its true nature, would they stick around? In other words, does the site scream, "I'm a marketer and I'm after your money?"

    Also, do you have a way of getting people to return to your website, i.e. are you building a list? You can use that list to not only sell the same product to more people, but also sell additional products.
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  • Profile picture of the author danieldesai
    I'd like to add something again here.

    While it's true that content length should be as long as it takes to bring the point across, for the most part, 500 word articles don't often achieve that.

    Can you get loads of traffic with short content?

    You bet.

    But it's not the same as suggesting that shorter content more often meets the needs of someone searching for information (nor is that necessarily true for long content).

    From my experience of looking at the top ranked Google listings in competitive niches, most of the search results feature in-depth content which is much longer than 500 words.

    This does NOT mean that Google prefers content because it is longer.

    However, Google ranks sites based on their usefulness to searchers, and that's determined by a number of factors, including time spent on-site.

    Longer content (when done right) typically helps users more as it is more likely to contain the information that the user is searching for and as a result they spend more time on that site.

    With that being said, 500 word articles are fine so long as they provide what the searcher is looking for; it's just that in most cases, more information is required than that which can be covered by such a short article.

    Great responses by everyone above, it really got me thinking.

    Regards,
    Daniel
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    • Profile picture of the author discrat
      kilgore is explaining a Concept that few want to take the time to learn and be effective at.

      It's sad more people do not heed it because it really does work over time


      - Robert Andrew
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