4000 Posts and a Gameplan for Making Money Online

Warrior friends, it seems like yesterday I was debating how to dip my digital fingers into the forum and make my first post. Back then, almost a decade ago, I had just bought a product so I could enter the secret world of the Warrior Forum and read juicy posts by Allen Says. For newcomers - in 2004 the home page here was just a picture. No public forum. No registration option.

Just a mocking graphic that money was to be made inside and you had to figure out a way to get in.



Much has changed!

Today, and a few million in profits later, if you'll indulge me with this long post I will cover 12 tips you can use to make money promoting products. Instead of theory let me walk you through a detailed gameplan of what to do.

This is just one way to make money. It is easy, does not require a lot of skill, and not much investment to get started.

I'll use an Amazon product as an example since almost everyone is an Amazon affiliate: the Hamilton Beach mess free Belgian waffle maker:

Amazon.com: Hamilton Beach 26040 Mess Free...
Hamilton Beach: Mess Free Belgian Style Waffle Maker (26040)

Why this product? It's in my kitchen and I use it to make waffles for the family every other Sunday morning. (The other Sundays I make pancakes)



Domain Name:

You need your own domain. I suggest branding the domain. Very few affiliates try to create their own brand. Instead, they are hung-up on SEO and EMD (exact match domains) or how to be an almost exact match domain without getting nuked by Google.

Instead of hamilton-beach-mess-free-belgian-waffle.com, or messfreebelgianwaffle.com, go for a name that is brandable, short, and catchy.

I might use Waffle Geek. As I post this wafflegeek.com is available to register. I use Namedroppers.com to find available domain names.

Then I would create a logo and sometimes try to create my own slogan. A logo like a waffle, with googley-eyes, and The Ultimate Waffle Site For Those Geeked About Making Their Family Tasty Waffles. Wiki Commons is a nice place to find free pictures. I will use PhotoShop to manipulate and crop pictures, and then Incansoft's GFX Writer to finalize a logo.

For domain names what I do is have a list of prefixes and suffixes I like to use with domains. For instance, geek would be a suffix. When I am looking for a domain I will apply my word list to the niche topic and I can almost always come away with a great domain.

The key point is branding. As you drive around your town are most businesses you see brand names or keyword names? Brand names rule.



General Page Structure:


Word Court

Search engines, especially Google, love longer articles and pages with more text. It is not sufficient to promote a product with the manufacturer's 100 word product description. 400 word articles are a thing of the past thanks to marketers pumping out millions of articles exactly 400 words long. Today, my goal is 750 words. For some of my high ranking legal pages the word court is a couple thousand.

For some product pages 750 is too many. (You may need to combine multiple products on one page.) For others not enough. Don't be anal in assuming every web page must have a set number of words. But my target is 750.

An average sentence has 15 words in it. That means we need 50 sentences. (50 times 15 is 750.)

Here is a possible topic outline:

3-5 sentences: Intro to web page and why it exists, about myself and making waffles for family, why waffles are yummy, some interesting fact about waffles, etc:

3-5 sentences: Overview of making perfect waffles every time, people hate undercooked waffles, people hate burned waffles, etc.

3-5 sentences: Measuring the perfect amount of batter to not make a mess and measuring cup provided with waffler.

3-5 sentences: How and why cleaning up messes decreases the life of non-stick surfaces and wafflers.

3-5 sentences: What is needed to avoid getting burned when opening waffle makers, describe the locking handle and the 2 inch distance from waffler that avoids burns.

5-10 sentences: Detailed description of the waffler, including easy to use and see dials and buttons, colors, material, what it looks like (describe what is seen in the pictures), size, etc. I spell out sizes to add words. Instead of 12" I may use twelve inches.

3-5 sentences: Paraphrasing reviews found online.

5-10 sentences: Feature and price comparisons to other waffle makers.

3-5 sentences: Brand importance, history of Hamilton Beach, something interesting about the company.

5-10 sentences: Miscellanous ideas, such as the funky and fun waffle strips this product creates, how much my dogs love them, favorite recipes, favorite fruit to also serve with waffles, cleaning tips, etc.

2-5 sentences: Where to buy and why to use the merchant I recommend.

Note: Use active (not passive) writing and adjectives to add words and to give your writing imagery and impact.

This is a rough estimate of sentences. As I start writing, or outsource this to someone to write, it may turn out some sections are shorter and others are longer. I have found providing a "brainstorming outline" significantly helps writers create better content when outsourcing. Better than just saying give me a 750 word article about this product.

In my experience this type of detail and word volume is sufficient to get a high ranking for most products without needing to consider backlinks. The long-tail keywords this type of outline creates can generate a surprising amount of traffic.


Pictures and Graphics

Use graphics and pictures to sell the product, discuss features, increase the word count, and to break up the text.

The forum limits how many pictures I can post, but here are three I took of the waffle maker:



This is a close up showing the top with the large dial and easy to read buttons. There is a green and red button which tell you when the power is on and when the waffle is done cooking.

This makes it almost impossible to mess up the waffle.

(Do you see how easy it is to describe what is in a picture and write a few sentences about the product!)



Here you see the recessed inside of the product and a measuring cup that comes with it. The recessed inside helps prevent messes where batter slops over the side if you add too much. The measuring cup makes sure you do not add too much - just the perfect amount each time.



This picture with the measuring tape shows the locking button on the handle and the distance between where you lift the handle to open the waffler maker and the hot main part. This is a good distance and helps you from accidentally burning yourself when opening the waffle iron.

(Again, easy smeasy to add content that describes the pictures, sells the product, and breaks up the web page. I could keep adding more and I haven't even got to the pictures available to use from Amazon or from the manufacturer to illustrate additional selling points.)

Often I will brand my pictures with the website url. The free product I use to do this is the Fast Stone photo resizer (FastStone Photo Resizer - Powerful Image Converter/Resizer).



Affiliate Links

One at the top of the page and one at the bottom of the page. Maybe a third in the middle of the page, as a graphic, to help break up the text.

I have been moving away from text links and instead using big graphic links - even if the graphic is just a box with text in it.

Why? Because it is easier to see and click on when using mobile devices. It is also easier to see and click for those over 40. Ahem, trust me on this one.

Bannerfans.com is a site I use to easily make quick graphics like this:



I "hide" every affiliate link from Google to protect my search rankings. This is because Google hates most affiliate pages. I use Elf Links and Squeeze Links. These are my products and my intent is not to write this promoting them, so I won't link to them, but they are what I use and the only products I know of that accomplish this critical task.

Required affiliate text, such as the Amazon affiliate disclosure, I also try to avoid for SEO reasons. Nothing like waiving a red flag you have an affiliate site. Instead, I put the text in a graphic.



Platform

Most of my sites are written in html and php. I hand write the code because it gives me control over how the page looks. It took a long time of self-education to learn how to code web pages, but it has been well worth it.

If I use WordPress I prefer responsive themes which automatically adjust in size for mobile devices.

I rarely use any Google products to avoid giving information to Big G. At most, on some sites, I have Adsense. For website analytics I use Piwik, which is free.



Other

That's it. Making money from quality pages does not have to be hard or complex.

Although some make a living from email marketing I usually have one goal on a web page. If that is to get an affiliate commission then I want to get the click to the merchant.

Not every product needs a newsletter.



Tips Review:

1. More words. A goal of 750 or more can be critical for SEO. I use a main keyword in the title, page description, H1 tag, and near the beginning of the content. Otherwise, I just write for readers and let the on page SEO naturally take care of itself.

You can tell when someone is writing for SEO (keyword density and stuffing in certain words) and it is not compelling or worth reading.

However, your content must be unique. Run your page through copyscape. If it does not come back clean then rework the text until it does.

2. Be specific. One of the biggest mistakes I see are articles being too general because you don't know enough about the product or why someone would buy it. Describing little things, even dials and buttons helps add content and explain why someone should buy the product. Experts are not general. Experts are specific in what they say, and people follow the recommendations of experts. If you wrote this outlined review page about the waffle maker you would be considered an expert on the product.

Giving an outline to a content writer will give you better articles. Once you have a product outline you can recycle it for other products.

3. Add more product pictures than just the one main picture on Amazon. The more the better. Quick graphics can be created to highlight major points.

Pictures and graphics and very useful to give you something to talk about and break up the text on the page.

4. Paraphrase testimonials.

5. Own the product to create credibility. Take your own pictures if you can. Consider watermarking your pictures with your domain url for when they are inevitably copied to other sites.

6. Find unique twists or entertaining tips that sets your review apart and makes it interesting. Did you know that Thomas Jefferson is believed to have popularized waffles in the US? (at least according to Wikipedia).

7. No affiliate links or your SEO rankings are in peril.

8. No Amazon affiliate text. Use a graphic.

9. Create your own brand, logo, slogan. Use namedroppers to find available domains.

10. Entertain and inform. You are educating potential buyers and directing them to products to buy, but this does not have to be boring. Think of every reason / issue / question someone has when comparing products and try to cover them all.

Often, the manufacturer's product features are a roadmap of topics you can expand on and discuss.

11. Check how your site looks on mobile devices (iphones and ipads). If you use WordPress then you want a "responsive" theme that automatically adjusts the size of your page depending on what device is being used to view the page.

12. Need a niche? Just look around your home and see what you have and think about why you bought it. It's that easy.



I have learned an incredible amount from the forum over the years. THANKS EVERYONE!