How soon you should apply for an Affiliate Program
Too often I see many new members always asking, how can I monetize my website with affiliate ads? The answer is simple. If your website is relatively new, only a couple of weeks old and you do not have at least 5 pages and 1 post full of useful relevant content of at least 400 words (not counting your About Me page), then you are not ready to monetize your website. Another answer would be, if you are not finished with the Level 2 training of the Certification Courses, then it is not your time yet.
YOU MUST BE PATIENT! There is a very good reason why the monetization portion of the training is in Level 3 of the Certification Course. If you are still in Levels 1 or 2, do not start to monetize your website until your foundation has been laid. If you try to, you will be wasting your time. There are many important factors that need to be in place before you can monetize your website effectively.
If you were to attempt to become an affiliate of many companies before your website has enough content and traffic, you will be denied. The easiest affiliate to join is Amazon but if you do not have the traffic coming to your website and thus no sales, then you will be dropped by Amazon. So building your website foundation and getting organic traffic coming to your site MUST come first before you monetize.
So if you want to be successful in affiliate marketing, then follow the guidance of those who are already successful at it. If you just slap together a website and stick affiliate ads on it I guarantee you will not be successful at making money online. Then you will get frustrated and think that the training is no good, when in fact the real problem is staring at you in the mirror.
THOSE DOING THE BOOT CAMP TRAINING
The information above also applies to all of you promoting WA in the Boot Camp course. It is RARE that I review a website of a new Boot Camp member and not find affiliate text links and ad banners on every page/post of their website. WHY DO YOU MEMBERS DO THAT? – The training certainly did not tell you to do it! Matter of fact Kyle tells you NOT to do that and if you do, Google will not like it and will hurt your rankings.
When you first start out the only page that should have WA affiliate links on it should be your WA Review page. You should never put an affiliate ad or link on your About Me page. That just screams, Look at me! I am a Spammer! The only link to WA you should have on your About Me page is a direct link (not an affiliate link) to your WA Profile page. Your non-affiliate link of your WA Profile page will still act as an affiliate link without having to use your affiliate ID number.
PROVIDE INFORMATION & NOT AFFILIATE ADS
Your goal for your websites is to provide relevant useful information pertaining to your niche. Your goal should not be to solely get people to buy from you. If you enter the creation of your website content with the mindset of making money first rather than providing plenty of descriptive and engaging content full of information, you will not succeed.
You should know by now that keyword stuffing is bad news. It will get Google to not rank your website highly. The same is true for affiliate link stuffing. I treat the use of both keywords and affiliate links the same way, I use them sparingly. Google does not like websites with affiliate links on every page and post. The affiliate marketing websites that do well are the ones with the fewest affiliate links and a lot of fresh ideas and useful information.
Do you like going up on a website and having to read page after page that is trying to get you to buy something when you are just looking for some information? Do you like going to a car dealership or a retail store to just do some looking around and then have the salesperson constantly try to sell you something? Well if you answered NO to both of those questions, then don't put affiliate links on all of your pages and posts. If you do you are no better than those pushy salespeople and your readers will go someplace else.
I'm sure you do not want to push people away from your website, right? If not then be smart when you create your content. Give your website readers a pleasant non-selling experience. Remember your goal is to provide information and not a lot of affiliate links/ads. Put yourself in the place of the reader who is coming to your website not ready to buy but only looking for information. Would you rather buy from someone who provided you with great information or someone who was trying to get you to buy from them on every page?
NOTE: Banner ads and widgets that appear in your sidebar and/or footer areas are okay to use. Google does not take these areas into consideration when checking to see how many affiliate ads are being used.
Recent Comments
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Couldn't agree more. This is a great post to send members to who ask this question or ask why they aren't making any money yet!
I agree Isabella. I wrote it for three reasons. 1) So that I can educate anyone here at WA who is at that point in their website creation. 2) So I can use this as an un-official affiliate link and link to this blog from relevant content on my website. And 3) To send people who ask that question of me again the link to this blog post. :-)
Yeah cheers Boomer, very informative post to read! I actually sometimes have the opposite problem of feeling that my website is never quite ready, even with +20,000 words (could be a subconscious fear of not making money when the links are finally up!), but this post has helped to put things in perpective! Cheers and speak soon :)
Martin, the money is not going to come in as soon as you monetize your website because again like every business, things take time. But if you are at that point in the training where Kyle tells you to monetize, then go for it! Get it done and go back to provide great horror movie content.
You're welcome Elizabeth. Just keep working the training and building good content that will build up your rankings and thus your traffic. Then when the time comes to monetize, you will be ready to go.
BRAVO BOOMER! This is right on the money (HA! No pun). I just hate being drawn in by a tickler post or ad only to then have to wade through links, more ads, flashing pictures and other garbage in order to hear the rest of the story. And more often than not, the "rest of the story" isn't useful anyway! Your post is very straightforward and helpful! Keep 'em comin!
Thank you Patti. I don't know of anyone who likes to read content that sounds more like a sales pitch than an information post. When people are rushed into buying they normally will not buy, especially from the person that is rushing them. I know I wouldn't. I just hope members that are thinking of monetizing their websites wait until the training tells them to.
I agree with you boomer, I have seen lately many newbies asking "When will I make money?" constantly, and they insist and want it now, instead of waiting and being patient. Also, I have seen a couple of websites being what it is called "bridge-pages" and never get ranked. That is why we have training here, to guide us to success.
You are correct Michelle. Websites with a lot of affiliate links and ads are looked upon by Google as websites with "bridge-pages". Google even says in their own webmaster tool guidelines that websites like these will not get ranked. People need to build their website businesses slow. "Rome wasn't built in a day." :-)
Thanks for the giving us the lowdown on what a lot of us do wrong starting off. This is great information once again, Boomer!
Jack :)
You are welcome Jack. It's just a matter of being patient and building our websites correctly. I rushed my first website and do not make any money from it. I took my time with my 2nd and 3rd websites and those are the ones I make money from. So going slow definitely pays off much better and that is what I want people to understand.
I think we've all been guilty of putting the cart before the horse here. Getting too excited before we have enough value to cash in on. Thanks for the great post!
You are welcome Tony. Like Kyle says in the beginning of the training (the same thing you just said too) "don't put the cart in front of the horse."
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Thank you Boomer for this information. I hope I haven't commited any of these no no's. Would you please look at my website and give me any pointer? http://mychristianproducts.com I appreciate any help you can give me.
You are welcome Phyllis. I will check out your website and get back to you soon.
Phyllis, I looked at your website and left you my comment on your profile page.