Trying to find money online.
Man oh man, I have no muse this week at all. I wrote some really good articles (at least, I was under the impression they were good), but no comments, and barely any clicks. My websites aren't doing bad, they're just not good either. It's been since what? Last May when I started my Pet Apparel site. No money made except 1.36 on Google Ads. But nothing in affiliate links
I had people tell me that because I branched off from Apparel, that Google was probably confused on what my articles were about that I wasn't getting ranked. So, last year I changed that and focused on just Apparel, but again, in searching through Google, no articles are anywhere in site.
I created the Bullies site so that I could write about other things, not just apparel, and that's ranking higher in Google than the other one already.
But, still no money. Still not a sngle afflilate link clicked on. It's almost like I have to write about making money online to get anywhere. But that's what everyone writes about. I don't want to write about what everyone else writes about, that's for sure.
Then there's the health industry. Again, everyone writes about this as well, so I don't want to write about that either. I have a degree in Nutrition, so I technically have a good background in it, but I get tired of talking about nutrition to my family even. They get angry when I don't fluff it and I tell them that most of what's sold in stores is garbage.
Money online and health are the two most competitive fields out there to write about. Everyone and their brother writes about money and health. I want to be different, but now my savings is gone and I have to make a decision.
Go back to that awful 9 to 5 job? Or struggle to continue as a lame writer at home that's making no progress? My husband is pushing for a job, but then I know what will happen. I'll stop writing. I'll be tired as usual. I'll get home and plop on the couch and not want to write. Then, this last year will all have been for literally nothing.
I attempted to see about selling random things on Amazon from Ali, but now they're saying that the shipping address has to match mine? How do people sell on Amazon? Is it only the big businesses that sell that can afford a huge warehouse?
There's got to be some way to make money online that doesn't take 2 years! God I'm frustrated today.
Recent Comments
13
I don't blame you. This is such a game when it comes to Google, when it should be a scientific process.
Yes! I've searched through Google and I don't see a single one of my articles. Even Google says I average at 54 searches. Well, no where on page 5 are any of the key words I've tried to focus on.
Hi Katrina, I was sorry to learn from your post that you're feeling so frustrated today. I've just looked at your website and was envious at how great it looks!. You are promoting some great products, compared with what I promote on my dog website. I've never gone beyond promoting Amazon products, for that site in spite of having joined other affiliates.
One thing that might be keeping you from sales is that many products on your site are in a higher price range. In view of financial situations globally, this could have a negative influence for the foreseeable future.
Are you using Social Media, particularly Pinterest, to help bring traffic to your website?
I'm not the best WA member to help you, but don't give up on your website. If you have not done so recently, I suggest reading training created by some experienced members. DianeScorpio is one I recommend. I read some of Diane's training this morning and was impressed by what she provides. I've been involved with affiliate marketing for ten years but I've never learned everything, and never will.
I hope tomorrow is a better day for you.
Valerie
Thank you Valerie. I've worked really hard on my page and I've been trying to make it great, it's just difficult, that's for sure. I will try to put lower end items on there as you mentioned.
I stopped affiliating with Amazon cause they booted me from their program after no sales at 180 days. I haven't reapplied, because honestly, while Amazon has great stuff, I just find their commissions so low compared to so many others. Though, Petco just lowered theirs to 1% as well. So, the same I suppose.
But thank you for the advice on lower priced items. I'll have to work on putting those for all the items I've written about.
Thanks!
Katrina
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Okay, time to do some tweaking to improve the customer experience.
First, I would take the list of categories off the top of each post listing. Better to have the traditional cookies, because when someone gets deep into the site, it becomes a pretty long stream. Since the type is in color and serif, so it's harder to read. People are expecting the title to be first and it's not.
Next, delete the black bar across the top for Affiliate Disclosure and Privacy Policy. That's not the first thing you want people to see, and a black bar like that is basically a visual speed bump.
Don't refer to past articles in the first paragraph of the new article. You could maybe put it in the second paragraph, but then make sure you have a link to that article.
When I clicked to any page off your home page, there's nothing at the top of the page. Not sure if it was supposed to be an image or an ad, but it's totally blank. If I hadn't scrolled, I would have thought the page was broken.
Remove the pop-up ad that I got the first time when I tried moving from the home page to the supplements page. It was unexpected and disrupted my journey from home page to more content. I had the same experience when I tried moving away to other category pages.
When showing the image of a product you are reviewing, perhaps crop the photo so that the stars and price do not show. It looks like the product is unrated and thus unpopular.
Hope those ideas help!
Jeanine,
I'll have to play around with some of the suggestions. I don't know how to remove the list from each article like you mentioned....I also don't know how to remove the ads from each article. I simply placed "Auto" ads on there from Google, but I imagine I can tweak those.
I do like your suggestions though. That's probably why I don't have people returning too much. That's pretty low when I look at my Google stats.
Thanks for the ideas. I'll be working on these this week.
Katrina
I know that it takes some time learning Wordpress, but it's worth it. That can be your next goal - to become proficient with that so that you can create just what you want.
FYI, Google may be difficult to change until you've got more visitors. They are always in control.
I realized that yesterday in poking around. I did remove the top black bar that showed the Privacy Policy and Affiliate Policy, looks better now, so thank you.
As for the blank posts on top, I didn't see what you meant when I went incognito. It shows ads at the top until you scroll past those. That's when I tried changing how the ads are placed.... But there wasn't much I was able to do with that.
I will admit, that's the only money I've made so far is with the ads, so I left them. It's not much, 1.34, but it's better than 0. :(
Let me know if you see anything else I can tweak to make it better.
Thanks!
Katrina
Those ads are so huge, though, that you don't think you're on a category page. Maybe a smaller ad?
I'll see how to change them. Not quite sure, but I did choose auto ads. I'll see about making them specific to what I want instead. Thank you!