First income from my website!

byLucyLee

333 followers

5 years ago

I'd like to share some good news and success wit you all. I have made my first income from my affiliate links. YAY!

I have been posting on my website since July, but didn't realy get going untill October. I have 20 posts now on my site now.

I have made £0.58p! ....and I am very happy to have done that!

So let me tell you what I've been doing so far, and what I have learnt.

Success with social media

I have had a social media presence in my niche for a number of years which I've not done much with in the past. So I've been sharing my posts on that, and getting some good discussion on facebook, and people are sharing my posts and interacting with them. 50% of my traffic comes from social media. So I would recommend others do the same if you are not already doing so.

I personally think its best to build up social media accounts with followers interested in your niche, although some say just follow everyone and anyone. I did try that once but I got alot of spam, so I'm sticking to just people connected to my niche.

Understanding Amazon

I decided to start with Amazon because I thought it would be easy. From what I understand I needed to make three qualifying sales within three months of opening the account for them to verify the account and then approve it.

I also opened Amazon accounts in the US and Canada so that I could use their geotagging links. Its nice for customers to click on a link and get the Amazon store in their country. Besides the US has the biggest online shopping culture so most of my sales will have to come from there to make this site work. I think.

So obviously I shared my posts, told my friends and family about my new website, and shared posts on social media. I needed to get the message out there and get some sales in to keep my account open. Otherwise it wouldn't get approved and I'd have to start over again with a new account.

Luckily for me I managed to have sold 7 items through the site!

BUT only 2 of them have come up with a commission. Why?

Why do I get 0 commission for 5 items that were bought through my site? I started reading through the Amazon contract again and it says that you will not get a commission from anything bought by yourself or your family. Well as it happens my sister did buy one thing, simply because she's been interested in learning about what I make, wants to have a go herself, saw my post that day, and bought what she needed. She doesn't live with me or have the same address or surname. So how does Amazon know that she is my sister? Its made me realise that there is alot of information out there about us, forget GDPR, they have it already.

The 4 items unacounted for I will have to wait and see.

Doing something for the first time is like ploughing through a thick jungle!

I'd love to have other people's experience for getting sales through Amazon. Do you also have 0 commission on some items? (that fall into categories of product that should generate a commission). I just want to know how things work... its like disectiong a clock. Leave a comment below!

Mistakes I made, and how I have corrected them

One thing that everyone will tell you when you start out is, find your niche and make 1 website. When you have built up one successfull website, then do another if you wish!

Of course I plunged into making 3 niche websites! I'm stubborn.

I could not give them all the attention they needed. I also do freelance work and have a family. And I'm learning a lot of this stuff for the first time, so that takes time too.

Start with one website. Make your mistakes with one website. Learn the ropes with one website. Get up to speed with one website. Build relationships with companies with one website.

Then, when that site is managed and successfull, make another, if you wish.

Or add a subniche website as a subdomain, at a later date.

So I will take down the other two websites, and rewrite the content in line with the niche site I'm keeping, and post it on there. Its kind of relevant. I don't need to throw the content away, its good original content.

What I will do next

1. Start making videos for my niche YouTube channel for product reviews, how to's, ideas worth sharing, to point to my website
   
2. Start FaceBook live and Insta Live regular weekly demos (which is very scary, but I have to overcome my fear and do it anyway)
   
3. Build up training courses to give away and sell (eventually) and put up here too
   
4. Keep blogging, and posting up original useful content as well as product reviews
   
5. Open another affiliate account with another company
   
6. Post a monthly upade post here on WA so that I can be accountable to the five points above!
   

Let me know in the comments below if you have any advice or similar or different experiences to me.... how did you make your very first pennies online?

Thanks for your time.