What Do You Do When You Finish Your Training at WA?
photo credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jayneandd/
Some of you will blast through all five courses in a few weeks, while some of you will take closer to a year to finish them. Regardless of how long it takes...what happens when you finish?
It's hard to say! Like everything else in business, it really depends on the quality and quantity of work you've been doing along the way.
But now that you've finished, what's next? What do you do if you are not yet making a full time income from your efforts so far? Here's what I recommend (and what I did).
1. Spend Some Money On Your Site
No, spending money is not required, but it can help out. Having a premium theme, a nice looking logo, and some "extra" plugins to add functions to your site can make you site looks and work better. I think a premium theme and a nice comparison chart plugin are two things that really helped out my business.
2. Go Through The Training Again
Boring? I hope so! If you find it interesting the second time around you probably didn't do all the work the first time, lol. But seriously, doing the training a second time will not only help you revise and find steps you missed or did wrong, but it will also show you how far you have come.
3. Keyword Research + Blog Posting
This is basically my work every day now that I have established websites. Discover things that people are searching for, then write about it. This generates traffic. Traffic means you are one step closer to sales.
4. Analyze Your Traffic
Already have traffic? Great! You might be just a few days away from your first sale (or more sales). See where traffic is coming from, and start thinking about WHO is visiting your website. Also consider WHY and WHERE they are leaving so you can improve what you already have.
https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/training/analyzing...
This also includes digging into other aspects of Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools! Understanding these two tools definitely takes some times and patience!
5. Improve Old Posts
I'll bet that your first post on your blog was quite short, a little bit scatterbrained, and maybe not so high quality. Hey, we all start out that way. So go back and add more content. Add a video, some pictures, and some internal links. Then re-share it on social media. This can bring Google back to your site, and you might get some improved rankings! I think Jay has a webinar about this. Speaking of which...
6. Watch Some Webinars
There are hundreds of hours worth of great webinars on various topics within the community. They are not in any special order so you just need to decide which ones you want to watch first. But if you are really bored and don't know what to do with your site, doing something is better than nothing. Watch 1 webinar per day for a month and I guarantee you'll have some new ideas of things to try on your site.
7. Start a YouTube Channel
This won't be available to everyone because you'll need a camera and some ideas of videos to posts, but YouTube is essentially an untapped resource for many niches. Most people don't go the extra mile and post videos, so by joining YT you can get traffic on your site that other people are missing out on.
8. Be More Social
To be frank, most people I see going through the training really drop the ball on social media. Hey, it was me too (and still is to some degree). But connecting with peers and mentors in your niche can get you exposure, comments, and increase traffic to your website. Social media stuff can be slow and hard to gauge progress, but it's definitely something that most affiliate marketers can do better!
9. Start Another Website
Maybe you got though the training and are really struggling to think of new post ideas or discovered that you are not as passionate about the niche you chose as you originally thought. That's OK. I built about 5 or 6 niche sites before my first successful one. You don't have to completely kill this one! Just put it on the backburner and start a new one. This time around, your second website will be faster, look nicer, be better researched, and your progress will be much easier!
10. Research Similar Websites For Ideas
Sometimes it's just plain hard to figure out what to do next when you don't really know which direction to go. Check out the top websites in your niche and consider what they are doing right.
- Do they have an email list?
- Do they have something cool in their sidebar?
- What topics are getting the most comments?
- Are they active on Twitter or Facebook?
- What type of images are they using?
You can use these ideas as a starting point for your own ideas (don't copy), or as contrast! If all the top sites are doing the same thing, you can see what they are doing then do something different to distinguish yourself and make yourself more unique.
11. Ask For Feedback, Then Take Action
WA is more than just a place to get trained. It's also a place to get support. There are many trainings on how to get proper feedback within WA:
https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/nathaniell/blog/fe...
The key is then to take this advice to heart and act on it. Remember, asking "Is this good" will get generalized, non-actionable advice. Be specific with your questions, ask more than one person, and actually try out what they say (if it's good advice).
12. Make More Friends in WA
A large portion of my success with the training in Wealthy Affiliate was due to having the support of the community. Another huge part of it was having friends I could discuss business stuff with.
Stick around in WA long enough, and you'll start to figure out who's serious about their business, and going to be here for a while. Chat with them, see what they're working on, or share with them what you're doing. Exchange ideas, collaborate, and review each other.
One of the big reasons I'm still here today is that I can meet other smart business owners that I can TRUST, and can bounce ideas around with. The community here is not just for newbies! There's a lot of smart folks here that hang out day to day or pop in from time to time. Find them and talk to them! Who knows what will happen from there!
Just because you finished your "official" training inside Wealthy Affiliate, doesn't mean that your website is done, and there's still a lot you can get from this community. I finished my original training in a few months, but it took me almost 2 years to make a full time income. I couldn't have done it without the help of many individuals within the community.
Even now, as a full time internet marketer, just having access to other full time marketers in chat and private message is enough to keep me renewing my membership every year (yes, I'm a Yearly member). Pay $1 a day to access to pros on this site? Heck yeah!
But aside from that, I hope that this post shows you there's still a lot that can be done every day on your website, no matter how much money you are making (or not making). Income potential is infinite in the world of online business. Earning it is a matter of how hard you are willing to look for it!
Recent Comments
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The timing of this is poignant. I just started a review of all my old content last night and man oh man, some of it, the stuff from the very start nearly two years back, is cringe central lol. Minimal value and too many affiliate links. I'll update where relevant and just delete in others. I'll try and sort out categories and tags better too to make an easier user experience.
It will take a couple of weeks to go through everything but it will be worth it. It's good to do it as I can see how much better I have got as a content creator, that alone is great to realize. I can make the older content more useful for readers and ensure it fit's into my more recent sales funnels. Definitely an action worth doing if you have your site up for some time.
I considered going back to the starter training too actually. I probably will do that but I have a bunch of other WA training and other external stuff I want to get to first.
I think when you're new to all this you can only gain by doing a full site review after a year or two. Even if you have good command of your native language for writing purposes, you probably won't have developed your style. That takes time for sure.
Great stuff Nathaniell.
Kind of embarrassing isn't it! I've actually blushed a bit reading my old posts. Just shows how much progress can be made over time, even if we don't realize it!
Thank you foe another insightful lesson.
It is so great to be able to have access to the advice and experience of guys like you.
Thank you !!
-Theuns
Excellent blog post, Nathaniell. I am currently nearing the end of Course 4 of the Bootcamp. Once I've done Course 5, I might take a break from the Bootcamp because Courses 6 & 7 are about PPC, which is a bit of jump up for me. During my break I will catch up on the webinars and other member-created training.
You are totally right about the community here. There's really nowhere like it. I'm really grateful for the feedback and advice I have received recently.
My medium-term goal is to be in your position in a year. My website will be as successful as yours and you and I will be fighting for the same WA Rank spot ;-)
(By the way, that IS going to happen)
Not exactly in a rush to complete everything. Will take time to learn and apply. Thank you for the heads up, at least I know what to do once I completed my training too.
Hi Nathaniel, loved this blog, the ideas you propose and the motivation you're giving us. Already had a few ideas... off to work! Thanks!
Hi Nathaniel, what a thought provoking blog, probably something most of us have never considered, particularly $1 a day for help and advice from experts on all things concerning an online business. Thank you, bookmarked.
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Great stuff. Thanks for sharing.
Please elaborate on 3 : Discover things that people are searching for, then write about it.