I'm Bringing My 7-Year-Old Affiliate Website Back to Life Using AI

Hey there WAers,

So, it's been almost two years since I was last active here at Wealthy Affiliate. In fact, I nearly cancelled the whole thing a number of times.

In my defense, a lot has changed since then.

I moved from Australia to Texas, started a completely new business, built a Pilates studio from the ground up, learned an enormous amount about digital marketing... and somewhere along the way my affiliate website was left sitting in the corner collecting digital dust.

The website didn't disappear, I simply stopped working on it. And if I am being totally honest, I really lost interest. I sold a couple of my other sites and nearly sold this one - but for some reason - didn't.

Then a few weeks ago, when I saw a bill on my bank account for some plugin I had forgotten I even owned (and was certainly not even installed on my site) I logged back in...

...and I was surprised by what I found.

The Website Isn't Dead...

My website is now over seven years old.

It contains:

• 263 published articles
• 50 pages
• A small collection of backlinks
• Around $70/month in recurring affiliate commissions
• More than 35,000 Google impressions over the last 28 days

Despite almost two years of neglect, Google is still crawling it.

People are still finding it.

Affiliate commissions are still coming in.

That made me realize that this isn't a dead website.

It's an underperforming asset.

And that got me thinking...

Can AI Bring an Old Website Back to Life?

Everyone seems to be talking about AI right now. And to be honest, it has been immeasurable in its assistance as we built our fitness business from the ground up here in a new country. It helps with all aspects of day to day but it is the Local SEO/ GEO and marketing audits that really helped.

I mean we got to number 1 in local SEO after 3 weeks against national brands by setting up and nurturing all sorts of skills, audits and research using AI.

When it comes to affiliate marketing, some people claim it can build an online business for you. Others say AI-generated content is destroying the internet.

Rather than debating it, I've decided to test it. I mean I already have the tools in place - I just need to aim them in a new direction

Over the next 12 months I'm going to rebuild this website using AI as my assistant and document everything publicly.

Not just the wins.

The failures too.

Introducing...

This isn't a course.

It isn't a sales pitch.

It's a public experiment.

I want to answer one question:

Can AI help revive a neglected affiliate website and turn it into a thriving online business again?

Over the next year I'll document everything inside Wealthy Affiliate and on YouTube.

Nothing will be hidden.

What AI Will (and Won't) Do

I'm not interested in pressing a button and having AI build a business for me.

Instead, I'll use it to help with tasks like:

• Content research
• Keyword planning
• Content outlines
• Updating old articles
• SEO analysis
• Website improvements
• Image generation
• Video scripting
• Workflow automation
• Productivity

The experience, opinions, editing, testing and final decisions will still be mine.

AI is my assistant.

Not my replacement.

My Starting Point

To make this challenge as transparent as possible, here is where I'm beginning.

Website

• Age: 7 years
• Articles: 263
• Pages: 50
• Platform: WordPress

Search

• Google Clicks (Last 28 Days): 35
• Google Impressions: 35,094
• Average Position: 52.3

Indexing

• Indexed Pages: 263
• Pages Not Indexed: 1,260

Audience

• Email Subscribers: 0
• YouTube Subscribers: 1,880

Affiliate Revenue

Approximately $70/month recurring

Not huge.

But enough to prove that the website still has life in it.

What I'll Share Every Week

Each week I'll publish an update showing:

• What I worked on
• AI tools I used
• Articles created or updated
• Website improvements
• Search traffic
• Rankings
• Affiliate income
• Wins
• Mistakes
• What I'll focus on next
• What WA training I have looked at to assist (you ready Jay?)

If I make a bad decision...

You'll see it.

If something works really well...

You'll see that too.

Why I'm Doing This

I think there are a lot of people in exactly the same position as me.

You built a website, life got busy and the site slowly faded into the background.

Now AI has arrived, and you're wondering whether it's worth trying again.

I don't know the answer yet.

That's why this project exists.

We're going to find out together.

The Goal

I'm not trying to become an overnight millionaire.

I'm trying to build something sustainable.

A useful website.

A growing YouTube channel.

A better content system.

A genuine online business that continues to grow over time.

If AI helps accelerate that process, fantastic.

If it doesn't, I'll be honest about that too.

Week 1 Scorecard

Website Age 7 Years

Articles 263

Google Clicks (28 Days) 35

Google Impressions (28 Days) 35,094

Average Position 52.3

Indexed Page s263

YouTube Subscribers 1,880

Email Subscribers 0 (I had a few but the account closed and I lost them - oh well)

Monthly Affiliate Revenue~$70

Next Week...

I'll be diving into the website for the first time in almost two years.

The plan is to work out:

• What's worth keeping.
• What needs rewriting.
• What should be deleted.
• How AI can help improve the content without sacrificing quality.
• Whether a neglected affiliate site can genuinely be brought back to life.

I am also going to create a skills tool that will automate functions and answer questions like:

• "What should I work on today?"
• "Which pages should I update first?"
• "What happened to my traffic?"
• "Write my weekly Wealthy Affiliate update."
• "Draft my YouTube script."

If you've got an old website gathering dust too, feel free to follow along. It will be interesting to see where this project ends up over the next 12 months.

Thanks for reading, and it's great to be back!

Paul