Facebook Fan Page
In April, I added some backlinks and set up a Facebook page for my pets site. The Facebook page has 15 fans and I've posted links to articles on my site there, receiving a few comments and a sprinkling of visitors. With the Google changes, social media is increasingly important for traffic and rankings.
Outsourcing Content
While the pets site was previously written entirely by me, and is on a topic with which I am very familiar and work with in real life on a daily basis, I decided to hire a freelance writer to help me add more articles to it in May. The writer has personal experience in this niche as well, and I'm confident I'll see quality work from him. I'll update on that front next month.
Pets Website Earnings
Income for this niche hit its peak in March, as was the case in 2010 and 2009, and will wind slowly down from here, with the fall months typically the lowest-earning.
Adsense $557.74
Clickbank $220.18
Amazon $16.44
April total $794.36
(-$10.33 compared to March 2011)
Family Niche Blog Income
Just the other day, I lamented to my husband that my newer niche blog on a family-related topic was only earning about $10 a month from Adsense, whereas the pets site at the same age was making $80-$100 a month from ad clicks and affiliate commissions. It wasn't until I listed and tallied all its income sources that I realized it's actually doing very well.
Started last August, it's less than nine months old and has just 15 blog posts and four pages. I discovered this niche from one of my eHow articles that did exceptionally well (it earned over $3,000 in revenue share and more than $1,500 in affiliate commissions in 3.5 years).
Family niche blog income sources in April 2011:
cj.com $29.75
RA sales $21.82
Clickbank $21.24
Amazon $17.06
Adsense $9.82
Total $99.69
Thus my total earnings from these two sites in April was $894.05 -- to me, a very encouraging number. I have over a dozen domain names, most sitting unloved with just a few pages or posts apiece (or in some cases, nothing), but by focusing my efforts on one or two sites at a time, I hope to bring them all up to at least the $100/month mark by next year and keep growing from there.
- Check out my Tools & Training resource page for links to the products and services I use and recommend. If you haven't made your own profitable website yet, everything you need to get started is right there.
Do you have a niche site or blog? How is it doing? If not, what's stopping you from moving forward?
14 comments:
Hey Maria,
This is great that you are doing so well. I am working on a niche site myself using SBI. I had started this site in late 2009 but had to revamp it over the last couple of months. So pretty much I am working on a clean slate. Right now the traffic is trickling in. It is still pretty new but I would say by the end of this year I will get a better idea of how it is doing overall.
I was think about using Wordpress for another niche site. Do you use Wordpress? How do you like it?
Alicia -- I still have an SBI site to but am thinking of transferring it over to my own system as I find SBI bulky and cumbersome to use now that I know basic html.
I think my html-based sites do better than Wordpress as a platform for website content; however, if you are writing a true blog in which social connections are key, a self-hosted Wordpress blog is definitely the way to go. I wish I'd started this blog on Wordpress.
Hi Maria~
Following your blog is isnpiring to me.
I blog, but it has been a personal one. I'm thinking of branching out in ways that I can maybe make some money with it.
Maria, it’s interesting to hear your comment about SBI. I always wondered why folks were so attracted to SBI. I don’t remember how much it cost, but I couldn’t get my mind around purchasing it for building sites.
From my experience, websites usually perform better than blogs. I transformed one of my sites into a blog and quickly noticed a drop in income. I didn’t transfer it back because I liked the ease of blogging. I still have a couple of sites and am considering building a few more in addition to WordPress blogs.
With the recent online changes, I think we all should branch out and experiment with various online models. It will be beneficial in the long run.
Very inspiring post and comments. I've always used web 2.0 platforms and blogging, but I'm now considering creating a static website to see what it's all about. It's nice to have your experience and Felicia's to consider.
Wow-that is neat to see your breakdown. I'm trying to be more aware of Social Media, as that is easily my downfall. Great tips!
Interesting that you have domains with little on them. You are like many that I have been reading about who do that. I need to get a few blogs going myself.
Note: Due to a Blogger glitch, the previous comments to this post were deleted. I've re-posted them here, with my responses.
Alicia James (http://www.blogger.com/profile/12460296983925675473 ) left a new comment:
Hey Maria,
This is great that you are doing so well. I am working on a niche site myself using SBI. I had started this site in late 2009 but had to revamp it over the last couple of months. So pretty much I am working on a clean slate. Right now the traffic is trickling in. It is still pretty new but I would say by the end of this year I will get a better idea of how it is doing overall.
I was think about using Wordpress for another niche site. Do you use Wordpress? How do you like it?
--
Alicia -- I still have an SBI site to but am thinking of transferring it over to my own system as I find SBI bulky and cumbersome to use now that I know basic html.
I think my html-based sites do better than Wordpress as a platform for website content; however, if you are writing a true blog in which social connections are key, a self-hosted Wordpress blog is definitely the way to go. I wish I'd started this blog on Wordpress.
~Maria
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Felicia (www.nojobformom.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Niche Site Profits April 2011":
Maria, it’s interesting to hear your comment about SBI. I always wondered why folks were so attracted to SBI. I don’t remember how much it cost, but I couldn’t get my mind around purchasing it for building sites.
From my experience, websites usually perform better than blogs. I transformed one of my sites into a blog and quickly noticed a drop in income. I didn’t transfer it back because I liked the ease of blogging. I still have a couple of sites and am considering building a few more in addition to WordPress blogs.
With the recent online changes, I think we all should branch out and experiment with various online models. It will be beneficial in the long run.
--
Felicia,
Back when I first started web writing and marketing, I learned a great deal from the SBI training. But their system doesn't make sense for me anymore and it costs $300 a year for one site (all well as the tools, training and support).
I think Wordpress is best used when you truly want a blog -- with all the community interaction, comments, conversation, etc that goes along with a blog. For niche content for a targeted audience, an html site seems the better choice. ~Maria
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Julie @ The Family CEO (http://www.thefamilyceoblog.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Niche Site Profits April 2011":
Very inspiring post and comments. I've always used web 2.0 platforms and blogging, but I'm now considering creating a static website to see what it's all about. It's nice to have your experience and Felicia's to consider.
--
Julie,
Yes, I agree about branching out -- having a few of each would be a good goal. ~Maria
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Heather @ Work At Home Market has left a new comment on your post "Niche Site Profits April 2011":
Wow-that is neat to see your breakdown. I'm trying to be more aware of Social Media, as that is easily my downfall. Great tips!
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~robin has left a new comment on your post "Niche Site Profits April 2011":
Hi Maria~
Following your blog is inspiring to me.
I blog, but it has been a personal one. I'm thinking of branching out in ways that I can maybe make some money with it.
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Maria,
This is a very inspirational post and blog in general. I too am trying to diversify farther, since saying good bye to eHow. Although I do like using WordPress, I'm not currently happy with my static web pages. What platform/editor do you write your static sites in? Do you purchase site templates?
Thanks,
Patti
Maria, I just got my copy editing site up (www.copyeditingforum.com) and am using WordPress. I want it to be more of a static site with just a few updates/responses to comments rather than a blog. I hope WP is okay for that too. We'll see. I really like reading about what everyone else is doing and what works and doesn't work for them. Oh, I've earned a few bucks so far. woo hoo!
Patti -- thanks! for my static sites, I buy simple html templates and use Kompozer, a free html editor, to customize them and create pages.
Peg -- that's great! I'm so happy you started your site. It looks great.
Thank you for sharing! I am still new in the blogging world and am enjoying it! I am in affiliate marketing and have not added adsense to my blog yet. That is the next step. I wanted to build up my traffic first. Thanks for giving us an open view of how you are making money online. Most people don't do that. It's very refreshing! Best of luck!
How long did it take for you to start seeing money roll in from Amazon? I've been working on Amazon niche sites for about two months now and have had a decent number of impressions but no purchases.
I will be starting a few niche websites in the new year, reading your posts lets me know that success is possible!
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