Does that still work with Wikipedia? As the links are now no follow (not tried myself, just going on other posts on this one).
Great thread OP - cheers for keeping us all up to date with your progress.
A Newbie's Journey - $3000 in 120 days
- Thread starter nogenius
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Does that still work with Wikipedia? As the links are now no follow (not tried myself, just going on other posts on this one).
Great thread OP - cheers for keeping us all up to date with your progress.
Yeah I'm not 100% sure I've heard about the no-follow links on wikipedia, however the no-follow links just mean that the pages don't pass on PR to your site but the bots will still follow the link, which means your still getting a link from an authority site.
Great goal...don't let anymore put you down...we all have to start somewhere, and we have to have goals Good Luck
Sure, just read every post in this forum and you will have an expert knowledge in affiliate programs!
April 29, 2007
Progress achieved since last post:
- Wrote up a set of alternate ads for the magazine titles that were too long for Google's character limit.
- Used a program called xsitepro to quickly generate landing pages. I hope to be proficient enough in coding to eventually write most of my own pages, but for now it saves me a lot of time and grief.
- Cloaked my affiliate links in my pages using a PHP script I found here.
- Added 3 more magazines, bringing my total to 165 exact matched keywords, 45 ads, and 15 adgroups.
- Read up on Adwords --> Adsense arbitrage, although I think I may have been smartpriced on my previous arbi domain, and for some reason almost all of my arbi pages are showing ads for the same thing, costing me clicks.
Goals for the coming days:
- Double check all of my landing pages, ads, and links.
- Launch my initial test campaign and see how things go.
From manually creating and submitting the ads, adgroups, and landing pages, I feel I have learned a lot. However, it is certainly a grind (even with the use of Excel spreadsheets), and I have been brainstorming ways to automate parts of the process using PHP and mySQL. From here, I think I will see how my initial promotion efforts go, and then upload about 15-20 new magazines a day, re-evaluating each day what keywords and ads work.
For the next four days or so, I will not be able to get much done, because it will be a particularly hectic week for me. However, following that period, I will be devoting (hopefully) close to 6 hours a day on online ventures.
Progress achieved since last post:
- Wrote up a set of alternate ads for the magazine titles that were too long for Google's character limit.
- Used a program called xsitepro to quickly generate landing pages. I hope to be proficient enough in coding to eventually write most of my own pages, but for now it saves me a lot of time and grief.
- Cloaked my affiliate links in my pages using a PHP script I found here.
- Added 3 more magazines, bringing my total to 165 exact matched keywords, 45 ads, and 15 adgroups.
- Read up on Adwords --> Adsense arbitrage, although I think I may have been smartpriced on my previous arbi domain, and for some reason almost all of my arbi pages are showing ads for the same thing, costing me clicks.
Goals for the coming days:
- Double check all of my landing pages, ads, and links.
- Launch my initial test campaign and see how things go.
From manually creating and submitting the ads, adgroups, and landing pages, I feel I have learned a lot. However, it is certainly a grind (even with the use of Excel spreadsheets), and I have been brainstorming ways to automate parts of the process using PHP and mySQL. From here, I think I will see how my initial promotion efforts go, and then upload about 15-20 new magazines a day, re-evaluating each day what keywords and ads work.
For the next four days or so, I will not be able to get much done, because it will be a particularly hectic week for me. However, following that period, I will be devoting (hopefully) close to 6 hours a day on online ventures.
Progress achieved since last post:
You will only get away with things for so long you know before they catch you.:bigear:
You will only get away with things for so long you know before they catch you.:bigear:
nogenius:
One lesson I learned early on is to test markets/niches/campaigns before investing a huge amount of time setting up a new campaign. One of my first campaigns, I spent a bunch of time putting together a good (and big) keyword list, setting up targetted ad groups, etc. When my masterpiece was finally complete, I activated it. I quickly found out that the market was too competitive for a noobie. I couldn't afford the traffic at the going rate.
Now that I have access to better payouts and know more about making landing pages that convert, I plan to try to launch the campaign again. But the point is that not every market is a good one. Some are too competitive, some have insufficient payouts or insufficient traffic, etc. If you figure out that magazine subscriptions is not a good market for your skill-set, you will have wasted a lot of time setting up the perfect campaign.
What I would have suggested is choosing a few magazine titles you feel good about and doing some smaller test campaigns. Then you could see whether it's a profitable niche, and you could also learn some things that would help you if you decided to scale up.
Good luck
One lesson I learned early on is to test markets/niches/campaigns before investing a huge amount of time setting up a new campaign. One of my first campaigns, I spent a bunch of time putting together a good (and big) keyword list, setting up targetted ad groups, etc. When my masterpiece was finally complete, I activated it. I quickly found out that the market was too competitive for a noobie. I couldn't afford the traffic at the going rate.
Now that I have access to better payouts and know more about making landing pages that convert, I plan to try to launch the campaign again. But the point is that not every market is a good one. Some are too competitive, some have insufficient payouts or insufficient traffic, etc. If you figure out that magazine subscriptions is not a good market for your skill-set, you will have wasted a lot of time setting up the perfect campaign.
What I would have suggested is choosing a few magazine titles you feel good about and doing some smaller test campaigns. Then you could see whether it's a profitable niche, and you could also learn some things that would help you if you decided to scale up.
Good luck
Great advice on starting slower.
As a guy said to me recently, it took you whole life for you to get to your economic position, don't expect to turn it around in one day. However, change the behavior that got you to this point and you will turn things around very quickly.
April 30, 2007
Progress achieved since last post:
- Finalized individual landing pages for each script.
- Finalized other aspects for the magazine campaign.
- Loaded $1,000 into my bank account for use with Adwords. I have some money left over from arbitrage in my MSN adcenter and Yahoo Search Marketing accounts.
Goals for the coming days:
- Launch my initial test campaign and see how things go. That will either happen later tonight or tommorrow.
I have really been getting hit in the face with work lately, but I promise that as soon as Friday is done with, I will be devoting around 4 - 6 hours a day minimum on this venture, and I will make some big gains.
Everyone who has been wishing me luck, thanks, I really appreciate your support and I wish the same to you.
See you all in 3 days.
Progress achieved since last post:
- Finalized individual landing pages for each script.
- Finalized other aspects for the magazine campaign.
- Loaded $1,000 into my bank account for use with Adwords. I have some money left over from arbitrage in my MSN adcenter and Yahoo Search Marketing accounts.
Goals for the coming days:
- Launch my initial test campaign and see how things go. That will either happen later tonight or tommorrow.
I have really been getting hit in the face with work lately, but I promise that as soon as Friday is done with, I will be devoting around 4 - 6 hours a day minimum on this venture, and I will make some big gains.
Everyone who has been wishing me luck, thanks, I really appreciate your support and I wish the same to you.
See you all in 3 days.
Thanks for the update. I really like your posts, because they are motivation to me.
Also the advise and published experiences of the other board members is highly interesting. thanks you guy
Also the advise and published experiences of the other board members is highly interesting. thanks you guy
May 05, 2007
Ok - I am back and ready to make some serious cash!
I haven't gotten much done recently due to aforementioned work, but I did manage to score my first sale to the tune of $9.50 (spent $0.53 in clicks). Obviously not sustainable, but felt great anyway.
Goals for the coming days:
- Add more magazines, tweak keywords as I see more data come in. Continue investigating the possibility of dynamic magazine landing pages using PHP and mySQL.
- Start a blog centered around an affiliate offer a la the classic post Enough Bullshit.
- Try to start up Adwords -> Adsense arbitrage, but the problem is my domain is still showing untargeted ads. So I will post in the Newbie Questions forum to see if anyone knows anything I can try, and will email Google as a last resort.
Also, for the blog I am planning to monetize, I am looking to sign up under someone in COPEAC, I am seeking someone who could guide me a bit in the different COPEAC promotions, PM me your affiliate links - I will give those who I have seen giving out good info higher precedence.
Ok - I am back and ready to make some serious cash!
I haven't gotten much done recently due to aforementioned work, but I did manage to score my first sale to the tune of $9.50 (spent $0.53 in clicks). Obviously not sustainable, but felt great anyway.
Goals for the coming days:
- Add more magazines, tweak keywords as I see more data come in. Continue investigating the possibility of dynamic magazine landing pages using PHP and mySQL.
- Start a blog centered around an affiliate offer a la the classic post Enough Bullshit.
- Try to start up Adwords -> Adsense arbitrage, but the problem is my domain is still showing untargeted ads. So I will post in the Newbie Questions forum to see if anyone knows anything I can try, and will email Google as a last resort.
Also, for the blog I am planning to monetize, I am looking to sign up under someone in COPEAC, I am seeking someone who could guide me a bit in the different COPEAC promotions, PM me your affiliate links - I will give those who I have seen giving out good info higher precedence.
May 07, 2007
Progress achieved since last post:
- Am about 60% done with a PHP script that will read from a SQL database that stores all of the magazine titles as well as brief descriptions. I also have another PHP script that will generate a keyword list and ad list that I can import straight into the Adwords Editor.
- Am in the process of picking out a suitable COPEAC offer that I can focus my planned blog around. I have a domain with Wordpress installed already for this purpose.
- Read up more on arbitrage, made some changes hoping to get better targeting on the ads on my current arbi domain.
Goals for the coming days:
- Finish the scripts so that I can add more magazines, and tweak keywords and ads as I see more data come in. I don't want to mass add all 400+ magazines at once, my plan is to add 20 - 30 magazines a day so I can better tweak the campaign as it grows.
- Get started with COPEAC.
My general feeling about affiliate marketing so far is that it is important to be patient with initial campaigns. Although I badly want to start making money, I know that I must learn and work copiously first before the money starts coming in. It also takes me a lot more time to build a website and write a script, because I am still relatively new to PHP/HTML (although I have previous programming experience).
Progress achieved since last post:
- Am about 60% done with a PHP script that will read from a SQL database that stores all of the magazine titles as well as brief descriptions. I also have another PHP script that will generate a keyword list and ad list that I can import straight into the Adwords Editor.
- Am in the process of picking out a suitable COPEAC offer that I can focus my planned blog around. I have a domain with Wordpress installed already for this purpose.
- Read up more on arbitrage, made some changes hoping to get better targeting on the ads on my current arbi domain.
Goals for the coming days:
- Finish the scripts so that I can add more magazines, and tweak keywords and ads as I see more data come in. I don't want to mass add all 400+ magazines at once, my plan is to add 20 - 30 magazines a day so I can better tweak the campaign as it grows.
- Get started with COPEAC.
My general feeling about affiliate marketing so far is that it is important to be patient with initial campaigns. Although I badly want to start making money, I know that I must learn and work copiously first before the money starts coming in. It also takes me a lot more time to build a website and write a script, because I am still relatively new to PHP/HTML (although I have previous programming experience).
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