Encouraged by Affiliate Income

I have recently started seeing a few orders from Amazon capsules associated with HubPages.  To me that is very encouraging since I didn't think that I would ever really sell anything.  Most of my articles are informational and aren't product related.

I know that there are several Hubbers who do very well on a monthly basis by creating prodjavascript:void(0)uct based Hubs and selling via the Amazon affiliate program.  I also know that this holds enormous potential through independent websites as well.  It simply becomes a matter of writing enticing ad copy and driving traffic to your Hubs.

Now I certainly don't expect to make a fortune doing this, but I can state that it is likely another piece of the puzzle and an area which deserves my consideration.  Now that I am getting better at seeing more consistent traffic, the likelihood of seeing some sales will be increasing.

Here are my Amazon results since I first started writing online at HubPages:

Amazon Q2 2009—4 clicks

Amazon Q3 2009—87 clicks

Amazon Q4 2009—100 clicks, 1 order, $0.94

Amazon Q1 2010—58 clicks

Amazon Q2 2010—91 clicks, 6 orders, $3.90

As you can see, I have not quite made $5 yet but the number of clicks has increased from the first quarter of 2010.  I would like to see that number increase and add some more sales so that I could make the $10 payout by the end of the year.  As a result, I will be working on adding Amazon capsules to those Hubs that don't have any and continue to work at driving traffic.

Granted, I have not earned a lot but I am starting to see some possibilities with this form of revenue.  If I can continue to develop this source of income as well as AdSense, that would be a good thing.  Let's see if I can get to that magical $10 mark by the end of the year.   

Creating Links for eHow

I am busy creating links for all of my articles since I believe that improving my traffic will do a lot to improve my passive income.  I decided to start with eHow since on a per article basis, it is my most profitable article site.  HubPages makes more but has 4 times the number of articles and only makes about 2 times the income.  Now not every one of my Hubs are evergreen so I can't expect all of them to be making money.

All of my eHow articles have links on Xomba, and I am getting close to being done with Shetoldme.  From there I plan on moving to Redgage, Snipsly, Folkd, and StumbleUpon.  I am trying not to do too much at one time since I would like it to seem somewhat natural.  The Xomba links were done last year so any new links will be fresh.

It will take some time to get all of them completed but I am hoping that I will be done with all of the eHow links by mid-August.  That would give me 9 months before my second anniversary to see if there is an impact upon earnings.  I believe there will be and that I might be able to see my average earnings up 1.5-2 times.  At least all I can do is try.

Then I plan on moving on to my HubPages articles.  I will probably mainly link the evergreen articles.  It will take quite some time (probably to the end of the year) since I have 143 Hubs.  Again, I think it will be very useful for increasing traffic and building up the income at the same time.  My HubPages traffic has been increasing naturally throughout 2010 so I think the links will give it an added boost.

What do you find helps you with traffic?  Are there other sites than the ones I mentioned that you would recommend for link building?  Thanks for reading and commenting.

Photo credit: Petritap 

My Online Income Worth $36,000

I read this amusing rant about domain values by Sara shortly after I had reviewed the worth of this blog which just happened to show up in some search results.  I also found it rather humorous that this blog was valued at $2637, had 1,238 estimated visitors per day and made about $4 daily.  Shoot, if a day is internet code for about 6 weeks, we might be on to something.

But then I started thinking about it a little bit and decided to do my own valuation.  And I came up with right at $36,000!  How on earth did I get that number?  Did I pull it out of my hat?  First of all, let me say that it is not the value of this blog by itself.  It is the value of all of my internet articles--everything that you have been reading about right here.  It includes all of my Hubs, eHow articles, and everything else all combined.

Of course you are still wondering what I mean so allow me to explain:

The same day that I ran across Sara's post I received a notification in my email that a $100 dividend had been paid on 2000 shares of Valero Energy (VLO) that I own.  This dividend is paid quarterly and represents about a 1.1% yield which is comparable to the rates on a 1-yr certificate of deposit.  In other words, it is passive income!

Compare that to my current online income for all of the work that I have done over the past year.  All of the articles at the various sites are currently yielding about $100 every three months between AdSense and eHow payments into my Paypal account.

Since VLO is trading right around $18 per share (closed at $17.99 today), it would take me $36,000 to generate the same amount of passive income via dividends or even a CD deposit that I am making with all of my blogging and writing.  So as you can see, I have valued my online activities at $36,000.  Assuming that I have worked 360 days over the past year, I have created $100 in value for each and every day of the year.

It is encouraging and makes me feel good to know that I have created that much value.  At $10 per hour, that is the equivalent of working for 10 hours each day and shoveling all of that money directly into savings.  Everything that I do over the next year will only serve to increase my passive income and enhance the value creation.  Boy, it makes me want to get cracking to create $100 in value today.

On a side note, I was able to complete my Highlight Video of the 2010 Indy 500.  This video is shot from our seats.  We are located on the front row of the stands across from the first few pits so we always get to see some good pit action where the outcome of the race can be decided.  I am hoping to get 500 views over the next year and add to my YouTube earnings.

Anyway, have fun creating some valuations for your online enterprise and let me know what you come up with.  Are you an online millionaire in terms of passive income?  You never know.

Thanks to My Blogging Friends!

Over the past year, I have spent several posts reviewing statistics and goals.  One of those goals for 2010 was to end up in the top 500,000 websites according to Alexa traffic rank.  Well, I am pleased to report that I am getting very close.  Although I am still over 600,000 for the 3 month rank, for the last few days I have been below 500,000 on the 1 month ranking.

I decided to take a look at the Google Analytic statistics and found that there are several sites that have referred traffic to this blog over the last 30 days.  It made me realize the importance of being connected to the blogging community.  Granted, I don't think this helps directly in terms of income.  But it does provide me with a great measure of satisfaction and comfort knowing that there are those who care enough to take time reading this blog and sharing their comments and experiences.

This has been one of the greatest things for me over the past year, enjoying the acceptance and encouragement from other bloggers, many of whom are online professionals.  Being embraced by the blogging community has meant a lot to me as a part-timer.  I want to take this opportunity to thank those who have allowed me to be part of their community, who have referred traffic, and have commented consistently.

Starting in the order of appearance on Google Analytics:

1. Ruth at webcareergirl.com.  I especially want to thank Ruth for sending an average of 1 visitor each day.  She placed a link to my blog on her very aesthetically pleasing site.  Thank you so much for that!  Ruth is working on the web for a living.  She is kind and professional.  I view her as a web friend and a mentor.
2. Brian at blogengage.com.  Brian runs a wonderful site for fellow bloggers to interact and post their articles.  Blogengage has helped to deliver traffic and followers to this blog and is responsible for a fair amount of referral traffic.  I want to thank Brian for developing and running such a wonderful site.
3. Michelle at passiveincomeonlineblog.com.  I just recently ran across Michelle's blog and was so impressed that I placed it on my blog roll the first day I found it.  Michelle is a single mom working hard to make a living online.  Her tenacity and spirit are admirable.  She also provided me the honor of adding me to her blog roll.  She is a frequent commenter on my blog.  If you ever need to look at anyone for inspiration, Michelle is the one.
4. Felicia at nojobformom.com.  Felicia is in a class all by herself.  She made the transition from working at a traditional job to working on the internet.  She is incredibly professional and it shows on her site and in her writing.  Even though she doesn't have a blog roll, I still get a fair amount of traffic simply from commenting on her blog.  She also comments frequently on mine.  I view Felicia as one of my first web friends who has encouraged me many times along the way this past year.  For that I will be forever grateful.
5. Kelly at kjflemming.com.  Kelly is one of my newest friends in the blogging world.  She is trying the internet marketing thing and trying to get to $15,000 per month with her sites.  I wish her the best of luck and am so thankful and pleased that she decided to add me to her blog roll.  I just happened across her site clicking on a comment one day and saw that I was there.  I was honored to be sure!
6. Deanna at Write Moms.  Deanna is a published author and in a class all by herself.  She has been a long time friend of this blog and has included me in her blog roll.  I have gotten lots of traffic from her site over the past year.  In fact, hers is the leading referral site for 2010.  Deanna has been incredibly encouraging when I have been down and not feeling like writing.  Thank you so much, Deanna!

There are also several friends who have been around for quite awhile, reading and following this blog and commenting from time to time.  I want to acknowledge these individuals as well since I truly appreciate them.

• bestmommy is a writer on many of the same sites on which I have articles.  She is one of my friends on all of them.  She has several blogs as well including momsonlinemoneymakers.com.  She has been a friend for almost my entire first year of writing.
• bristolboy is a great Hubber on HubPages and follows this blog on a regular basis as well as comments frequently.  He is a great source of advice and encouragement.  Thanks, BB!
• David Guion writes the All-Purpose Guru blog.  David is a part-timer like me and has been following me since the early days.  I appreciate his comments and continued support.
• prerna is a frequent commenter I met at Blogengage.  Thank you so much for all your comments.

Finally, I want to make a special mention of Nelle Hoxie at HubPages.  She is a very busy internet marketer who makes quite a bit of money with the Amazon affiliate program.  She is a big source of support and encouragement at HubPages and follows this blog regularly.  Thanks, Nelle!  I am amazed at your ability to produce product pages and make money in that fashion.  I may try to do this someday but not yet.  Amazon just doesn't work for me yet.

If I never make my goal of $3000 per month online in the next 8 years, that will be OK with me.  I know that I will be farther along than I am now thanks to the support and encouragement of all my current and future blogging friends.  And I will surely be richer for the experience as well.  Here is to another year of developing friendships!

Good News from eHow

I went to my eHow account this past weekend to look it over for the purpose of improving my links to my 38 published articles and found out that every single article had at least earned something.  I found it exciting and encouraging to see those results.

If you read about my goals for my second year online, you know that I am going to try and increase my earnings through continued publishing of content but also through improved efforts at linking and "marketing".  I decided that I should start with eHow since I won't be tempted to write more content.  Besides, the payments come via Paypal which I plan to use for funding the development of any niche sites.

My original goal was to start making money online without investing any of my own money.  I could only invest my time and use whatever money I made to reinvest in the online venture.  So far, I have done this.  I used the money in the Paypal account (from eHow) to purchase Michelle Adams' Virtual Real Estate Development Guide for $57.  (I am almost halfway through reading it.  It is long and detailed, and I at times have to re-read a paragraph several times.  But that is good for me as a novice.)

Anyway, I thought that I should begin with linking and marketing eHow so that I could increase my passive earnings there and use those funds to start making niche websites.  Then I could continue to use AdSense checks for paying down debt.  That is why I was looking over my eHow articles. 

So far, I have created a link to each of my eHow articles on Xomba.  This was done last fall.  I also have about half done on SheToldMe which were again done last fall.  But I have none on Redgage, Folkd, or Snipsly which I plan on completing over the next several weeks.  It will be interesting to see if there will be any impact.  Needless to say, I certainly hope so. 

Once I have completed this task, finished reading the VRED guide, and made a little more for the Paypal account, I plan on starting a niche site.  Don't worry, I will keep everyone posted.  It won't be incredibly quick since I am a part-timer.  But I'm OK with that.  I am still having fun. 




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Revamping Old Content

In my last post, I mentioned that one of the ways I hope to generate more traffic in the upcoming year is by revamping old content.  I managed to do this successfully with one of my early articles on HubPages simply by changing the title.

The article was first published on June 8, 2009 and did not generate a lot of interest.  It took learning about keywords and search over the ensuing 3 months or so, but I figured that the problem with the article was the title.  To illustrate, compare these two titles:

(1)  Ease Into Stocks Positions a la Livermore

(2)  Trade Stocks Like Jesse Livermore

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the first title was the original which did not generate a lot of traffic (I think it might have been under 30 views through October).  After learning a little about keywords and search, I changed the title (without altering the article at all) to the second iteration.  Now the article is getting an average of 1 view per day.

Granted that may not seem like a lot of traffic for some niches and authors, but for me, I am pleased that the change was positive.  I suspect that if I look at some of my other early articles from last summer, I could make similar adjustments with additional positive results on traffic.

Currently, this article is on Google page 6 when searching for Jesse Livermore.  The only link that I have made to the article is at Xomba.  Plus I have the HubPages RSS feed on this blog.  I will often see this article show up as a "Hot Article" since it will tend to get a few surges of traffic now and again.  With a little more promotion, it is possible that I could do even better.

Anyway, the point was that maybe I could review several of my poorer performing, evergreen articles and revamp the titles and my keyword targets.  Maybe this would result in more traffic.  Having a better sense of what people might be searching for in Google is one of the keys to making money online.  Like I said, I have learned a lot in the past year and plan to keep learning.  

The Next 365 Days

In my last post, I took a look back at my first year of making money online and found that I had written more than one piece of content per day on average and earned $2.22 on average for each of those pieces.  The results were actually better than I expected but were influenced by the payment from Life123.  I think it will be challenging to overcome that payment, but I would like to at least make as much this year per article.  That way, when I end up adding more articles, I will end up making more total.  At least the Life123 payment represented just under half of my total income for the year.

So, if I look ahead at the next 365 days, what is it exactly that I hope to accomplish, and how do I propose to accomplish these goals?  First, I want to say that while it is useful to make income and traffic goals, I really don't have any direct control over those results.  I first need to make sure that I figure out how I intend to accomplish those end goals and get those tasks finished.  So, let's look ahead at the next 365 days:

HubPages:  My goal with HubPages is to continue generating traffic at the current rate and then double it.  That means going from 25,000 views to 75,000 views over the next year.  It won't be easy to pick up an additional 25,000 views over my current pace, but I think it can be done.

Getting 50,000 views in the next year would require 136 views per day which is about one per article.  There are occasional days that I am getting that much traffic so my goal may actually be low.  I plan on writing more articles and having between 200 and 250 Hubs by a year from now.  I also plan to revamp some of my more poorly performing articles (My next post will be a useful example).  Doing a better job of linking should also help drive more traffic to my existing Hubs.

eHow:  I will not be writing any more articles so will have to live with the 38 that I have.  I can drive traffic through better linking and plan on doing this during my various linking campaigns.  I would like to more than double my views from 8,900 to 25,000 using this strategy.

Xomba:  I plan on adding more articles to get my article total to 100 over the next year.  I will also be adding links at the site to my other work.  Combining these efforts, I would hope to get my total reads around 18,000.  This might be difficult as that would mean getting about 20 reads per day.  That may not seem like a lot but the total reads from last year include reads by bots.  Now it is only counting human reads, and I know what my current daily reads are.

My Online Income Blog:  I plan on adding content steadily throughout the next year--on average 2 posts per week.  I don't make a ton of money here but enjoy the interaction with other bloggers.  I would like to add some followers and have about 60 total by the end of the next year.  I would also like to watch my Alexa rank climb into the top 400,000 or so.  I think that is possible if I can double traffic over the next year.

Miscellaneous sites:  I will continue to post periodically to my other blog, but am not sure what I will do with Triond, InfoBarrel, or Squidoo.  I also don't know if I will pursue other sites.

Niche site:  I do want to create a niche site this next year.  This will take me out of my comfort zone, but I think it is important in order to move to the next level.  I want to at least get one done by the end of 2010 so that by next May can begin to see some results.  I will probably begin to work on this in the next few months after getting done with the current Hub Challenge.

Well, it seems like I have a lot of work in store for me.  I didn't realize how much I could get done this past year while working full-time and running 6 kids all over the country for their activities.  Here's to the next 365 days. 

What are your plans?  What do you hope to accomplish?  How will you follow your progress?