Monetize Your Site

Many of my recent posts to this blog concern the Deep Link Engine. I am continuing my experiment with this plug-in, but I see a pattern forming, I think.

I did see a significant traffic boost when I first started using this plug-in. Of course, more than a couple of visitors a week is good for some of the blogs with which I am using the plug. It appears the the initial traffic boost falls off after a time. I can only see short term effects at this time, because I have not had the plug in service for a long enough period of time.

When the plug is first installed there is a bit of traffic. I suspect that most of this is blog owners checking on the pingbacks that they receive. This is validated by the traffic logs that I have followed. The surge of traffic on posting seems to have been dwindling as the age of the blog/plug increases. There is less immediate traffic to these blogs after posting.

My theory is that since the pings are tied to the keywords used, and since the blogs are concerned with one general topic, the same keywords reappear and the same blogs get pinged on a regular basis. These blog owners begin to recognize the source and either consider the pings as spam or approve without rechecking. Most of them probably consider the pings as spam since the blogs are not as well targeted as they could be. Some of the pingbacks do get approved sometimes. I do see the links showing up occasionally, and I do see occasional traffic reported in my analytics  from links that do get posted. The pingbacks are much more likely to result in a link if the blog is somewhat on topic.

Much of the traffic that I see in analytics comes from blogs that have a recent comments box on the main page. Of course these comments fall out of the recent category when a few new comments trickle in to the blog. This does point to the fact that the plug-in would be better suited to an auto-blogging context where there was a high volume of diverse material posted to the blog.

The real problem with the auto-blogging idea is that monetization will not be as effective without a lot of work. I have had amazing results with my posts. My affiliate links are collecting clicks at a rate that has approached 50%. There have been no conversions, but the affiliate cookies are persistent and there may be a payoff over the next few weeks (I would not suggest holding your breath.

The high click through rates are due to the presentation that I have been using on these blogs. I match a text link and a banner to the content of the post in the main posting box. The banners seem to be the source of most of the clicks. This demonstrates the value of truly targeted traffic and the potential that is available to the Internet marketer. The key, as always is to get truly targeted traffic to your blog or website.

If nothing else the experience gained through this exercise has been worth the time invested. I have had under a one percent click through rate in the past and have seen an average of over ten percent over the past couple of weeks. I had almost suspected that there was a problem with the reporting on my primary affiliate program site, but then I looked at some of the other numbers and realized that there is a clear trend. This trend is not entirely due to the Deep Link Engine. While having the semi-targeted traffic helps the real story here, as far as the click through rate is concerned, is with the layout and add placement.

I now understand my job better and may be able to pursue a more profitable course of action. If I can convert some of this traffic into sales it will be a beautiful thing.

I have recently added banner advertising to several of my sites. On some of these sites I use a simple php script to randomly rotate the banners so that the content appears to be dynamic. I have attempted to select the advertisers that will be of interest to the visitors of a particular site.

There is an advantage to niche sites in that you know the targeted audience. You can select advertisers that have products that will appeal to most of the visitors to that site. Adsense does a good job of matching the ads to the content on a page, but my click through rate still hovers around 1% for the Google ads. I think that these ads are easy to ignore since they are so prevalent around the web. Good banners appear to catch the eye and provide better click through rates. There have been one or two days when my click through rate on the banner ads has exceeded 30% according to the statistics on my affiliate network data page.

The advantage with Google ads is that they are pay-per-click. The website owner makes a small amount for each click on an ad. The banner ads are mostly pay-per-action so a click does not necessarily result in even a small increment of income. The person that clicks on the banner must complete some specified action in order for the site owner to get paid. The action can be filling out a form or joining a program, in which case there is usually a flat rate offered for the action. The action can also be making a purchase from the merchant. For purchases the offer is usually for a percentage commission.

Most pay per action programs do not require an immediate action on the part of the visitor. If the required action takes place within a time frame set up in the individual agreement then the incentive will be paid. These time frames can vary from immediate to infinite. The potential income from pay per action programs is much greater than pay per click.