If you already have content in the form of a site or blog, consider how you can present products to your visitors. Maybe you will simply create a weekly post featuring a merchants product, or your are considering creating an online store as an addition to your current site or blog.  Maybe you want to create an online store with a specific theme.

Product data feeds can help you do all these things and more. To show you what a product datafeed can do, I created an entire site from scratch in three days using the product data feed from a merchant that sells one thing. Pajamas.

First I selected a topic or niche that I thought would perform well in the next few months. I considered how I can promote it and what sort of budget I have to promote it. My promotions will focus on: PPC (google adwords), organic traffic via social media, organic traffic via optimized SEO.

I then determined a keyword friendly domain url and I obtained some affordable web hosting  that supports WordPress. I installed wordpress and the plugins that optimize SEO and user experience.

Then I signed up for a third party Data feed service ( i.e. popshops or datafeedr). I decided on Datafeedr as I like their ability to create categories. Datafeedr was easy to use and has a WordPress Plugin. I then created the images, navigation and store.

A product datafeed, and a third party data feed service allowed me to create an entire product specific website/store without needing to worry about the overhead costs of running an actual eccomerce online store. By partnering with established merchants my ‘online store’ was up and running in just three days (a realistic time frame would be two weeks).

View the site at www.PajamaTree.com

So how can you utilize the product data feeds for your merchant programs?

Today’s tip is Article writing.

Write some quality, unique, articles on topics relative to your website or blog.  Consider what type of visitor you are looking for and write content for that audience.

For example, if you blog about family, write a series of short articles related to parenting. Something as simple as ‘Funny things children do’ sharing stories of your child’s antics would be unique and well received.

Write a short author bio that contains the search terms for promoting your website. If your blog is a cooking blog don’t write a bio about your teaching background. It should outline your cooking background.  Share your bio with others and ask for feedback ( post your bio here in the comments and I will provide some feedback). Pick three relative keywords for your website link.

My sample below shows that my link words are Outsourced Affiliate Management not my blog or business name. Consider what keywords  people search for.

Article Bio Sample;

About the Author: Karrine McFarlane is the owner of Her Media Marketing and Design Ltd. Established in 2006. A certified affiliate manager, Karrine has over 13 years of experience developing Internet presences for businesses and has been working within the  Internet advertising industry for over 7 years. Outsourced Affiliate Management Solutions http://www.her-media.com

Submitting your articles

Many website publications will only accept unique content. Before submitting your article to bulk article directories consider submitting your articles to some top website publishers within your audience profile.

There are thousnads of article directories out there. Our goal is not backlinks, but developing organic traffic so you only need to submit yoru articles to a few of the top directories such as;

Article Circle

Amazine

Article Geek

A list of top article directories can be found here.

You’re right. I hear that from bloggers a lot. Why don’t they convert?  There are a few reasons but the top two are;

1) Your content is not a close enough match or to generic.

2) You have too many outgoing links

Allot of bloggers find that sidebar affiliate banner ads don’t convert. Affiliate ads can be tricky, the content has to match (i.e. seo’d posts). They work better as they create organic search engine sales down the road …

So if you have a generic parenting blog skip the sidebar banners this month but don’t just give up on affiliate ads. Instead look at your archived content.

That’s’ why we offer a 500 by 100 banner that fits on the bottom of posts. A lot of our affiliates simply place the banners on old archived posts that are relevant each month – keeping their new content clean while monetizing their older content.

Give it a try, you won’t see large volume or immediate results but you will build more consistent ongoing affiliate revenue down the road.

As a publisher you have limited prime ad space on each of your pages. With each page you create you are faced with the decision of what to place in these spots (ideally you will have an adserver tag which will rotate your offers/campaigns but that is another training post).

An in house ad would mean that you are promoting an offer to your visitors that benefits your website over an advertisers campaign.

Here are some examples of possible inhouse campaigns:

1) Announcing something new on your website such as a ‘giveaway page or new tool’.
2) Encouraging sign ups; (register now) or newsletter subscriptions (get offers to your inbox for free)
3) Featuring another page of your website
4) Visitor surveys

Sometimes (especially with a new site) increasing your subscriber base is more important then a paid advertisement . Why? The  value of your ad space is based on your traffic volume. So until you have enough visitors and subscribers (those who return to your site) the spot has little or no value as a paid advertisement.

To recap:

1) In house campaigns are not paid advertisements but your own ads and offers that increase your traffic /subscriber base or announce new features on your site.

2) When you first create your design and page layouts the top spaces should be used to increase your followers and encourage return visits to your website.

The goal of an affiliate post is to generate traffic from search engines specific to the offer or product being featured on the page.

A parent looking for childrens Halloween costumes would type what into a search engine?

So the goal for a post would be creating a SEO rich post using these keywords and making a specific call to action to get users to click your affiliate link.

Here’s an example using Kidorable;

Keywords: Kidorable, children, Halloween costume
Post title: Kidorable as a Halloween Costume for children
Content should be about 350-500 words and include your Keywords.

i.e.
Have you ever thought ‘Wouldn’t it be great if my child could use their Halloween costume year round?’ Well I have found the answer!

Kidorable’s unique line of rain gear for children makes a great Halloween costume that not only keeps your children dry but your child gets to wear their Halloween costume all year long.

I really liked these ideas for a Kidorable Halloween costume …
Feature some of the products. Offer tips on personalizing the rain gear – include a coupon code – get creative it’s your unique content.

Be sure to also include META tags. Including keywords, title, and description.
Make sure your urls are search engine friendly

We always include a banner for our programs that is 500 by 100 which fits perfect at the end of a blog post – where it is more likely to be clicked by a reader of the post. you can grab the html code in your CJ dashboard:

To promote an affiliate program effectively you want to have a bit of a plan.
The banner would be great on any Halloween related posts. Banners in a post or article will CLICK better then sidebar items…

You could even simply create posts about Halloween in general :
Halloween craft ideas for kids
Halloween safety
My kids Halloween costumes

Think about who would click a Kidorable banner – what are they interested in? Write a post for that shopper and include the banner …

Hope that helps!

My Twitter Affiliate Traffic Tips:

1)  Build your followship. Ask yourself  who are the people you will find your offers and tweets interesting. Only these followers will engage (click) your tweets.  I personally use Tweet Adder to locate unique targeted tweeples to follow. Tweet adder is affordable and can help manage all aspects of your Twitter management.

2) Interact with your followers – do not JUST post out your offers and links.

3) Use a Twitter management tool such as HootSuite to manage your twitter accounts. Schedule future tweets.

As an affiliate you need to build a followship of over 4000 targeted followers before you will see a lot of benefit to your campaigns.

So put it on your to do list.

review your Twitter efforts and establish a way to build your follow-ship and manage your interaction with your followers.

Why do links matter?
Both the incoming links to your website AND your outgoing links matter.

Incoming Links: Incoming links matter to the search engines, your credibility, and the quality of your visitors.

Incoming links from websites with relevant content create relevant visitors. 10 RELEVANT visitors has more impact to your revenue then 100 non interested visitors who don’t stay to read your site or interact. i.e. if you have a blog about pregnancy, you want links back from websites relevant to those interested in pregnancy.

Outgoing Links: Outgoing links matter to your success and revenue potential.

It is basic math. You want your visitor to click your affiliate link (or other revenue generating link). If your side bar is cluttered with too many outgoing buttons, badges, and links, you are ASKING your visitor to LEAVE your blog or website over asking them to interact with a revenue generating aspect of your website.

You need a LINK strategy for every one of your websites and blogs. You also need to review the effectiveness of your links. Does that entre card widget or blog frog widget bring you QUALITY visitors?  Revenue?  Does that banner generate you revenue? If not it’s time to make some changes.

Speaking of banner ads – Are you monetizing your ad space by using an ad server? Or do you show the same banner to EVERYONE on every page?

Google offers a free adserver solution – so there’s no reason you aren’t using an adserver:

The keys to earning money on your blog/s are:

1) Have unique content.

2) Blog about something you know so you can provide valuable content.

3) Treat it like a business and have a plan.

4) Know how to design a layout that encourages ‘conversion’ not just clicks. Regardless of how your advertisers pay you – if they don’t see a return on their investment, they will not return.

So let go of your generic blog and  plan to build 1-3 NICHE content blogs.

So here’s some tips to figure out what your blog niche should be:

1. Make TWO LISTS – One of your passions & One of things you do well.
2. Make a list of all the things that are in BOTH lists and select 2-5 of these.

Here’s my example list:
Childrens fashion
Early Childhood Education
Homeschooling

Now that you know what topics you likely have enough knowledge and interest in it’s time to dig deeper…

You need to understand what people will search (keywords) to get to your site and how much potential traffic those keywords (your niches) have.

Google has done the homework for you. They KNOW how many people have searched for your topics, and that information will tell you what sort of traffic potential your blog has.

3. Go to Google Keywords and search for your topics..

Here’s some interesting results in my searches under ‘childrens fashion’:
The top search was clothes girl 1,500,000 and the competition wasn’t hat high (about 3/4 bar)
baby girl clothing came next 1,000,000 and the competition was really high.
An interesting surprise was ‘smocked clothing’ 40,500 and not too high for competition.

4. Now you need to consider the money making potential.
Go to Google and search for your keywords- look to see how many ‘sponsor ads’ you find in the side bar.
Check The top three Affiliate networks to see what sort of CPA program offers are out there. What sort of commission do they offer ? Most campaigns need a min 12% to convert. Check their EPC rates.

It’s the publisher hat I am always talking about. You need to know your audience and your publication/blog’s potential reach if you want to earn ad revenue on your blog.

1) You have too many outgoing LINKS on your pages. (Side bars can kill your affiliate revenue if you have too many banners, buttons, and things that don’t earn you revenue.)

2) Your affiliate links aren’t generating enough clicks. (see number 1)

3) You aren’t promoting your affiliate links across more than one venue. (i.e. you are only placing links in your sidebar.)

So how do you solve this? Take one of your programs (we’ll use TotSites as an example here ) and create a plan.

1) Place  a converting banner in the top fold of your side bar. I hate to say it – but 125 buttons do NOT click. Their click ratio – well stinks-  compared to a 160 by 600 skyscraper. What is it they say – go BIG or go home use an ADSERVER to get the most of your space.

2) Use your old content. Go through your old posts and  put the 500×100 banner across the bottom of your posts. This way you don’t take away from your post’s content  but give your readers somewhere to click when they are done reading your post.

3) Create a weekly post on a  relevant topic that contains the sites KEY WORDS. For Tot sites these could be any post related to your children. Schedule them to come out over the month.

4) Social Media->  If you have a Facebook  page or group share your affiliate links on your wall. Tweet your links out using a free service like hootsuite.com  to schedule a unique tweet every 3-4 days.

5) If you have a newsletter, plan to feature one of your affiliate programs in each one. Email the program manager and ask for a product ‘bio’, product image, and company logo.(if you don’t have a newsletter – it is time to get one- check out Mail chimp. It’s free for up to 500 subscribers.

6) Promote your affiliate links onsite, through social media, and email.(OK I repeated that – but it is important to NOT put all your eggs in one basket.)

7) Build traffic to your site.

Have realistic expectations of the numbers it takes to convert an ad on the Internet. Less than 4% of the clicks to any one ad will result in a sale.

9) Create quality SEO ‘d posts and pages relevant to the ads located on the page.

10) Unless you have a VERY niche site with very targeted banner ads – The side bar banner ads won’t be  your bread and butter. Your pages are. Place your banners and text links in your content.

So how do you get the search engines to bring you those visitors ? With some blog SEO.

There are some ways to automate blog seo. If you have a wordpress blog there are a few blog seo plugins. However if you don’t understand why you need seo and how to seo your blog posts manually maybe you should hold off on the seo automation.

Quick and dirty tips (ok not really dirty) for blog post SEO

1)  CONTENT -  Google bots will read every word in each of your posts. For the best results you need at least 2-3 paragraphs and each post should relate to a specific topic. Know your topic ahead of time.

2) Know the keywords you need to include. You may think that ‘coupon organizer’ is the blog seo keyword that will get you the most qualifying traffic, but Google and the search engines HAVE the numbers. The KNOW what keywords people search.

So use a handy sidebar tool like Wordtrack SEO blogger or Google’s keyword generator and use the top searched keywords.

Using Wordtracker SEO Blogger on I  typed in ‘grocery coupons’ and it gave me a list  of 30 TOP searched keywords on Google to include

3) Title tags – The top keyword should be in your Title

i.e. Organize your ‘grocery coupons’ savings with the couponizer

4) Meta tags: Blog Seo means including your keywords in your meat tags along with a description using your blog SEO keywords. This is a bit harder in blogger or blogspot. There are many great videos on you tube explaining how to create SEO meta tags in blogger.

Good SEO is about quality content rich in keywords.

If you are creating content for a specific affiliate program, consider writing 2-5 posts at once, using a different  but relevant ‘content idea’. Then schedule your posts over a three month period.