Why Your Affiliate Marketing Stinks (And 3 Ways to Fix It)
Published by Jeremy. Last Updated on December 15, 2020.
Disclaimer: This Week in Blogging uses demographic data, email opt-ins, and affiliate links to operate this site. Please review our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.
Affiliate marketing is a tough nut to crack, and I would know.
Three years ago, in my 9th year of blogging, I was barely making $100 per month on affiliate marketing, despite having over 150,000 monthly page views on my two sites combined ($0.66 on an RPM, revenue-per-1000, basis).
After many months of testing, optimizing, re-optimizing, and learning about best practices, I've overhauled my process to consistently make $1,500 to $2,000 per month in affiliate marketing on 225,000 monthly page views ($6.66 to $8.88 on a RPM basis- over a 10x increase!).
During this process, I learned the reason why my affiliate marketing sucks, and realized it is the reason why most blogger's affiliate marketing sucks. So today, I wanted to share more about this, and give the three biggest lessons learned in the entire process- whether you're a beginner looking for how to start affiliate marketing or are a bit more advanced and want to increase your earnings.
What Happened When I Removed Dates from My URL Slugs
Published by Jeremy. Last Updated on December 14, 2020.
Disclaimer: This Week in Blogging uses demographic data, email opt-ins, and affiliate links to operate this site. Please review our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.
When I started my first blog in 2008, I had no idea what I was doing. In many cases I opted for whatever the default setting was in Blogger (my CMS at the time), and, as blogging best practices weren't established just yet, I had no idea why some settings were terrible.
This has come back to bite me many times throughout the years.
Having dates in my URLs was one such setting that I was unaware could pose a problem down the road.
It only took 11 years for me to pay a developer to remove dates from my URL slugs on that site, and quite frankly it was something I should've done a long time ago. In this one, I wanted to share the results of this change.
Pitching Tips for Bloggers with Lavina Dsousa
Published by Chris. Last Updated on December 14, 2020.
Disclaimer: This Week in Blogging uses demographic data, email opt-ins, and affiliate links to operate this site. Please review our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.
A lot of the time in the blogging world, opportunity doesn't present itself on a platter, and that means you need to understand how to effectively market yourself. Perhaps the most obvious way that we seek out opportunity is through pitching. In short, “pitching” is the practice of reaching out to new potential clients or partners to showcase why you'd ideal to work with.
It could be because you've got a stranglehold on their niche, or because of your access to a strong community that heeds your advice, your proven professionalism, or any number of things. That, ultimately, is for you to know and convey in your pitch.
Pitching, as you probably already know, is more an art than a science, so it's always worthwhile to see how other people approach it. And that's why today we've got an expert who knows a thing or two about pitching. Don't forget, by the way, that we feature an expert every week on everything from SEO to affiliate marketing, YouTube to Patreon. But today, of course, it's all things pitching, so we'll go ahead and introduce our expert!
Lavina is an Analyst, Entrepreneur and the founder of ContinentHop.com which strives to inspire professionals to invest in immersive travel and make the most of their limited holidays while ensuring they get to explore the world no matter how short the duration. In addition to being a content creator, she is also a freelance writer, photographer and mentor to numerous women, helping them to start working remotely while working full-time.
To empower women she met on her travels, she set up untraditionalhumans.com, a space for South Asian women to share their stories about breaking free from norms and to inspire others to never give up.
She's also been to 52 countries across 5 continents, while working full-time. She has been nominated for various awards including one by Saveur magazine for her expertise in food, culture and travel, and has worked with numerous brands like Intrepid Travel, Skyscanner, and TripAdvisor to help them get the most from their marketing campaigns. She's also been featured by Lonely Planet and the Times of India to name a few.
Affiliate Marketing for Bloggers with Kayleigh Zara
Published by Chris. Last Updated on December 7, 2020.
Disclaimer: This Week in Blogging uses demographic data, email opt-ins, and affiliate links to operate this site. Please review our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.
It's difficult to imagine a blogger being able to turn their passion into a profession without harnessing the power of affiliate marketing. It's probably not the very first thing you think about when starting a blog, but once you start to gain traction an audience, then utilizing affiliate marketing in your content strategy is almost a no-brainer.
For those who may be closer to the start of their blogging journey, affiliate marketing is simply the commission you earn from promoting somebody else's product. This can be a product for a company, or for an individual, and the rates and agreement will usually be a little different depending on what it is you're actually promoting.
Of course, the larger your site is, and the more traffic you have, the more potential there is for your affiliate marketing partnerships to pay off. That's why utilizing SEO best practices is vital, as well as continuing to learn about blogging best practice from experienced bloggers.
We'll step aside and stop talking about affiliate marketing, so that we can let today's expert shine. Today, we're very fortunate to be joined by Kayleigh Zara.
Kayleigh is a 24 year old full time freelancer based in the UK. Her main blog can be found at Kayleighzaraa.com, but she currently runs and manages three blogs in total. She, like us, has the belief that with a little bit of guidance anyone can make money online. When she's not blogging, she's a PhD student, and really enjoys black and white movies, caffeine and martinis!
We like her style.
LinkedIn for Bloggers with Katherine Banks
Published by Chris. Last Updated on November 30, 2020.
Disclaimer: This Week in Blogging uses demographic data, email opt-ins, and affiliate links to operate this site. Please review our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.
We're doing our best at This Week in Blogging to cover a wide breadth of topics with our interviews, and, with this interview, our aim is to offer some insight on LinkedIn for bloggers.
For a long time, LinkedIn was the stuck up platform that you immediately thought of as useless the moment you stepped out of company culture and into content creation and blogging. But that's a tired trope that doesn't necessarily hold weight anymore. LinkedIn has been on a massive growth spurt as of late, and in the process, the door has opened wider as to just who LinkedIn is for, and who it can serve.
It used to be a headquarters for the powerful narcissists of business, but nowadays, it's a more creative, vulnerable and supportive space than it's every been. More than anything, LinkedIn has finally made it kosher to sprinkle in a bit of personal with the professional, while staying focused on being a “business platform.”
Our thoughts aside, we wanted to chat with someone for whom LinkedIn has been a game-changer. Enter, Katherine Banks, a social media marketer who specializes in travel destinations at Traveling Greek, but is known in particular for her unique usage of technology (blockchain + AI) in her content creation strategy. Thanks to Katherine for joining us!
