Associate Programs Newsletter #525
I don’t know whether you’re a glass half-full or glass half-empty sort of person but these days I keep stumbling across people who are pessimistic about something.
If you’re pessimistic about affiliate marketing, I think that’s a ridiculous attitude, because there’s so much new data to be optimistic about.
Here are 7 reasons to be optimistic about your future in affiliate marketing.
#7 Did you see Google’s latest profit report? Google’s revenue for the 3 months to the end of September was $9.72 billion. That’s billion with a “b”. Online companies are spending massive sums on online advertising. Via AdSense, we can get our share. There’s LOTS to go around.
#6 Amazon’s sales increased 44% to $10.88 billion in the third quarter of 2011, compared with the same time last year. That’s an extraordinary jump.
#5 ValueClick has just had a good third quarter, too, predicting lots more revenue next year and a good year for affiliate marketing.
#4 World-wide e-commerce sales are growing at a staggering 19.4% a year, according to Goldman Sachs. More and more people are going online and becoming more comfortable with buying online.
#3 Goldman says global retail sales on the web are predicted to rise from $472.5 billion in 2010 to $963 billion in 2013. That’s nearly a TRILLION! This means more companies online, more products sold and many more customers for all of us.
#2 Cyber Monday sales in the U.S. hit a new one-day record of $1.25 billion, according to comScore. Cyber Monday has spread into Cyber Week, with Tuesday and Wednesday also topping the $1 billion mark in sales for a single day. All this increased enthusiasm for buying goods online is fantastic news for affiliates.
#1 Most things you worry about don’t happen. Years ago, Joanna was worrying about something and took some advice she found in a self-help article: She began keeping notes of all the things she was worrying about, and checking later to see how things turned out. You know the sort of thing… Would we lose our part-time jobs? Would we be able to pay our mortgages? Would we solve our health challenges? As it turned out, NONE of the things we worried about ever happened. Remember, 99% of the things you worry about never materialize.
If you are worried about the future of your online business, the most powerful thing you can do today is… Take action. Do something.
For example, you could get out of bed half an hour earlier tomorrow and… But why wait till then? Right now, do this…
As your first priority every day, ask yourself one of my favorite questions…
“What’s the most important thing I can do RIGHT NOW to improve my business?”
Now DO it. Don’t allow yourself to get distracted. Just do it.
As almost all of you probably already know, in affiliate marketing you can succeed simply by spending most of your time concentrating on two basics.
1. Create high quality content.
2. Get high quality links.
If you own a simple affiliate business and you’re spending most of your time doing other things, such as reading emails, or “researching”, when deep down you know you should be concentrating on creating content and getting links, then you really need to keep asking yourself…
“What’s the most important thing I can do RIGHT NOW to improve my business?”
And then do it. When you do, you’ll feel good because you’ll see yourself making progress.
Try it for 21 days. It takes most people about that long to form a new habit.
If you keep following this simple recipe, you won’t need to waste time worrying about things that never happen.
By the way, Google says its latest algorithm update puts more emphasis on fresh content. No doubt this will encourage some affiliates to try to outsmart Google by producing even more worthless articles.
Can you outsmart Google with dumb content that no one wants to read or link to?
We’re not going to even try to do that, are we?
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New AdSense competitor starts small
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It’s pleasing to see that AdSense has a new competitor, but don’t expect it to be just like AdSense. It will mostly provide display advertising.
WordPress has teamed up with Federated Media to provide the service, called AdWords. Whoops! Sorry. I mean WordAds.
At this stage, WordAds is not for everyone. You’ll need to own a WordPress blog with a custom domain name, have quality content, and receive an unspecified amount of traffic.
“Think of it like a beta – we’re working with a few partners as we test out the concept and build out our systems, then we’ll open it up over time to a wider and wider audience,” says WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg.
Jon Burke of WordPress told VentureBeat that WordAds will mostly deal in display advertising (banners, pictures and maybe some text). The types of ads will depend greatly on the kind of content each blog produces.
The new ad service is expected to launch in the first quarter of 2012.
If you’ve been kicked out of AdSense, perhaps you can make a fresh start with WordAds. Otherwise, based on the few details announced so far, I can’t see any reason why you’d want to bother.
WordsAds announcement:
https://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/wordads/
Apply here:
https://en.wordpress.com/apply-for-wordads/
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Who else wants 700 times more visitors?
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On average, SBI sites get a massive 700 times more unique visitors than WordPress blogs hosted at WordPress.com.
Thanks to Ken Evoy for this startling news…
If you examine the WordPress stats at https://en.wordpress.com/stats/ you’ll see that WordPress.com hosts half of the 68 million WordPress sites in the world.
These 34 million blogs attract 321 million “people” (unique visitors).
Sounds a lot, doesn’t it? But…
That’s an average of 9 visitors per month.
In comparison, in November, 2011, average stats of SBI sites were..
9,400 visits/month.
So the average SBI! site gets 700 times more visitors than the 34 million blogs hosted by WordPress.com.
The most important difference between WordPress and SBI is that while WordPress is a tool and SBI is a bunch of tools, SBI also provides you with step-by-step instructions and videos, teaching you how to brainstorm, research, and build a successful online business – as taught in more 30 colleges and universites around the world.
SBI wasn’t designed with AdSense revenue in mind – it was invented before AdSense appeared – but it’s perfect for generating revenue from AdSense and affiliate programs.
If you’ve been thinking about getting SBI, now is the pefect time, because, starting on Friday, there’s a “Buy 1, Get 1 Free” offer.
If you’ve been experimenting with WordPress and not getting very far, I strongly recommend you you do what more than 100,000 other SBI customers have done – build your online business with SBI.
For years, I’ve been recommending SBI to family and friends. It’s a life-changer. They love it.
By the time you read this, the “Buy 1, Get 1 Free” offer may be available.
(I’ve just checked. You’re in luck. The offer has already begun. Be quick. Grab it while it’s still there.)
Check out the tools you get with SBI
Check out the proof of success
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Affiliate gardeners
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Joanna and I are in New Zealand now, here for the southern summer, just in time for the start of the cherry season, and for all the other delicious summer fruit and vegetables that grow exceptionally well in southern NZ.
I like our apartment in Queensland, but it feels really good to be back in a house with a garden.
We were relieved to see that our lopsided 100-year-old apricot tree – supported by two hefty timber props – has survived another winter, even though the trunk is three-quarters rotten at the base. We really must plant new fruit trees this year.
I’m doing some experimental vegie gardening.
Last summer, I added bags of donkey poo from a nearby farm to a large heap of garden and kitchen waste, watered it thoroughly and covered the heap with a large tarpaulin. Now my garden rubbish has turned into useful looking compost, in which I’ve planted various varieties of tomatoes, capsicums (bell peppers to Americans), climbing beans, zucchini, and herbs.
When roots of the tomatoes and beans go down a few inches, they’ll discover a surprise package of donkey poo. That should either energize them or kill them. We’ll see.
As with affiliate marketing, a little bit of spadework, experimenting, and maintenance can produce healthy results. At worst, we learn something useful.
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Thought for today: Tomorrow
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“Gardening is a way of showing that you believe in tomorrow.” – Author unknown.
All the best
Allan Gardyne
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