hey how's it going welcome to the Doug
show this is Doug Pennington this is
episode one and we're gonna talk about
affiliate marketing in Amazon affiliate
marketing so let's get to it
yeah that is some high-energy intro
music I hope I can keep up with it
before I get into the content today
which is affiliate marketing and Amazon
affiliate marketing let's do a quick few
housekeeping items here so number one
for show notes and other links please go
to Doug dot show that's it it's just
Doug dot show in the show notes there
will be a link to download a free pdf of
a more detailed process than what we're
gonna go through for affiliate marketing
so be sure to check out the link there
as this is the first episode I'm still
feeling things out the way it'll work
today is I'll do a bit of a monologue
here where I'm just gonna talk about
affiliate marketing and that sort of
thing I'm also going to have a little
segment where my wife joins me we're
going to talk about resolutions and sort
of themes four goals each month and our
dog Georgi joins us you'll hear her
squeak in her toy in that short
conversation and then finally at the end
I'll cover a couple frequently asked
questions about affiliate marketing and
Amazon affiliate marketing so those
should be really good those questions
will actually be this super common one
should I start an Amazon affiliate site
and then another one is around how much
affiliate sites earn with like Amazon
Associates so without further ado let's
get to it
[Music]
let's start with an introduction to
affiliate marketing in general this is
how it works if you recommend a product
to someone and they make a purchase
after using your affiliate link then you
get a commission the concept is very
simple but it could be new to you now I
was right there with you when I first
found affiliate marketing and making
money online it was through the smart
passive income podcast and that was back
in 2013 now I didn't know anything about
affiliate marketing at the time or
actually anything about WordPress making
money online or niche sites in general
there are a lot of affiliate programs
out there and for example you can work
with a like big marketplace like
ShareASale and they match up marketers
with retail companies there are also
marketplaces that have mostly a focus on
like information products and software
like Clickbank or Commission Junction
and there are other programs with like
big retailers like Walmart and Target
and Amazon so as you can imagine from
the title and what I've been talking
about Amazon is sort of my go-to so
Amazon's program is called the Amazon
associate program now just in general
outside of affiliate marketing I prefer
to shop on Amazon I like to order stuff
online versus going to a physical store
for like 90 percent of the things that I
buy and that's probably one of the main
reasons why I like Amazon so much there
are pros and cons for working with
Amazon so once it the pros first people
do buy a lot of stuff on Amazon you get
a commission for all the products in
someone's order not just the item that
you link to Amazon has a extremely
diverse range of products and you can
market the products using a blog which
is kind of my main content outlet also
you could use YouTube social media and
I guess there's probably some other
online things you could do but that
covers the majority of it so a blog
YouTube and social media now cons for
using Amazon the commission rate is
lower than other programs and in the
show notes I'll I'll paste a link to the
latest commission rates but in general
you get paid anywhere from like one to
ten percent and it depends on the
category that the product is in now
again you do get a commission for all
the products in someone's order but it
does depend on what category that
specific product came from other cons
well there's a lot of rules to follow
with the operating agreement too many to
go into now but some some of them in
general are around usage of images
listing prices and there are just
special rules that you need to follow in
the last con that I'll mention is you
can't use email marketing directly for
Amazon Associates now let's get into the
four main phases of an Amazon affiliate
site or at least launching one now if
your experience with niche sites and you
already know the steps it is possible
that you may have a hard time explaining
to other people what you do or you know
what you're interested in trying if you
haven't started a site yet so hopefully
these four steps will simplify the
process for them in whatever you need to
explain it to someone now the caveat
here is we're you know we could divide
the four steps into like hundreds of
steps which I have done in other areas
as far as like a task list but this is a
high overview just to give you the you
know the main points so again you could
use these ideas maybe even send this
podcast over to your parents or your
friends or maybe even your spouse to
explain this hopefully I hope this is
the simpler way so quick note I am a
project manager by trade I did software
project management for something like
ten years and I'm a PMP also and that's
a project management professional I got
laid off a few
years ago back in 2015 so when I talk
about these phases it's very much in a
framework of project management I'm not
gonna go deep into the lingo and the
corporate jargon of project management
because it's boring
but keep it in mind that this is a well
thought-out process it's been used and
refined and repeated over and over again
and I'm really just dividing it up into
the major areas so you'll have a better
idea on what to focus on in certain
phases so here are the four main phases
so number one pick a niche number two
you setup your site and you're probably
going to use WordPress number three
you're going to be posting and
publishing content and number four is to
get traffic to your site by promoting
and doing outreach now that was super
simplified so we're gonna dive into each
one of these steps a little bit more
deeply so number one is choosing your
niche
and it sounds simple especially if
you've already done this sort of process
before it sounds easy but a lot of
people get stuck on this step now one of
the reasons why is it's one of the most
important phases of the process and
every single part of the rest of your
niche site process is dependent on
choosing a niche that targets a willing
group of buyers so basically if you're
the kind of person who experiences
paralysis by analysis where you can't
quite make a decision you keep
researching ad nauseam you just research
more and more and you try and figure
things out perfectly before you take
action this is the step that you may get
stuck on in fact I've worked with a lot
of people where they basically just kept
doing research in fact maybe even for a
couple of years and they were literally
experts on the whole process they
understood all the steps they knew all
the vocabulary around affiliate
marketing but they just never picked the
niche because they were scared that they
would make the wrong decision so if I
haven't scared you yet then
hopefully hopefully no one else will but
basically you can't make this work if
you don't have a commercially viable
niche or market so this is what I like
to say you should be intercepting a
customer on the way to make a purchase
on Amazon so the people visiting your
website will be buying something no
matter what you just need to help them
make that buying decision and by the way
that is the value that we're bringing to
the world right it doesn't feel good if
you're gonna start a website publish you
know information that's not helpful for
someone and you're not really helping
anyone at all so you don't want to do
that the value that you're bringing to
the world the value that you're bringing
to the Internet is someone's trying to
pick out for example the best of all
point pen for note taking or something
like that and then you're gonna help
them make a decision based on their
needs and what you know and what
research has been done on the topic of
choosing such a wonderful pen so you're
helping them make a buying decision
that's the whole point so there are
three main things that you need to keep
in mind so that you can confidently
create a site and like around the Amazon
affiliate program so a couple of the
things you want to think about are the
products in the niche available on
Amazon right so that's the most obvious
thing next is it big enough so there's a
couple things that you'll need to think
about with that but is the niche big
enough the third main thing is if the
competition level acceptable so the
first one's pretty easy you could just
go over to Amazon and start browsing
around for products I recommend you take
a look at some products that you're
interested and/or familiar with already
and start looking at the category other
products within the category and you'll
get an idea if there are products
available most of the time I mean Amazon
basically has everything so it would be
surprising if Amazon doesn't have the
product unless it happens to be some
sort of like highly controlled I don't
like like drugs or firearms which you
know that's a whole other calm
anyway within a few minutes of browsing
around on Amazon you'll see other
related products on the product pages in
in less than an hour I would think you
could generate a list of dozens of
products on Amazon now as far as the
competition level that's a little bit
more difficult that's more in-depth but
a lot of times you could just Google
some terms and then figure out like what
other sites are out there and I would
say most of the time unless it's a super
highly competitive niche you're probably
gonna have some wiggle room if you niche
down far enough now talking about
pitching down far enough and doing the
research keyword research is huge
and that could be a course all on its
own a full course but the one thing that
I will introduce you to here in a very I
guess brief way is the keyword golden
ratio and the keyword golden ratio is a
concept that I created around finding
keywords that are underserved on the
internet it is a data-driven way it is a
manual way to look up keywords that
literally don't have enough results on
the internet so again it's going to be
just a brief introduction but it's a
data-driven way to find keywords that
are underserved on the internet and
there are many videos on YouTube again
I'll put some links in the show notes so
that you can see me explain the process
and show you how to find keywords but
there are many different keyword tools
that you may use out there and just
about any of them are fine I'm not a
huge proponent of any one keyword
research tool but it's more about how
you use the tools and what you do with
the information so overall for selecting
a niche you have to figure out if the
products are available on Amazon if the
niche is big enough and you use keyword
research to find out how many people are
searching for a term for a particular
niche and then figure out if the
competition level is acceptable
so the next thing in the process is
setting up your site it's fairly
straightforward it's less of an art and
research and more of a science and you
could pretty much treat this
mechanically if you've created a website
before you could probably do this in a
couple hours or so you need to choose a
domain name so that maybe is the
creative part you need to pick a domain
name you need to set up a hosting
account and then set up a wordpress site
which in most cases takes like under
five minutes you could just click a
button and on your hosting account and
WordPress is installed and then after
that you need to select a wordpress
theme which this is another area which I
don't say you have to use X theme you
don't have to use a particular theme
there are some themes that are better
than others but some of my some of my
early sites I just you'd use the free
wordpress theme that is included
whenever you install WordPress and I
just use that because it was the
simplest one to use and in my opinion
communicating clearly is more important
than having a flashy website with sexy
formatting as far as choosing a domain
name I don't recommend you use like an
exact match domain name and that would
be this situation where you put your
keyword into your domain name I don't
recommend that that was a popular way to
do it maybe like eight to ten years ago
it's kind of an old-school way that's
not effective anymore
or at least it's not the smart way to go
I'll put it that way it may it may work
out fine but an example would be best
ballpoint pen for journaling com you're
kind of painting yourself in a corner
and I think when I say it like that you
can see that you can't really expand out
very much so I don't recommend exact
match domains further just pick
something brandable find something
that's easy to spell maybe not confusing
to say out loud you don't want it to be
complicated where it's hard for people
to figure out and shorter is better just
in general so after that step three is
about
publishing content this is a crucial
step to master and it's gonna it's gonna
take a while right if you haven't done
much writing it's gonna be like climbing
a mountain it's it's kind of seem very
difficult but the good part is you can
hire people so when I first started I
wrote most of the content like 90% of
the content myself and then after I
started making a little bit of money
then I started hiring writers to do the
work for me again the great part is
there are marketplaces out there like up
work or you can hire just freelance
writers work with them directly and you
have the protection of working via the
up work platform so you have some
protection the the writer and freelancer
they would have protection too so you
put money in escrow they are not paid
until you approve the content or
whatever work you're having done so
again there's good protection for the
the freelancer and for you so I really
like using up work I find you can get
really good writers for you know fairly
good prices you could hire people
located in the US or North America or in
Asia or Europe or wherever you want
someone to be located me personally I
don't care where someone's located I
just want to make sure that they can
write while using you know the right
lingo using the right American English
and vernacular and all that stuff so
again I don't really care where they're
located now further if you don't want to
work with someone directly like on up
work there are services out there that
you can hire where they assign you a
project manager and you work with a
project manager and they work with the
writers and they manage the process and
the schedule and all that it cost more
right because they're doing more of the
admin and management but it's easier for
you so if you have more money than time
one of those services could be a good
way to go so the last step is around
getting traffic all right so it can seem
difficult in fact there there's a huge
industry
getting traffic to your site called SEO
search engine optimization since this is
a high-level overview I won't go to too
deep into the different things you can
do to get traffic but before we get into
that I will mention that the keyword
golden ratio does help tremendously in
getting some traffic to your site a lot
of times you can get traffic to your
site just by publishing kgr or keyword
golden ratio content and not getting any
backlinks to your site so here's the
thing when you start your new site
you're gonna publish content and the
question is are people gonna find it now
if you use the kgr a few people will but
the real magic is when you can rank in
Google for higher search volume terms
and generally if you want to rank well
you need to have really good content
that's the price of entry and then it
also helps to have backlinks pointing to
your site content and backlinks are the
two main things that Google uses the two
main things that Google use to help rank
your site now there are over 200 factors
but those two are the main ones I like
to keep things simple and as I mentioned
the since this is a an overview I will
keep this straightforward my general
thought around promoting the site is
around high touch outreach and guest
posting the two-step process again it's
two steps but you could divide it up
into many more once you get pretty
granular but you network within your
niche or the Related niche and then you
ask to guest post on someone's site and
if your are unfamiliar guest posting is
basically writing a blog post and then
it's published on someone else's site
it's kind of like if I have a guest on
the podcast or if I'm a guest on other
podcasts I'm putting out content on
someone else's platform that's the idea
the benefit of publishing a guest post
on someone else's site is typically you
will get at least one backlink from that
person site to your site which is
helpful again one of the top two things
that Google uses to
your site I'm in the search results so
to break it down a little bit farther
and give you a little bit more help the
longer you spend on like the first step
which is networking within your niche
the better you're gonna do the higher
conversion rate you will have when you
ask to guest post it's really all about
networking and it'll set you apart from
the competition in fact in most cases if
you spend a whole lot of time on the
networking if you're actually making
friends with a blogger your competition
won't be able to replicate your links
now the really good part is for step one
with the networking you can do some
really simple stuff so my number one
go-to is to comment on their blog you
could read one of the recent posts leave
an intelligent comment interact with
them a couple times just via the blog
comments another idea actually we'll go
through several here so the next idea is
around emailing the blogger so you can
sign up for their email list for example
and then reply back to one of their
emails as a person who has an email list
I can tell you that I read a hundred
percent of the email responses that I
get back I replied it back to most of
them but I read a hundred percent of
them next you can share the bloggers
content on social media so I love it
when someone shares my stuff and I know
everyone else does too so if you just
share their content especially on a
platform that they are active on they're
gonna notice just be sure you tag them
and you can even have a little
back-and-forth with them you can leave a
comment on one of the posts that that
they put on social media to again a lot
of people do read the social media post
further a lot of times on social media
there is some sort of chat or direct
messaging I guess channel that you can
contact them so all you have to do is
ping them now some people may be
super-busy rights and they may get
hundreds of direct messages and they may
not be able to DM you back right away
they may not be able to DM you at all
but if you leave a good
message a lot of times that we'll see it
another great idea is to link to the
blogger on your site so you can feature
them again for example you could create
a post that is the top five youtubers
and Instagram people that you should
follow in 2019 around ballpoint pens
that is a weird example but I think you
get the point you can link to their site
and then you can let them know again you
can share the content on social media
and then tag them you can shoot them an
email and say hey I feature to you on
here just wanted to let you know I
wanted to get your permission or
something like that of course they want
to be mentioned but you can frame it as
a question all right so you could frame
it as a question and get their
permission and they're gonna say sure
and if it's a good piece of content they
might share it now the fun thing about
those few things that I mentioned there
I think there were like four or five
you're just being nice you're being cool
you're trying to be friendly you're
trying to make friends with someone
online that's great
you're just you're helping them out it's
really important to spend time being
friendly versus saying hey I want to
post on your website or why don't you
link to my website person that I don't
know and never have emailed before
that's not cool
most people are gonna delete those
messages so if you put the time in like
early you put the time and doing
something nice for someone they will
notice and they will potentially
reciprocate after you spent some time
building the relationship you can ask to
guest post on the person's site now
there's a lot of different ways you can
do that I recommend you head over to the
show notes or niche site project which
is where I blog and you can download a
lot of the emails and scripts that I've
used to land hundreds of guest posts
well I have gotten hundreds of guest
posts I've also been rejected many many
times so that is something you will have
to get used to basically you're going to
get rejected way more times than you
will be accepted like
maybe seven to ten more times you're
probably gonna hear a rejection and
sometimes that will come in the form of
just being ignored in fact a lot of
times people will just ignore you now
again if you spend the time building the
relationship you're gonna be in much
better shape people don't want to
disappoint their friends and if you are
friends with someone online through the
networking it's just it's the fact that
you're gonna get more acceptances now at
worst they will say hey I politely
decline or something like that but they
won't be mean about it
now I used to send a lot of emails
before I kind of refine this process I
would send hundreds of emails and
sometimes people were pretty rude about
it and I got the hint right I understood
that I was going about it the wrong way
and I really needed to spend time
building the relationship and to give
you an idea
I went from something like a you know a
two to five percent success rate to some
of the more recent campaigns that I've
done with guest posting I've been able
to get like 30 to 50% conversion rate
because I spent the time building the
relationship the blogger knew who I was
because I commented on their blog
I sent them emails I shared their stuff
so if you do spend the time it really
will pay off here's a quick recap of the
four main steps for an Amazon affiliate
site number one find a niche that will
consist of doing keyword research and
this step takes a little time because
everything else is dependent on
selecting a niche which is viable and
hopefully profitable step number two is
to set up your site luckily this is a
lot more mechanical and you can pretty
much follow a process to set up a site
and it should just take you a couple
hours step three is to publish content
this can take a while if you have to
write it yourself it also could be a
little challenging if you're hiring
freelancers for the very first time
again you can get all the templates that
I use for hiring on up work and that
includes the job listing correspondence
that I use and I also included
template that you can supply to the
writers so it's a little bit easier for
them to produce the content that you can
publish on your site further you could
use those templates just for your own
writing and the fourth step is around
promotion and outreach in in general the
goal there is to get backlinks to your
site and to let other people know about
your site who may be influential in some
way my wife Elizabeth and I had a chat
on New Year's Day so here it is all
right so I'm hanging out with my wife
Elizabeth and her dog Georgie so if you
hear a squeaky toy that is Elizabeth
[Music]
Georgie has this new toy that she got
for I guess is that like Christmas or
what was the occasion because we love
her
and it's she picked it out herself and
Elizabeth was walking Georgie at the
time yeah she we let her peruse the
aisles
she likes to smell everything but she
went for this green squeaky broccoli toy
it's got a nice little face on it it's
got the florets and then some spy Keys
on the stalks and so she sniffed it out
was trying to pull it off the shelf
Doug was in another store and then he
came over to the pet store with us and I
said let's go back and if she picks the
same toy again we'll get it and she was
sniffing the whole rack Doug was
watching her and she went right for it
so she said it's anatomically correct
you said it's anatomically correct and
because it has the penis no it has has
the florets yes miss doc yeah like you
described
so it's pretty cool Georgie really likes
it but it is it's actually New Year's
Day right now and we're recording this
and we we usually have like some sort of
theme I wouldn't say we have resolutions
do you consider what we're doing
resolution like yeah well it's not we've
gone back and forth over the years and I
think one of the problems with the
resolutions is they they Peter out over
time you just kind of forget about them
frequently and so last year we did sort
of like themes like time-boxed themes so
and I think the idea was well I think it
was from you you read the power of habit
and you said it takes like 30 days to
solidify a habit is that right I think
it's like 60 something there there have
been multiple studies I don't even
remember what you're talking about
exactly but well the idea was so we do
sort of like monthly themes and so I
think like last year for one month I
wanted to eat like a whole piece of
fruit every day you know whether it be
an apple or a banana or whatever just
like a whole piece of fruit and I very
yeah but one blueberry that's right a
grape and I think the idea was I would
do that for a month and then sort of I'm
into the habit of it it becomes sort of
ingrained in me and then I can switch
over to something else the next month
that's where I was going with that with
the power of habit gotcha and just that
I'll do more research and maybe put a
link in the in the show notes but I
think there was some study where it was
like 21 days but I think further studies
showed that it will actually take longer
so like 57 or 60 or something like that
it's a little bit longer to actually
like quote develop into a habit but
anyway the point is you have a couple
things you're gonna be working on this
January you want me to go first
great I'm doing dry January which means
no alcohol for the whole month of
January I also did it last January I
believe so doing that as Doug is
drinking a beer right now he asked me
since it is January 1st he said will it
bother you if I drink a beer and I said
no but it's gonna be a long 31 days
he'll be getting a lot of smooches be
getting try to get contact booze so I'm
doing that and then I've also been
having some knee problems so I'm going
to
a 30 day yoga challenge I actually
ordered a yoga mat and it's a free
YouTube challenge if we come back on
I'll let you know how that goes I'm not
gonna promote this free challenge yet
unless I think it's a good thing but yes
I'm excited about that
stretching breathing you know being more
at one with myself nice yeah
and for me so I usually I like never did
resolutions just because not really my
thing
not interested and you can't improve on
perfection probably can't improve you
know what I usually try and do things
like whenever I think I want to get
started so there's like no real point to
wait until the new year for me and I
think maybe I mean that's always been my
excuse the same I mean if I was lazy
maybe I would say the exact same thing
but I actually do get started on things
like earlier in the year or the tail end
of the year but in any way I am going to
meditate every day and I actually
started a similar thing last December I
think it was like to this exact point it
was like December 22nd last year like
2017 I started meditating and I think I
had like a hundred and seventy day
streak or something like that like I did
it for about you know not quite half the
year but I'm gonna get back started with
that and I mean I enjoyed it but for
whatever reason I just like tapered off
in the middle of the summer
what is your meditation philosophy do
you like say um do you have a word do
you like visualize a candle like what do
you do I say pizza pizza and then you
eat it
that's not meditating it makes yeah well
I'm waiting for the pizza to come out no
really I'm late I gained a lot of weight
during the meditation thing cuz it's
really just a pizza eating thing
are there certain techniques I don't
meditate
I don't write so I have been using an
app called calm CA LM spelling yeah not
CLA and that's clam but he used calm and
it is just a guided meditation there's a
lot of different themes in there yeah
but what do you I'm at what do you do to
quiet your mind well with the guided
meditation they tell you stuff and then
you know it's silent for most of it but
every now and then they'll pop in and
say hey you know if your mind's
wandering which it basically always is
like 99.9% of the time just come back to
whatever the theme is generally cuz I've
meditated a lot without a nap and
usually I just try to focus on my breath
and just not I try not to think of
anything but it's really not that cuz
you can't not think of something it's
just to try and focus on your breath
again one or the other I just got back
from the gym and I I sit in the sauna as
well like after a workout and that is a
really good place to it's sort of
meditative like it's quiet in there it's
dark there may be like one other person
that pops in for a second but if I could
sit in there for like 15 minutes it's
very warm I'm not it's probably I don't
know one 150 to 180 in there or
something like that
there's no thermometer Honda on the
Sunda that I go to but basically it's so
hot that really you're thinking this is
really hot I'm so sweaty like you're
you're thinking about that not about
like other things that your mind may be
distracted from or to or whatever so
I'll work on the meditation and I'm
planning on like continuing on like past
January I know it's a good habit for me
to do so sounds like we're gonna be
really holistic and centered at the end
of January yeah I would think so I mean
I I will continue to drink beer I've
done the dry January before
but at the last couple years I've had I
think last year I had a beer event that
I needed to like actually consume
alcohol for beer judging and this year
technically I could do it but we are in
a curling league and a good portion of
curling you know you can drink beer so I
don't want to miss out on that and a
couple of our teammates work at one of
the breweries so the beer does flow very
plentifully yeah that's gonna be I think
the biggest challenge is curling Sundays
but we do have the one off we have the
one by week but you know what there's
always a reason so I think I I think I'm
gonna be okay yeah and I mean whenever
we we did this a couple of January's ago
it was you know we just it wasn't an
option so it really wasn't an issue and
we just didn't quite hang out as much
with people that we would like meet at
breweries which a lot of our friends
either work at breweries or they just
visit often you know maybe once a week
at least so a lot of times if we were
meeting up with people it would be head
of brewery so we just kind of buckled
down and didn't do much
yeah and we're going to a concert in a
couple weeks I got tickets for Christmas
and Doug was like hey you know what we
can over to the concert we can we can
get an uber there and back you know it's
only a couple miles why not I looked at
him and I said hey it's Trey January you
got a driver all month
his eyes kind of lit up yeah
thanks Elizabeth for hopping on for a
minute here anytime see you later
[Music]
now we're gonna hit the questions this
music is pretty cool I have to say I
don't know if I'm cool enough to line up
with this music but that's what we're
working with right now so first question
here is how much do niche sites earn
with Amazon Associates now let me rewind
a little bit and well talk about my
favorite subject which is myself now
when I first got started back in 2013 I
immediately tried to figure out how to
get into a mastermind group again
another thing that I picked up from Pat
Flynn I think he was talking about
mastermind groups and how great it was
to talk to people that were into the
same things that you were and you're all
making progress in the same direction
and that sort of thing now that first
mastermind group only lasted like six
weeks before people sort of stopped
showing up and didn't take it seriously
but there was one guy in there who had
been working on affiliate sites and
niche sites for a couple years and he
was making about 3 bucks a day and I
remember I got off it was like a
Saturday morning I woke up early to do
the meeting and I had told my wife
Elizabeth hey you know I'm gonna meet
with these people and you know I will
have a normal Saturday after that anyway
I got off the Skype call with these
folks and I was like there's this one
dude he's making like 3 bucks a day and
like that's amazing
now Elizabeth thought the same thing as
I did it's like if we could just make a
few bucks a day it would be awesome
maybe it's an extra dinner out maybe we
could supplement the vacation budget in
fact that was kind of the goal if we
could just make like three hundred
dollars a month
we could take or do a little bit more on
our vacations or something like that now
little did I know that a site could be
earning hundreds of times more than that
and I did it you know pretty quickly and
you can too in fact there's a lot of my
students that have been able to like
replicate my success as well and in
every like many other people not just me
there's a lots of people doing this
so I'll get to the point now the
question is how much can an Amazon
affiliate site make and the answer is
it's kind of impossible to answer
there's a huge range some sites will
make nothing most sites to be honest
with you will make nothing because a lot
of people don't follow through I hope I
hope you do follow through now there's a
couple of reasons why a person may not
follow through or a reason why their
sites end up not making any money so
number one a person may not have enough
time to work on the site people have
families they have full-time jobs they
have hobbies or other stuff going on the
site gets neglected and it doesn't
really take off at any point another
reason the site may not make anything is
because they picked the bad niche and
they did bad keyword research then the
third main reason is around poor content
and that's content that may be flawed in
some way it'll never rank in Google for
example there's something called keyword
stuffing and that's basically overusing
a keyword within the content and it used
to work like you know a decade or 15
years ago you used to be able to just
keyword stuff put your keyword all
through the page and it would actually
rank in Google but the thing is if you
can get past those three main hurdles
then you'll probably be able to make a
decent amount of money so I'll give you
a very broad sort of time range and mail
that you could potentially make alright
so this is a around disclaimer so they
like you may not make anything you could
do everything right and you may not make
an anything that is unlikely but these
are just some broad examples so that is
my disclaimer so you could make about a
hundred dollars a month within four to
six months if you get the process right
and I have seen people make about a
thousand dollars per month within six to
nine months and additionally when you go
out a little bit further you can make
say fifteen hundred to five thousand
or more once you're past nine months or
so after a year the sky's the limit
because the growth accelerates once your
site is a little bit older again there
are a lot of caveats for the ranges I
just mentioned so keep that in mind
there are lots of steps in the process
more than the four main phases that I
mentioned earlier and if you get you
know one of the little steps wrong you
may have to go back to that step and fix
it up most of the time you can recover
most of the time your decision is
reversible and it's not a huge deal you
can go back and fix it now the other
caveat the even more positive caveat
around the range is basically you could
make a lot more a lot faster so some of
the upcoming episodes for this podcast
will be interviews with people who
implemented the keyword golden ratio or
maybe they're a student in five figure
niche site which is my premium course
around creating a site and they've been
able to make a lot more money than what
I mentioned faster now they worked
really hard some people worked on their
site full-time but that maybe they were
able to you know hit four thousand
dollars a month within like eight months
eight or nine months and that is that is
an actual example that will be in an
upcoming episode there are a couple
milestones that I'll sort of emphasize
because a lot of people ask me
specifically like via email or on my
youtube channel around making say 1,000
dollars a month or more or ten thousand
dollars per month
now again we'll rewind and back in those
early days when I first discovered
making money online I didn't know that
normal people like us could make over
four figures a month
not to mention someone making like ten
thousand or fifteen or twenty thousand
per month and it blew me away just
thinking about it that's enough to
replace full-time income for a lot of
people and of course for some people it
is many times that now that's motivation
enough for me at the time to get
and rank my site as quickly as possible
so I set a goal the amount I wanted to
make for my first Amazon affiliate site
and as I mentioned it was about 300
bucks I was like if I could make about
$300 a month within six to eight months
that's the success I'd be thrilled with
that now whether you want to make twenty
bucks a month or four hundred a month or
whatever setting a goal can of course
help you focus when you're building your
site I was able to reach that 300 dollar
mark much faster than I expected and in
fact within six months on that first
site I made over six thousand dollars so
it can happen really fast one caveat is
that was back in 2013 so things do take
a little bit longer now but I have seen
people in the last year hit six thousand
dollars a month within six months there
are a lot of examples on the YouTube
channel where I've interviewed folks as
well so you could take a look there if
you want to you don't necessarily need a
lot of content on your site to make good
money for example I've been a part of a
couple sites but maybe had 40 or 50
pieces of content and they were making
$10,000 a month in fact I wrote a lot
about this particular case it was called
project a white hat so if you want to
check that out you can go over to niche
site project comm and then just search
for that project white hat and there's a
very long blog series about it
however in contrast a lot of times I do
publish key word golden ratio content
and in that case it's a pretty low
search volume and in that case maybe
your site does have a lot of content but
don't let the amount of content deter
you if you're starting out you're gonna
have to start with one post just like
everyone else a long journey right what
did I say a long journey starts with one
step and you know then you finish it
there's a lot of steps you have to take
but you have to get started somewhere
the next question is should I start an
Amazon affiliate site it seems like
there are so many out there already this
is one of those questions that I think I
had back in the day but for some
and I was naive and arrogant enough
which those are two ingredients that you
may need I was that naive that I was
like you know what I'm gonna do it
anyway and one of the reasons why is
because I saw people who seemed to like
me I saw my peers out there or just
other folks who I thought hey if they
can do it I can do it too
so that is one of the reasons some of
these upcoming episodes should be really
interesting these are just normal folks
who started an affiliate site and
they're making it work maybe it's a
single parent
maybe it's stay-at-home mom maybe it's a
software engineer with a full-time job
or an IT director with a full-time job
whatever the point is this this question
should I start in the Amazon affiliate
site is very common and here is I kind
of call it a permission question and you
could kind of substitute in like any
business model all right so it may come
in the form of should I try Amazon
Kindle publishing
should I try fulfilled by Amazon what
about drop shipping I hear drop shipping
awesome maybe I should start a podcast
or maybe I should do a YouTube channel
one of my friends does that the point is
if you're listening to this podcast and
you consume other sort of marketing in
business-related entrepreneurship
related content whether it's a blog or a
podcast or YouTube you will end up
hearing success stories from everywhere
any business model can work that's the
secret here any business model can work
but what doesn't work well is if you try
one of them for six weeks you make a
couple mistakes and then you move on to
the next one so for example you can try
fulfilled by Amazon but if you stick
with it for you know six weeks you make
a few mistakes you end up with a whole
bunch of widgets in your garage or
something like that and then you realize
maybe you picked a bad product and then
you switch over to starting a podcast
you work on that for six months you're
gonna end up you know number one being
very frustrated you're gonna be very
frustrated because you're gonna be
failing in multiple different things now
one of the reasons why that it's going
to happen is whenever you start
something new
what whichever thing you pick what I
mean you can say open a restaurant or
open a brewery or open a paper store or
whatever if you pick something you're
gonna make mistakes there's no way
around it the key is to not make the
same mistakes again and again you're
making them is sort of like beginner
mistakes in each of the cases and what
happens is you'll get you'll do Amazon
Kindle publishing and you'll make a few
mistakes you make those beginner
mistakes and then you move over to an
affiliate site and you will make
mistakes they're basically you're never
getting a chance to use the knowledge
you gained by making that mistake yes
there are a few things that may transfer
here and there but if you are in this
situation where you've tried like five
or six things by the way the reason I
know this is I've done that I skipped
around I tried a lot of different things
but only when I stuck with a specific
thing whatever it is whatever I stuck
with a specific thing that's when it
worked out and I have a lot of students
and I have a lot of people to contact me
and they say hey you know I tried like
these five or six things over the past
four years like nothing really stuck and
I really want to focus down on one thing
because I realized that I was just
making the same kind of beginner
mistakes over and over again so what's
the punchline here should you start in
the Amazon affiliate site yes you should
start an Amazon affiliate site if you're
interested in the concept if you're
interested in this business model the
key is don't try too much basically you
could start any of those things that I
mentioned you could do the Kindle
publishing fulfilled by Amazon drop
shipping whatever you could do all of
those things however you cannot do all
of them at once you can start a podcast
you can start a blog you can do an
affiliate site but just pick one at a
time
and you'll be way better off focusing on
one thing you'll be less stressed out -
and you'll make more product progress in
general now I'm not different than you
right we think we can do more than we
really can
I am constantly taking on too many
projects and it's only through just
repeatedly making that mistake that I've
realized that the more things I cut out
the fewer things that I focus on the
better those projects go I make more
progress and I'm less stressed out so
should you start an Amazon affiliate
site yes if Amazon affiliate sites
aren't for you start something take
action just do anything as long as
you're making some progress to move
forward that is where you want to be
right that's it for episode 1 of the
Doug show and if you liked it please
subscribe leave a review I really
appreciate it if you do that hopefully
we can get some reviews in like iTunes
and stitcher or wherever you subscribe
alright so really appreciate it I'm not
a hundred percent sure how many episodes
we're gonna publish each week it'll
it'll at least be one episode per week
here's what I'm thinking right now I'm
gonna do like one episode similar to
this where it's sort of tactical I'd
also like to do some interviews so some
of those are going to be the interviews
with people from the audience right
success stories and I also want to do
interviews with experts or people who
own apps other entrepreneurs and that
sort of thing the other little piece
that I'm looking at is just having sort
of a guest sort of a random episode
where maybe I have a conversation with a
friend of mine over some drinks or
something like that basically just a
random set of topics that I'm interested
in I've done this on my youtube channel
as well most of the time it's about
affiliate marketing most of the time
it's about productivity and its really
niche there
but other times I have a vlog where my
my family came to visit me and we
recorded some of that and it's a lot
more sort of personal and just a
conversation the point is I'm not a
hundred percent sure so we'll see how it
goes
be sure to subscribe and we'll catch you
next time
I'm Doug Pennington
[Music]
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