Making money with Amazon in 2018

A few years ago I built a little website that reviewed travel accessories.  Even though I rarely update that website anymore, it still earns a small amount every month.  Even though the competition between these sites is more competitive than ever, it’s still more than possible to make money from Amazon in 2018.

The Amazon Affiliate Program

Amazon has one of the worlds largest affiliate programs.  They’ll pay you a small commission if you refer someone to amazon and they end up buying something.

Picking the right niche

From my experience, I’ve found focused niches to be more profitable then just blogging about a general niche.  For example, Bluetooth speakers works better than blogging about all audio products.

I’ve also had more success writing about products other than books.  Every now and then I write a book review on my personal blog, and while these might get a decent amount of traffic, these posts don’t earn very much revenue.

Genuine reviews work Best

It’s so much easier to write about products you actually know and care about.  I’ve seen so many people fail because they outsource there content creation to people in india.  This content is always going to be trumped by well written, genuine reviews from someone who knows what they’re talking about.  Google is getting better and better at finding this type of content.

Links > Ads

The best converting ads are links within articles.  I like to include more than 5 links per article, scattered throughout the post.  And usually a call to action at the end (find out more about this product etc.).  This strategy works really well and I’ve found it to convert better than banner type ads.

Create foundation content

The heart of any successful affiliate strategy is what I call foundation content.  This content should be more than 1000 words, contain lots of images, and scattered with links to amazon.    Your foundation content is what you’ll drive traffic to and it’s where you’ll make most of your income.

Once you’ve created your foundation content, create supplementary posts on the same site that naturally link to this content.

Track Everything

Make sure you use unique tracking ids for all your links.  You want to know exactly what’s working and what’s not.

Not a get rich quick scheme

From my personal experience, if you want to build a website that will generate passive income in the long term, it will take around 6 months before you start seeing proper results.

Sure, there are ways to try and cheat and speed up the process.  But if you employ any blackhat techniques, they’ll come back to bite you in the ass in the long run.  In 12 months time, you’ll be bitching on your blog how Google is evil etc etc..  Even though you were the one spamming your shitty links all over the place.

Publish “Top” type posts.

The “Top X product” type posts work well.  Put together a list of the top products in a specific niche, and make sure you explain in detail the reasoning behind the list.

Comparison posts also work really well.  Compare two products that shoppers might be having a hard time choosing between.  Because the shopper is already looking to purchase, these posts often convert extremely well.

Update Posts every year

One of my little secrets, is to publish posts such as “The top x products in x niche in 2018”.  Just by tacking on the year, you automatically get a tiny boost in Google.  Remember Google loves fresh content and people will often search for fresh content.

Build an Email list

Trust me, in the long run, an email list will be your most profitable asset.  No matter what happens to your site on Google, you’ll still be able to target people directly with your list.  You might need to be a bit creative to come up with an email list for your specific niche.

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