This post is long overdue. I've been a member of this group for several months now. I joined because I wanted to know more about affiliate marketing. I spent a LOT of time looking through old posts just to get an idea of how people got started, what they're doing, challenges they might have faced, etc. The information was enormous but what really helped was the VERY generous spirit in which it was given. I was so impressed with all the helpful people.
As I read through the information, two themes kept reoccurring. First, was to go with a niche you're passionate about and the second was to take action. I think it was described as "get off the dime." Obviously, I covered a lot more territory than just those two themes but they're the ones that seemed to really stick with me. The passionate part threw me because (and I hate to admit this publicly) I'm just not that passionate about much. I really thought I was going to have to throw the towel in over that one. I was stumped and felt defeated before I even got to the starting line. Nevertheless, I kept the passionate thing in my mind and just let it roll around until one day I had something close to an epiphany. I suddenly realized that I had been looking at the "passionate" thing with blinders on. I'm passionate about a lot of things especially those things that I know little about. My passion is for discovering new things. I love learning and have an insatiable curiosity. Knowing that really made my day but I still had one more thing gnawing at me. I needed to commit to a course of ACTION.
I'm the kind of person who makes a lot of lists. So I got out my pen and paper and began making a list of the things that I felt were keeping me from turning my research into action. I knew I wanted a website but the big problem with that was that I had no idea how to build a website. After sifting through all the information on website building I finally decided that I would teach myself how to build one. I bought a book for around $20 and for the next several weeks studied it from cover to cover, using only a text editor to create the site. My first site wasn't a conventional affiliate site. I was marketing my own service. I spent a lot of time promoting my site through article publishing and was very happy to see traffic steadily growing. I did make some money from the site but I still wanted to get into a more conventional affiliate site.
Next I bought SBI (Site Build It). I did this because I wanted to concentrate on SEO principles and from what I read, SBI would help me through it. It took another two months for me to build a site using SBI. It's been up for about 2 1/2 months. I've continued to publish articles as a means of promoting my site and I think my efforts are paying off. Average visitors per day is right around 12. That's up from 1 when I first started and although it's not a great number, it's satisfying to see. I've even made a little money from it to boot and I can see my site is getting some good billing from Google. I'm not on the first page of search results. Page 2 is the closest I've gotten so far but that's a far cry from oblivion when I first started.
Well, I won't belabor the point but I do want to let my fellow newbies know that things do start falling into place once you've started on a course of action. Sometimes (okay, a lot of times) it's slow going but progress can be so satisfying. Be patient with yourself. If you find yourself in a bind, step back away from the problem a bit to find that epiphany moment. Finally, there are going to be lots of mistakes. I'm still making them but I won't let them get me down (for more than a few minutes!). Hope you enjoy yourselves as much as I have as you find your way in affiliate marketing.
As I read through the information, two themes kept reoccurring. First, was to go with a niche you're passionate about and the second was to take action. I think it was described as "get off the dime." Obviously, I covered a lot more territory than just those two themes but they're the ones that seemed to really stick with me. The passionate part threw me because (and I hate to admit this publicly) I'm just not that passionate about much. I really thought I was going to have to throw the towel in over that one. I was stumped and felt defeated before I even got to the starting line. Nevertheless, I kept the passionate thing in my mind and just let it roll around until one day I had something close to an epiphany. I suddenly realized that I had been looking at the "passionate" thing with blinders on. I'm passionate about a lot of things especially those things that I know little about. My passion is for discovering new things. I love learning and have an insatiable curiosity. Knowing that really made my day but I still had one more thing gnawing at me. I needed to commit to a course of ACTION.
I'm the kind of person who makes a lot of lists. So I got out my pen and paper and began making a list of the things that I felt were keeping me from turning my research into action. I knew I wanted a website but the big problem with that was that I had no idea how to build a website. After sifting through all the information on website building I finally decided that I would teach myself how to build one. I bought a book for around $20 and for the next several weeks studied it from cover to cover, using only a text editor to create the site. My first site wasn't a conventional affiliate site. I was marketing my own service. I spent a lot of time promoting my site through article publishing and was very happy to see traffic steadily growing. I did make some money from the site but I still wanted to get into a more conventional affiliate site.
Next I bought SBI (Site Build It). I did this because I wanted to concentrate on SEO principles and from what I read, SBI would help me through it. It took another two months for me to build a site using SBI. It's been up for about 2 1/2 months. I've continued to publish articles as a means of promoting my site and I think my efforts are paying off. Average visitors per day is right around 12. That's up from 1 when I first started and although it's not a great number, it's satisfying to see. I've even made a little money from it to boot and I can see my site is getting some good billing from Google. I'm not on the first page of search results. Page 2 is the closest I've gotten so far but that's a far cry from oblivion when I first started.
Well, I won't belabor the point but I do want to let my fellow newbies know that things do start falling into place once you've started on a course of action. Sometimes (okay, a lot of times) it's slow going but progress can be so satisfying. Be patient with yourself. If you find yourself in a bind, step back away from the problem a bit to find that epiphany moment. Finally, there are going to be lots of mistakes. I'm still making them but I won't let them get me down (for more than a few minutes!). Hope you enjoy yourselves as much as I have as you find your way in affiliate marketing.
