What are Niche
Sites?
There
are people making money online through (relatively) passive income websites. These
sites are often called Niche Sites
because they focus on a narrow market and have a focused customer base. They do it by setting up a website that is
primarily focused on selling a product or specific product type; the site earns
money when people buy the product. Affiliate marketing is another way to
sell a product by linking to a commercial site where the customer buys the
product. An affiliate marketer will have
advertising and product information on the page with links to the product page
of the seller. When the user clicks on
the link on the affiliate site and buys the product on the seller’s site, the
affiliate earns a commission. Until the affiliate site begins showing up on the
first or second page of search engine results it probably won’t make much
money, so most of the work early on is getting traffic to the site. Once the site is getting a good share of
traffic it will earn income without a lot of additional work.
What is required
to start an affiliate marketing or commercial site?
Website and Domain
name
Although
you could build an affiliate or commercial site from a free blog there are
restrictions on how you can organize and monetize that blog site which will limit
your ability to compete with other commercial sites. A free blog format limits how you can
organize the site; the blog format may not be appropriate or as user friendly
as you want if you are selling products.
When
choosing a domain name you want to include the main keywords that will direct
people in the market you are targeting to your site. Having the keywords in the domain name will
also help your site show up on the first page of search engine results. It is important to have your site on the
first page of search results because as you probably know users rarely search
past the first page and almost never go past the second page.
Keyword Research
The
choice of keywords is important in getting users to your site. You ideally want keywords that are searched
fairly often, but you also don’t want keywords that have a lot of high-ranking
competing sites. A beginner shouldn’t
start out trying to compete for keywords like “quick weight loss” or “cheap
Viagra” there is just too much competition.
So you need to research your keywords to find just the right balance
between a highly searched topic and low competition from other sites.
Content
Once
you have chosen your topic and keywords you have to be able to write (or have
someone else write) a substantial amount of content for your site. This content should include useful
information, product reviews, comparisons, product options, how to choose the
best product, etc. If your site is too
thin on content it will eventually be downgraded by Google and other search
engines and will show up lower on search engine results.
Creating Backlinks
Backlinks
are links to your site from other related websites. Backlinks are needed to provide users with
another way to find your site, and backlinks are used by Google to determine
the quality of your site. Google uses
both the number and of the backlinks to rate the quality of your site. The higher the quality of your site, the
higher Google will place it in the list of search results.
On-site SEO
(Search Engine Optimization)
Not
as important, but also not to be ignored, is the process of optimizing your
titles, headings, tags and content for the keywords you want to focus on to
bring people to your site.
On-Site Ads and
Affiliate Links
Google
Adsense provides ads that are geared to the searcher and the site. It is easy to sign up and get started https://www.google.com/adsense/signup.
Amazon
has an affiliate program that allows you to link to any product sold on
Amazon.com, and they sell almost anything.
You can get more information or sign up for the Amazon affiliates
program here: https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/
Commission
Junction also lists other commercial sites that have affiliate programs or that
want to place banner ads on appropriate websites. For more information go to: http://www.cj.com/
Niche Site Duel
I
haven’t started a niche site yet, I’m still studying and learning the process,
but one blogger that I follow, Pat Flynn of SmartPassiveIncome.com, has started
what he calls the Niche Site Duel. He
has challenged his readers to follow along with him as he starts a niche site and
goes through the process step-by-step. I’ve
committed to joining in the Duel. I don’t
know what niche I’m going to target yet, I’m still in the keyword research
process. As I get deeper into the
process I’ll be posting on each step in more detail.
