Edit: That cryptic comment of mine about following the ‘nofollow’ link means you should follow it, if you follow me. You’ll find out when you get the guide.
Ya know every now and again the Thad man surpasses himself. Well, quite often actually.
See, Thad and I live in those really competitive niches, right? And to do that you need a bit of ‘healthy insurance’. Yep, and that’s exactly what we’ve got in Thad himself.
With this one, even if you have no interest in marketing this particular niche, the ideas and keyword analysis Thad provides can be used as a way to think about and understand how we dig down and participate in any highly competitive niche market.
Including one tip so hot that I only found about it after reading the report. (He doesn’t tell me everything, sneaky is he!)
The one difference we see in all the examples the FTC give is when a merchant approaches a site owner and gives them perks to write about something. The way most affiliates approach it is WE pick out the products to promote….so we’re still being selective and trying to pick out the best products for the reader. Even though we get paid, we’re not writing it simply because a merchant approached us and asked us to make a blog post or write a review in exchange for a gift or freebie.
It’s possible though, that we may require a disclaimer on a privacy or terms page making full disclosure that we get compensated for purchases through our links.
It’s likely this one will rumble on for some time so we’ll be keeping an eye on it. Feel free to add your views and comments.
In the meantime I’ll just add that if you decide to join Wealthy Affilate via any of our links on this blog we do indeed receive a commission but I’d also point out that you can’t join through your ‘own’ link anyway and that you won’t get our great bonuses unless you use our links!
(Do you think that’s the kind of disclosure they have in mind?)
OK, well you should know the vid I’m gonna pop on the bottom of this one, right?
Anyway, there’s a huge fuss going down in the Wealthy Affilate forum and in loads of other IM forums and blogs about an upcoming Squidoo Policy Update.
Whole topics (like weight loss) are gonna get canned. Yep! No matter how good your lens is, no matter how non-spammy you might think it is. Come mid July they’ll be gone. Poof!
So, what to do?
Well, first check out that lens about the changes and think about how it applies to your own lenses. Do it before the clampdown… and if in doubt pull the lenses. You do NOT want your whole account locked!
Next… I don’t think people should abandon Squidoo, etc… just make sure you create good quality original non-spammy content (but not in the ‘banned’ topics).
And remember the bigger picture…
The thing is, if you are making any kind of sales with Squidoo, you should already have started thinking about branching off, having your own site, getting other traffic sources…
I mean, Squidoo has got to the point where it’s almost as complicated to build lenses and get them indexed as it is to build your own site and SEO it, so start thinking about that.
Squidoo is certainly good to use in some ways, but to build an entire business and income source around it, is probably NOT a good long time plan anyway.
These so called ’slaps’ have happened before… at Ezine, at Squidoo, at Hubpages… and they’ll happen again!
So start preparing now!
I have to say that you’re better off in the long run creating your own sites and blogs on your own domains.
It is NOT that hard to do. Even with something like Dreamweaver, if you can do the HTML stuff on a Squidoo lens you’ll soon get the hang of it.
Ditto Wordpress. But with WP make sure you host those on your own domain and use Themes. There are plenty of free ones and some really good paid ones (for a one off fee).
And before you dismiss the idea of investing in Dreamweaver or some of the better Wordpress Themes consider this…
How much would it cost you to set up an offline shop (or business)? An awful lot more than the cost of DW or a good WP Theme. And you can set up an unlimited supply of online ’shops’ with either.
Check out Affilate Theme for example. Couldn’t be easier to set up a really professional ‘review style’ landing page.
I really HATE stock photos (at least the cheap ones). They just suck for the most part and I get nauseous every time I see those lame stock photos of a person with a laptop and their hands up in the air. I’m sure you know which ones I’m talking about, eh?
I also don’t like ripping off other images just to get better photos. So what’s a good solution for good photos for your website, blog, Squidoo lens, Hubpage?
Dig around on Flickr for a little while and you’ll see some really interesting, engaging, and captivating photos! It’s like night and day compared to free or $1 stock photos.
The question then is how, when, and where can you use them for your marketing website or page?
Flickr users can choose to offer their photos for use by others under a little something called creative commons license, which you can find on Flickr with a filter under their advanced search, or browse this page:
There’s several different licensing rules contributors can set, but as Internet Marketers you’ll need to mainly focus on 2 categories that allow for commercial use, which are:
This generally means you can use the photo and alter it into a derivate form, as long as you give proper credit.
This one basically means you can use the photo “as-is” with no alterations, and must give credit.
For giving credit, there’s multiple ways to do it and Creative Common’s language is kind of open to interpretation and subject to some specifications by each contributor. I’ve used my own interpretation for credit on this post, but there’s a good short thread on Metafilter for how to credit creative commons work with a comment by someone who says they used to work for CC.
A great example of a blog making extensive use of Flickr photos is the health blog called Disease Proof. Have a look on there and see how captivating and engaging it makes all the posts. And while you’re at it, read the excellent diet advice they have on there…good stuff.
If you think an issue like photos is trivial, think again! Dave and I have seen many split test results of our own, and seriously, things as simple as a good photo, a headline tweak, etc…can sometimes make all the difference in the world when it comes to getting visitors to stick around, click through, and ultimately making a sale. You don’t have to use Flickr of course, but be creative and interesting…it’ll go a long way.
Oh…and here’s another cool tool for finding Flickr photos based on color. Play around and check it out:
LOL! Finally our friends over at Squidoo have cottoned to the fact that all those orange lenses were… well… a bit orange, YUK!
Well, they have finally got around to adding some themes, including a new default one.
There are 8 in all (including the default):-
Default
Gone Camping
Purple People Eater
Easy Street
Moment of Zen
Paintball
Highlighter
The Professor
So, which would our Grim Friend choose for The Reaper Lenses? Surely, Purple People Eater or Moment of Zen?
But no… he’s gone for Easy Street! Typical I suppose… I mean he just hangs around all day (and night) waiting for people to… well, you know what he does.
Others that stand out are ‘Gone Camping’… no, it’s not pink… it’s green… good for ‘green issues’ or ‘Paintball’ if you want to make a splash!
Whichever one you pick, pick one! Don’t leave it as the default.
Just go into Edit mode and the Themes can be selected from the top right hand corner (above your Bio).
Tip: The new layouts have shortened what is actually on display in your visible Bio box. So if you have a ‘url’ in there (and you should have) make sure it’s visible.
Tip: The new Themes only work if your lenses are maxed.
Tip: Experiment with different Themes. I’m not sure if one will convert better than another yet but changing the Theme counts as an ‘update’ to your lenses and having an updated lens improves your ranking within Squidoo.
There’s a bit of debate going on at the moment over in the Wealthy Affiliate forum about bonuses. It kinda came about from someone questioning why anyone would buy a Clickbank product through someone else’s link when they could use their own to get a hefty discount and it was specifically aimed at the IM niche.
Well, the short answer is, if you are promoting in the IM niche, then you must offer bonuses that have a perceived value that is more than the discount you can get by buying through your own affiliate link.
‘But’, came the reply, ‘I’ve got a hard drive full of these bonuses and have never done anything with them.’
OK, we’ve all got those, right? And I bet many of you have whole ebooks you’ve never done anything with as well.
Maybe some are crap but I can tell you I’ve rarely read any guide or bonuses that didn’t have something of value. It may have just been one idea, one sentence.
Now, I’m not suggesting that go and buy every guide under the sun or buy things just to get the bonuses.
More… I’m thinking about your own campaigns…
The recent WASeven Day trial promotion was successful for us because we added a critical bonus. Our ‘Using Wealthy Affiliate Guide‘ which showed people how to get straight to the juicy bits of WAwithin that first week. You can’t sign up to WA using your own link anyway but you can go direct of course.
But the crucial thing about the bonus was not so much the amount of people who took up the trial though our links but how many stayed on board and became full members. And I can tell you more than 75% did. That’s a pretty good conversion rate.
Anyway, that’s in the IM niche… what about other niches?
In most other niches people are not even aware that they can buy products through their own affiliate links… indeed a lot of people are not even aware of affiliates at all!
So, do you need to offer bonuses? Certainly, if you are list building, you must offer a bonus to get people to opt-in. It does not have to be a 20 page PDF. It can just be a ‘Top Ten Tips on ____________ ‘ Anything that adds value.
And that’s the key to whether to use bonuses or not. Do they ADD Value?
Because if they do, not only will you enhance your customers use of the product or service you are promoting but they are far more likely to buy related products from you again.
So, think about this in your promotions… look for opportunities to add real value bonuses. Ones that people will read… that people will use.
The effort it takes to create a good bonus are far outwighed by the benefits for both your customer and you, as an affiliate.
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