It’s true that the benefits of a parent cannot be measured or quantified in any meaningful way. It’s hard to put a price on the emotional commitment and special experience of raising a child as a parent, some of which may not even be realized by the parents themselves until afterwards. But it is undeniable that the experience of parenthood is a rewarding and special time in someone’s life.
Making Extra Money Part 3: Product Selection
When you’re setting up a niche site, you need to monetize it. You need to have a way to make money, or it’s a waste of time.
There are two main ways to do that: AdSense or product promotion. To set up an AdSense site, you write a bunch of articles, post them on a website with some Google ads, and wait for the money to roll in.
I don’t do that.
I don’t own a single AdSense site and have never set one up. This article is not about setting up an Adsense site.
My niches site are all product-promotion sites. I pick a product–generally an e-book or video course–and set up a site dedicated to it.
Naturally, picking a good product is an important part of the equation.
The most important part of product selection is that the product has an affiliate program. Without that, there’s no money to be made. There are a lot of places to find affiliate programs. Here are a few:
- Amazon. If you don’t live in one of the states that Amazon has dropped in retaliation for passing laws that attempt to circumvent the Supreme Court’s ruling on collecting sales tax, you can sign up as an associate and collect a commission on every referral you send that turns into a purchase. That means you have a lot of product to choose from. Unfortunately, your commission is small, so you need to promote fairly expensive products to get a decent return. On the other hand, people trust Amazon, so that’s one less hurdle to making a sale.
- Commission Junction. These are the people managing affiliate programs for a large number of credit cards and banks. If you’ve opened an account with INGDirect through one of my links, I got a commission for the referral. (Thank you!) They have a lot of other products, too.
- e-Junkie. This one is a popular distribution system for bloggers. It’s likely that, if you’ve bought an ebook from a blogger, e-Junkie handled the fulfillment process. A lot of the products available there have an affiliate program, but that is up to the owner of the product.
- ClickBank. My favorite. This is one of the largest affiliate networks specializing in electronic products, whether that’s membership sites, ebooks, or video courses. Commissions are good, often 50-75%. They also offer a 60 day guarantee of every product sold through their site, which helps soothe the wary customer. This is the site I’ll be using for this series.
The first thing you need to do is sign up for whichever program you intend to use.
If you’re not going with Clickbank, feel free to skip ahead to the section on keyword research.
Once you are signed up and logged in, click on the “Marketplace” link at the top of the screen.
From here, it’s just a matter of finding a good product to sell. Here are the niches we’re going to be looking for:
- Back pain
- Bankruptcy
- Conflict resolution at work
- Detox diets
- Fat kids
- Foreclosure avoidance
- Job hunting
- Weddings
- Writing sales copy
I’m going to look for one or two good products in each niche. When that’s done we’ll narrow it down by consumer demand.
For now, go to advanced search.
Enter your keyword, pick the category and set the advanced search stats. Gravity is the number of affiliates who have made sales in the last month. I don’t like super-high numbers, but I also want to make sure that the item is sellable. Over 10 and under 50 or so seems to be a good balance.
The average sale just ensures that I’ll make a decent amount of money when someone buys the product. I usually aim for $25 or more in commissions per sale. Also, further down, check the affiliate tools box. That means the seller will have some resources for you to use.
This combination will give us 36 products to check out for back pain, unfortunately, none of the results are for back pain products. After unchecking the affiliate tools and setting the gravity to greater than 1, I’ve got 211 results. Sorting by keyword relevance, I see three products, two of which look like something I’d be interested in promoting. One has a 45% commission, the other is 55%. The X-Pain Method has an initial commission of $34 and claims a 5% refund rate. Back Pain, Sciatica, and Bulging Disc Relief pays $16, which will make it a potentially easier sale. I’ll add both to the list for further research.
I’m not going to detail the search for the rest of the niches. That would be repetitive. You can see my selections here:
- Back pain – X-Pain Method; Back Pain, Sciatica, and Bulging Disc Relief
- Bankruptcy – I’m dropping this one from the list. It’s too complicated and deserves an attorney. I don’t know enough about the topic to make sure it is up to date.
- Conflict resolution at work – Management Training: By the Book; Anger Management for the 21st Century
- Detox diets – Master Cleanse Secrets: 10 Day Diet; Master Cleanse Insider; Eating for Energy: Raw Food Diet for Weight Loss
- Fat kids – I’m dropping this one, too. A kid’s health is too important. I don’t want to sell a dangerous or unethical product.
- Foreclosure avoidance – How to Stop Foreclosure in 7 Days Flat; Foreclosure Defense Secrets
- Job hunting – Guerrilla Resumes; Amazing Cover Letters
- Weddings – All Types of Wedding Speeches; The Master Wedding Planning Guide; Amazing Wedding Planning
- Writing sales copy – Instant Swipe File; Ad Copy Creator Pro; How to Write Killer Copy
Now we’re going to go through a few steps for each of these products.
The Sales Page
We need to make sure the sales page doesn’t suck. If the site doesn’t work, is hard to read or navigate, has a hard-to-find order button, or just doesn’t look professional, it’s getting cut.
- Raw Foods is eliminated. The sales video is horrible and the order link is at the bottom of several screens worth of nothing. It’s a crap site.
- The 7 day foreclosure-avoidance product is out. Site’s down today. I want reliability.
- Management Training By The Book is out. I don’t like typos on the sales page, especially in the page title.
The Email List
If it has an email subscription form, we’ll need to subscribe, then double-check to make sure our affiliate information isn’t getting dropped in the emails. If it is, the seller is effectively stealing commissions. In the interest of time and laziness, I’m going to eliminate anyone pushing for an email subscription. It’s harder–and time-consuming–to monitor that. On of my niche site had a seller completely drop their product. Instead, they pushed for email subscriptions so they could promote other products as an affiliate. Absolutely unethical.
- Wedding speeches is eliminated for throwing a mandatory email entry into the order process. There’s no guarantee they are up to anything shady, but I’m taking the simple route.
Checkout and Credit
Finally, we’re going to visit the checkout page. You need to do this from every links in the newsletter and the links on the sales page, just to make sure you’ll get your money.
The way to tell who’s being credited is to look at the bottom of the order page, under the payment information. It should say [affiliate = xxx] where xxxis your ClickBank ID. Anything else, and the product gets cut from the list.
When you are checking these, don’t click on every possible link at once. That confuses the cookies. Do one at a time. I tried to do it in one batch for this post and lost half of the cookies. If it weren’t for the fact that I already own one of the products and bought it through my own link and got credited, I would have been talking undeserved trash about thieving companies.
Other Factors
Sometimes, when you’re examining a product, it just doesn’t feel right. When that happens, drop it. There are millions of other products you can promote. In this case, I’m dropping the anger management program because, in my experience, angry people don’t think they are the problem. Here’s a life tip: If everyone else is a jerk, the problem probably isn’t everyone else.
- Another important factor is the sales page itself. If it doesn’t make you want to buy the product, why would anyone else?
- Amazing Cover Letters is eliminated because it’s too easy to overlook the buy link. If I have to hunt for it, it’s losing customers.
- Amazing Wedding Planning is getting eliminated because I don’t like the sales page. The buy link is easy to overlook, and it doesn’t compel me to buy.
Now we’re down to 10 products in 6 niches. At this point, we’re comfortable with the sales pages and we know that they are crediting commissions. As it stands right now, all of the products are worth promoting.
- Back pain – X-Pain Method; Back Pain, Sciatica, and Bulging Disc Relief
- Detox diets – Master Cleanse Secrets: 10 Day Diet; Master Cleanse Insider
- Foreclosure avoidance – Foreclosure Defense Secrets
- Job hunting – Guerrilla Resumes
- Weddings – The Master Wedding Planning Guide;
- Writing sales copy – Instant Swipe File; Ad Copy Creator Pro; How to Write Killer Copy
We’ll make the final determination after doing some heavy keyword research in the next installment. That’s where we’ll find out how hard it is to compete.
Any questions?
How You’re Finding Me
Every once in a while, I like to dig through Google Analytics and see how people are finding this site. Some of the search terms are interesting.
“father of three” mid life crisis
Here’s a free piece of advice. As a father of three, you don’t get to have a mid-life crisis. It’s not allowed. Rather, it’s allowed, but you aren’t allowed to act on it. At a minimum, until your children are out of the house, you need to man up and provide all of the support you possibly can. No sports cars you can’t afford and no 22 year old hardbodies. Be there for your kids.
“payday loans” which accepts guest posts
Payday loan marketing. Just go away. You aren’t running a guest post here.
“slow carb” hungry all the time
You’re doing it wrong. If you are hungry, eat more bacon. Or beans. Beans fill you up longer.
$1000000 business idea
Ideas are the easy part. Execution makes you a millionaire.
articles on why appearance shouldn’t matter?
Appearances do matter, and always will. Your appearance is what makes the initial impression when you meet someone new. You don’t have to be a model, but basic grooming and fashion sense is necessary. Take this with a grain of salt. I’ve got a week’s growth of a beard and I wear a different plaid, button-down shirt every day.
are push ups supposed to be hard
Only the first 50. After that, I kind of go on blissed-out autopilot. If you can do 100 pushups, you can probably do 200.
acceptable place to put tattoo
If you wear clothes there, you can put a tattoo there. Visible tattoos are called “job stoppers” for a reason. If you put a tattoo on your face, the only job you qualify for is “drug dealer’s girlfriend”. Or possibly prison janitor.
burning bridges with toxic people
If you must burn bridges, filling them with toxic people first isn’t a bad idea.
candied pork butt
Rule 34: If it exists, there is porn of it. Interesting side story: while double-checking the rule number, I stumbled across My Little Ponies doing things they never advertise on the box.
cut my wife’s hair
I did this once. Pro tip: In the back, at the bottom, cut small chunks and leave them longer than you think they should be. You can always cut more, but uncutting hair is really hard.
f***** on the roadside by your mechanic
He probably deserves a tip for that.
girls fart for money and girls live farts
See the bit about the pork butt, remove the funny, and…ewww.
how to be a successful debtor
I recommend starting by paying your bills. When the debts are gone, you win. Success!
i ate bacon on slow carb diet
So did everyone else, sweetie. It’s the biggest draw to the slow carb diet.
in memory of pets tattoos
When I get a pet, I get it with the understanding that I’m going to outlive it. The day I bring it home, some small part of me is preparing for the day when I have to dig a hole in my backyard. Tattooing that day? Not gonna happen.
thickening felt behind testicle
Why are you on google? Go to the doctor. Please?
Interesting. Between girls farting and my post about being well-trained, there is a significant amount of fetish traffic coming through here. Maybe I need to explore a new advertising strategy.
Does Money Make Miley Cyrus Act Crazy?
If you’re like millions of people who saw Miley Cyrus’s performance at the MTV Video Music Awards recently, you’ve probably wondered what the effect of massive success on the music and acting star. Cyrus seems to be
doing everything possible to remake her image in the exact opposite of her squeaky clean mold that Disney and other companies have created for her over the last several years. (A rumor has it that Disney even created a contractual obligation for Cyrus to maintain a certain haircut during her “Hannah Montana” television show.) There’s a sense of someone taking on their first sense of independence, and running with it — the star seemed to be sending the message to the audience that she was not going to live according to the expectations of others anymore, and from the look of it, they got that message loud and clear.
The fact that Cyrus is barely into her 20s should tell you something about how much time she has to develop her career. She has enough to retire at an age when most people are just starting their first real job. And that is a tough position to be in. If she is hoping to push her singing and acting career well into adulthood — as most artists would like to — it may be that she is trying to make her mark now. Think of it a bit like Bob Dylan in 1964, releasing electric music for the first time, when before that point he was primarily known as a folk singer making gentle acoustic music.
Dylan’s idea may have been a bit like what Cyrus’ is. That is to say, maybe Miley Cyrus is trying to avoid becoming a has-been, a relic of the 2000’s who burned out playing inoffensive pop music. If this is the case, Cyrus may be able to shift her career into a different mode by showing herself to be an uncompromising artist. Remember that even the greats of the past — Frank Sinatra for example — were once viewed as essentially music for teenagers, and not serious artists. Sinatra even suffered career failure in his 20’s when his audience grew up and moved on to other things. But he came back to record success when he began allowing his music to mature and his ideas to gain focus. If Cyrus can pull such a move, she may not be remembered as a teeny-bopper, but as a serious artist.
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Carnival of Personal Finance #307: The Silver Edition
This is the 307th Carnival of Personal Finance, the Silver Edition. As of 10:00 PM CDT last night, silver is at $43.76 per ounce. Three years ago, when I last bought silver, it was at $11.30. In honor of that, and inspired by my first editor’s pick below, I’m going to share some facts and history about silver.
The last time prices rose like this was in 1979, when the Hunt brothers bought or controlled close to 50% of the world’s silver. They managed it by leveraging their silver hoard. As they bought more, prices went up, increasing the value of their hoard, which they then used as collateral for more loans to buy more silver, which caused the prices to go up so they’d use it as collateral…. You get the idea. Prices went from $11 per ounce to $50 per ounce in less than a year, before the regulators figured out the game and changed the rules, bringing the whole thing crashing down. The resulting losses and lawsuits bankrupted the former billionaires within 10 years.
Editor’s Picks:
First, we have a post from Squirrelers, Is There a Silver Bubble? How High Can Prices Go?. This post reminded me of not only the Hunt brothers story, but the small box of silver I own. Now, I’m debating taking it to a precious metals dealer and cashing out for 400% of my purchase price.
Suba from Wealth Informatics brought Never Pay full price : How to save 10-50% on every purchase. This was entirely new to me, which surprised me. I see a lot of ideas presented in new ways, but rarely see something I know absolutely nothing about.
If you’ve got legal papers you need to fill out, or questions you need answered, you could do far worse than to start with the site Jeff Rose from Good Financial Cents gives us with 7 Free and Cheap Online Legal Resources. If you think you don’t need the resources, that means you a complete estate plan, right? You have a will?
Saving
Dimes, quarters, and half-dollars were 90% silver until 1964. Half-dollars continued to be 40% silver until 1971. At that time, the government tightly controlled the price of silver and kept it at $1.29 per ounce so the face value of the coins matched the value of silver they contained. Today, a supply of 90% silver coins with a face value of $5 can be had for the bargain price of $173.74.
Fanny from Living Richly on a Budget – Personal Budget Blog presents How to Build the Crucial $1,000 Emergency Fund, and says, “How do you finance unexpected personal expenses, such as car repairs, medical visits, home maintenance repairs, etc? The most effective way to finance these expenses is through a personal emergency fund.”
Flexo from ConsumerismCommentary presents Silent Inflation is Destroying Your Net Worth, and says, “Inflation continues to deflate individuals net worth and there are no signs of it getting any better.”
Adam Piplica from Magical Penny presents Avoid Hitting the Rocks of Financial Ruin, and says, “This post draws on a famous story in Homer’s Oddessey how a captain made it safely passed the Sirens because he had protected himself from making a poor short-term decision. It’s exactly the same thing you have to do if you want to grow your pennies.”
Clint from Accumulating Money presents Baby-Boomer Generation Must Get Serious About Planning for Retirement, and says, “The “Baby-Boomer” generation has undergone two severe business-cycle reversals in the past ten years alone. Many of these fifty and sixty year-olds are now facing a daunting task – how do you rebuild your net worth in so short a remaining time period?”
Jason from One Money Design presents Planting a Garden to Save Money, and says, “As Spring is here, planting a garden is a great way to help feed your family and save some money at the same time.”
Career
Silver is almost always found with lead. Through most of history, mining silver meant mining lead and breathing lead dust. In the ancient world, silver miners had a life span of about 3 years, so free men refused the job. This was a slave occupation.
Crystal from Budgeting in the Fun Stuff presents Job Experience – Don’t Rock The Boat, and says, “Being young and ambitious may seem like the best thing in the world but knowing your audience and environment is very important. You don’t want to come off as the young new hothead…here’s a story all about exactly that.”
Well Heeled Blog from Well Heeled Blog presents 5 Ways to Spend Your Raise, and says, “Congratulations, you got a raise! Now what? Now, what to do about this extra money? No matter what, don’t want to fritter this raise away. Here are 5 ways for the extra money to work hard for you. ”
Kathryn @ Financial Highway from Financial Highway presents 30 Common Interview Questions and How to Answer Them, and says, “This guide not only tells you what the interview questions are but also provides insight into what the interviewer is really asking and what types of answers will help you get the job.”
Credit
Around 500 BC, Athenians discovered a huge silver mine on land belonging the city-state. This find was used to finance building their first effective navy, which catapulted them to the heights of power they achieved.
Craig Ford from Money Help for Christians presents Best Ways to Maximize Cash, Credit Card, and Debit Card Rewards, and says, “How to maximize your credit cards or debit card rewards.”
Tim Chen from NerdWallet Credit Card Watch presents Premium Credit Cards: The Value Beyond the Cost, and says, “A premium credit card is a step above your average card: better rewards and extra perks offered at, well, a premium. These exclusive credit cards come with additional goodies like lounge access and free plane tickets, as well as hefty annual fees.”
Kevin (for Moolanomy) from Moolanomy presents How to Avoid Credit Cards and Credit Repair Scams, and says, “Credit cards don’t have to be a bad thing, but they definitely have their fair share of scams out there. Here’s how to avoid them.”
Real Estate
In World of Warcraft, silver is a rare spawn of tin. If you want to find silver, you should try mining tin. Over and over. (Source)
Mike from Green Panda Treehouse presents How Much Should We Spend on Housing?, and says, “How much is the right amount for housing costs?”
Ben from Money Smart Life presents How to Use a Mortgage Calculator to Compare Home Loans, and says, “A post about how to use a mortgage calculator to screen and compare the rates and costs of home loans.”
Frugality
The early discovery that water, wine, milk and vinegar stayed pure longer in silver vessels, led to its desirability as a container for long voyages. Herodotus wrote that Cyrus the Great, King of Persia, a man of vision who established a board of health and a medical dispensary for his citizens, had water drawn from a special stream, “boiled, and very many four wheeled wagons drawn by mules carry it in silver vessels, following the king wheresoever he goes at any time.” (Source)
Donna Freedman from Surviving and Thriving presents This isn’t your grandparents’ recession, and says, “When the going gets tough, it’s tempting to invoke our grandparents and their tribulations during the Great Depression. But some of their advice wouldn’t help us. ”
Glen Craig from Parenting Family Money presents Inexpensive (Cheap) Date Night Ideas for Parents, and says, “It’s tough getting out with the spouse when you have kids. With babysitting and the date it can get expensive. See some inexpensive date night ideas and how you can save on babysitting as well.”
Finance
From 1998 to 2009, Bernard von NotHaus marketed the Liberty Dollar as an alternative to U.S. government fiat currency. Liberty Dollars were made from silver and later, gold and copper. von NotHaus was later convicted of–among other things–counterfeiting coins, even though he only produced his own coinage and didn’t pretend it was the same thing.
N.W. Journey from Net Worth Journey presents What is Compound Interest?, and says, “A basic introduction to compound interest.”
Bret from Hope to Prosper presents Age 21: A Year of Change and Humility, and says, “The year I turned 21 was the most tumultuous of my life. In many ways, that one year shaped my life more than any other and determined the direction of my future.”
Economy
Colloidal silver is claimed to be a near-magical cure-all. Its proponents claim it has the ability to “benefit the immune system; kill disease-causing agents such as bacteria, viruses, and fungi; serve as an alternative to prescription antibiotics; or treat diseases such as cancer, HIV/AIDS, diabetes, tuberculosis, syphilis, scarlet fever, shingles, herpes, pneumonia, and prostatitis (inflammation of the prostate).” Scientific evidence for any of this: none. (Source)
Money Beagle from Money Beagle presents The Economy Must Be Improving, and says, “I don’t need a government report to show me that the economy is improving; I look no further than the latest coupon offerings from local restaurants!”
Darwin’s Money from Darwin’s Money presents Stop Complaining About Gas Prices, and says, “Americans are complaining about prices at the pump. I say “Stop Complaining and Look in the Mirror”. Here are some very rational reasons and real solutions.”
Investing
The best method of storing silver is in bullet form. When the werewolves attack, none of us will have long to fight back.
Mike from The Dividend Guy Blog presents 7 Deadly Sins of Investments, and says, “Are you making these mistakes with investing?”
Mike Piper from Oblivious Investor presents Replacing Index Funds in Your Portfolio, and says, “For the most cost conscious of investors, it might make sense to build a portfolio of individual securities rather than index funds.”
RJ Weiss from Gen Y Wealth presents How to Convert a 401(k) to Traditional or Roth IRA, and says, “Reviewing your options with your 401(k) when leaving or changing jobs. More specifically, to look at the steps to convert your 401K(k) to an IRA, since this is most likely the optimal choice.”
Michael from DoughRoller presents How Half a Percent Can Ruin Your Retirement, and says, “Investing for retirement is crucial to securing your financial future. Make sure to find the best interest rates available, as even half a percent can ruin your retirement aspirations. ”
Money Management
I had a silver ring in my septum for almost 10 years and, in fact, still maintain the piercing, but it’s usually empty.
Cathy Moran from Money Health Central presents An Alternate Truth About Financial Literacy, and says, “Financial literacy is grounded in understanding bigger truths about money, not in acting on those truths.”
Kara from Frugal In My Forties presents Worst Money Lessons My Family Taught Me, and says, “My parents had great financial skills: Unfortunately they weren’t really great about passing them on to their children. These are the 4 big things that I think they should have done differently!”
Mike from The Financial Blogger presents Teaching Finance In High School, and says, “A look at getting finance across at the high school level.”
Eric from Narrow Bridge Finance presents How Your Insurance Rates are Calculated, and says, “Ever wonder how insurance companies determine your monthly rates? Find out what you need to know here.”
FMF from Free Money Finance presents How Millionaires Become Millionaires, and says, “Many people mistakenly think that most millionaires have their wealth handed to them from either their relatives or some stroke of luck (like winning the lottery, being gifted with amazing abilities/talent, etc.) This is completely false. Most people with over seven-figure wealth got it the old-fashioned way, they earned it.”
Matt Bell from Matt About Money presents Money Lessons From the Royal Wedding, and says, “Amid all the royal wedding hoopla, did you notice what Prince William and his fiancée, Kate Middleton, asked for in terms of wedding gifts? Since this is one couple that truly does have everything, they asked anyone wanting to get them a gift to consider making a donation instead. For all of us commoners, there are two lessons we can learn from the royal couple’s philanthropic mindset.”
Debt
Sterling silver is 92.5% silver and 7.5% other, usually copper. Pure silver is too soft for most applications. It is, however, the most optically reflective element.
Jacob Irwin from My Personal Finance Journey presents Helping A Friend Get Out of Debt – Part 3 – Cut Your Interest Rates In Half, and says, “A look at the steps my friend and I took to get his credit card interest rates lowered, and how you can too!”
Junior Boomer from Consumer Boomer presents Top 5 Bankruptcy Myths Dispelled For You, and says, “For those who have been considering bankruptcy, but are concerned about the overall impact it could have on their financial future, we are going to break a few myths.”
Other
Silver fulminate is an explosive, ionic, fulminic acid salt of silver. Yes, silver goes boom.
Echo from Boomer & Echo presents Assessing Your Estate Plan, and says, “Before making an appointment with your lawyer take some time to assess your situation and review your estate plan.”
Sustainable PF from Sustainable Personal Finance presents Eight Favourite Blogs, and says, “There are some awesome PF blogs out there and these are 8 you shouldn’t miss!”
Nicole from Nicole and Maggie: Grumpy Rumblings presents Dissecting an emergency room bill, and says, “Nicole and Maggie discuss how a recent bead up a preschool nose cost one of them $1400. (Actually $1700– a additional bill just came.)”
Tom Drake from Canadian Finance Blog presents The new breed of financial bloggers: Young, frugal and vocal, and says, “I’ve discovered a lot of young bloggers who do care about personal finance. Young bloggers can fill a void in financial education for young people.”
Tom from Stupid Cents presents What Is Term Life Insurance?, and says, “Life insurance is important for everyone but it can be expensive. That is where term life insurance can be the most helpful.”
Philip from PT Money: Personal Finance presents How to Pick a College that Suits You, and says, “Financial and other considerations when deciding on a college.”
That’s it. If you enjoyed this little journey through silver, please take a moment to subscribe to Live Real, Now.