@spunko2010 - I have never been deindexed - that's more of a Panda thing. If I go more than -100, it's toast. If it's around -50, I try some things for a short time - if no results, I kill it. If it's -10, then that was just a love slap - keep it.
@Elias and @Pratik - I use standard affiliate programs. No Amazon, Clickbank or CPA. And no, I don't do Viagra, Payday, Casinos, etc. Those types of business attract too many extreme blackhatters as well as newbs, so I don't waste my time on areas that stick out like a sore thumb to Google. I am more mainstream.
@Pratik you must find them yourself. People will share their SEO settings to an extent, but their niche too? No chance Mine is quite traditional, it's one of those niches that people say 'don't bother' as it's "too full of experienced sites" but this is not true. At least not in the UK.
@spunko2010 Not wanting niche at all! I respect not disclosing that fully. Just wanted to know from where do they find individual aff programs to promote, that's all. But its fine either way if that cannot be discussed or disclosed.
Oh, well a good place to start is to sign up for a place like www.viglink.com (Free) and then sort through the programs/merchants by CPC or EPC. For example the casino 888.com is/was the highest last time I checked on there and the avg amount they paid out per click to the affiliate was something like $3... Casinos pay very well.
Another good method is to find high paying affiliate programs, these are usually private or direct affiliate programs. You can even Google a list of these and you'll find some great ideas.
I nearly forgot one other awesome source... WSO's...
I download loads (not buy of course :P) and find some very nice nuggets about potential affiliate programs, with the complimentary method of ranking for those keywords/offers. Of course the method is either: a) too expensive to implement as described or b) too ineffective to get the job done... So you can come along and steal the idea then use the awesomeness of SER to easily outrank all those amateurs that bought the WSO.
Not only works well but someone has done all the hard work of researching the products/niches for you.
Ugh, I was stupid and got spanked. I don't do affiliate marketing but rather do small time local search engine rank building. I've been learning to use GSA and No Hands SEO over the past year and have been (like a dumb ass) using my own site for practice. I know, I know. In the past few months I've really fined tuned the process due to posts from this site. I now use a buffer site between my client's own site and the tier 1 links. The tier 1 links are built with lots of variation and only using higher quality links down on to my tier 3's with a good mix of follow and no-follow. Lots of variation everywhere. So since these links are all tied to my client's "buffer" sites they were good.
Mine, that I learned on. Not so much. Lost ranking on every phrase I was originally ranked highly on. I had been ranked highly for years on most of these.
At first I was a bit disheartened for my tool'ish behavior. However, once again due to you great guys I'm learning again. Dump the site, learn from your mistakes, move over to a new one, block the robot's, start again with some buffer sites and quality links and never ever use your own domain to learn how raise rankings in search engines
@saintdilbert - Are you using 100% buffer sites? No direct links at all to money site? If so, how's that working out for you? I've never tried with no direct links so curious about the results.
@gooner for the people who are paying me I'm using about 90% buffer sites. Takes longer and is a heck of a lot of work but as this update proves its a lot safer.
@Pratik - You have to search google. If you spent two hours researching this, you would have enough programs to make your head split.
Try to learn which ones are big boys - who offer the best products, merchants and depth of categories. Always have relationships with the big boys, and always perform your due diligence on each network as far as reliability of payments to affiliates, etc., before adding new affiliate networks.
Also, pick any products, and look at their official websites for affiliate programs. That text is usually somewhere small and at the bottom.
Lastly, always review your niches for what other sites are selling. Reverse engineer, as mentioned above, which affiliate network is offering the products they are marketing.
I don't understand the meaning of 'buffer' sites used above. How does this differ to using T1 links? i.e. have 10-20 links to your M$, 100-200 to those (T2) etc. How can you do SEO with no links to the M$ at all?!
I guess they mean like manually created web 2.0 or some other manually created websites in the same niche which will channel the link juice to the money site.
@spunko2010 which tool do you use to check backlink profile ? Currently I have only free options - majesticseo, opensiteexplorer. I need a tool that allows to sort links by platforms/engines..
@RayBan I just use SER in built option and AHrefs. I don't really get that worked up over positions, if I'm in position 4 sometimes this converts more than position 3, for example. Depends on the competition. Money talks, i.e. conversion %.
Comments
@spunko2010 - I have never been deindexed - that's more of a Panda thing. If I go more than -100, it's toast. If it's around -50, I try some things for a short time - if no results, I kill it. If it's -10, then that was just a love slap - keep it.
@Elias and @Pratik - I use standard affiliate programs. No Amazon, Clickbank or CPA. And no, I don't do Viagra, Payday, Casinos, etc. Those types of business attract too many extreme blackhatters as well as newbs, so I don't waste my time on areas that stick out like a sore thumb to Google. I am more mainstream.
I download loads (not buy of course :P) and find some very nice nuggets about potential affiliate programs, with the complimentary method of ranking for those keywords/offers. Of course the method is either: a) too expensive to implement as described or b) too ineffective to get the job done... So you can come along and steal the idea then use the awesomeness of SER to easily outrank all those amateurs that bought the WSO.
Not only works well but someone has done all the hard work of researching the products/niches for you.
If so, how's that working out for you? I've never tried with no direct links so curious about the results.
I wasn't hit too badly this time, only sites that had been hit before were hit again. No new sites penalized at all, so far.
High PR aged domains for the buffer sites presumably?
@Pratik - You have to search google. If you spent two hours researching this, you would have enough programs to make your head split.
Try to learn which ones are big boys - who offer the best products, merchants and depth of categories. Always have relationships with the big boys, and always perform your due diligence on each network as far as reliability of payments to affiliates, etc., before adding new affiliate networks.
Also, pick any products, and look at their official websites for affiliate programs. That text is usually somewhere small and at the bottom.
Lastly, always review your niches for what other sites are selling. Reverse engineer, as mentioned above, which affiliate network is offering the products they are marketing.
I'd honestly recommend ahrefs if you want one.