Why Use Wealthy Affiliate?

Wealthy Affiliate University

I’ve recently been thinking about my online endeavors and where I am in my pursuit. Am I chasing a dream that is that, and only that? A dream?

Since my start in 2012, I’ve practiced a lot of trial and error concerning internet marketing. I spent about a year finding information on my own, trying to learn as much as I could without spending money.

I soon found this to be a very frustrating and tedious way to learn the business. My biggest concern was I didn’t know where the info was coming from. On top of that, was I spending my time on suggestions that didn't even work, or worse, hurt my marketing reputation?

That’s about the time I joined Wealthy Affiliate.

But now I’ve been a member of Wealthy Affiliate for almost six months. Why use Wealthy Affiliate if I haven’t seen a return yet?

It really come down to what I’m getting out of it.

I know there’s huge potential for internet marketing. There’s just so many ways to approach this business, I can’t help to see the potential in it. So, I still pay for my subscription because:

Training- I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again, I’ve learned more in a month after joining Wealthy Affiliate than I did on my own the year prior to joining. The website builder alone makes it so easy to build a site, I just follow it step by step and I have site ready for content in minutes.

Tools- I’ve wasted full Sundays doing keyword research for my articles, making it a long, tedious and sometimes a task I used to avoid (unacceptable when it comes to keywords). The keyword tool alone has saved me countless hours of cross-referencing and, to tell the truth, really don’t know what I would do without it

Support- Having a network of successful online entrepreneurs to ask questions and get feedback from is priceless. The community is full of support, not only from members, but the owners, as well. So no more worries about where the information is coming from!

So, yeah, I’m not making any money yet, but that’s not going to deter me from continuing my membership at Wealthy Affiliate. If anything, it will make me work harder, smarter and enjoy the accomplishment more when I do make a sale.

I neglected to mention an inspiration to all this. Dominic Wells recently posted some earnings and I was extremely motivated. I think he joined a few months before I did and is already showing excellent returns. Thanks, Dom!

Are you new to internet marketing? How long would you continue without making a profit?

Please share your thoughts below and thanks for reading!

Scott

My Online Business That I’m Still Working On

My Online Business

I was just reading back to the last post and wow, I haven’t written on here in quite some time. A lot has happened over the last few months, influencing my online business that hasn’t taken off like I had hoped for.

I still haven’t made any anything from my websites. It’s a little disheartening because I see associates making sales and they may have been marketing for a month or two before me.

I joined Wealthy Affiliate at the end of January and have been working on my online business off and on ever since. I suppose that could attribute to the fact that's why some are getting a response from their efforts. Just working off and on.

Looking at how I have approached this endeavor, I see the two major impedances I've put on myself.

One of the biggest things that has affected my progress in consistency. I have to be completely honest and say I haven’t been consistent with my work. Look at how long ago it was since I last posted here.

There are times when I can’t get enough writing done, sometimes posting an article or page twice a day. But then there are weeks that will go by and I don’t write anything.

Two different mindset go into play. I start writing because I feel a strong potential. An ability to work from home by creating a recurring monthly income. Perhaps one of the more popular mindsets.

But then, things change. I may feel I’m not getting a good enough response for the efforts I put forth.

Back and forth, back and forth I go, excited and full of potential one minute to feeling I may be wasting my time the next.

And that’s where persistence comes into play. I realized during those weeks I felt down and unmotivated, I need to remember the promise I’ve made to myself about persistence and working through it.

I really believe if I stay consistency, coupled with persistence, I’ll get my online business that is in the red (not much red, other than my subscription to Wealthy Affiliate) into the black.

photo credit: SEOPlanter via photopin cc

Still Trying To Make Money With My Computer

I've been working on this affiliate marketing venture for some time now, just about over a year. And to be honest, I'm still trying to make money with my computer.

When I started this campaign, I fully intended to pursue this with no out of pocket expense. But, the greatest asset you expend when trying to cut cost is time. I have been saving expenses for some time now, but I have spent an enormous amount of time researching and learning through trial and mistakes.

My first article was published Feb 17th, 2012. It linked to a Squidoo lens I had started developing in December of 2011 but didn't post until mid January of 2012.
It's funny thinking back to how long it took to write a 400 word article.

When I first started writing, it would easily take me three days to complete the process and finally publish something. Whether it was a post on a blog, page for a lens or writing an article, I took way too much time to write something that should have been a lot better if it took that long in the first place.

Normally, I would have given up, but I kept going. I have finally got my page posts and article writing down to a manageable hour or two, depending on research. It's taken awhile, but it did get easier the more it was practiced.

And using simple recommendations from the article sites themselves were useful. Offering template ideas and form suggestions, they have helped break down some of the overwhelming issues into manageable pieces when writing.

I started a website, but began to think about the domain and realized it was inappropriate for the niche I was pursuing. Something I should have reconciled before starting a fan page on Facebook, but no sense crying over spilled milk. Besides, I think I can use it for a different angle.

Right now, I'm in a transitional phase, figuring out how I'm going to approach another campaign while continuing the one I'm currently managing. I've got the steps and just need to apply what I learned from the first one to avoid time consuming mistakes that have hindered my progress in the past.

I could have continued a fee free endeavored, but the downside I have discovered is you won't own any of your sites.

So, I'm considering setting myself up with a budget now to help purchase necessary things such as domain names and help.

Make Money Online, No Money Invested?

When I started this blog, I wanted to see if I could start a career in affiliate marketing without spending anything. Earn as I learn, I phrased it. I wanted to see if I could make money online, no money out of pocket and start something from scratch?".

I started this blog, trying to get traffic to a site I had no idea how to put together. I paid for a domain and hosting every month. It wasn't much, but it wasn't free, either. For the duration of 2012, I blindly posted on blogs and wrote articles, trying to build traffic without much luck.

Then I started thinking about an affiliate program called Wealthy Affiliate I joined back in 2009. I was a member for only about a month but was happy with what I was getting. Thing is, I wasn't mature enough to do the actual work necessary. Ever since then, I haven't been able to forget about their program and wanted back in.

So at the end of January, I joined again and wish I had done it much sooner. At least looked into it. I could have saved myself a lot of time, aggravation and money.


Some of the tools I took advantage of seem invaluable now that I've used them.

The keyword tool is worth the paying subscription alone. I have had tremendous turnaround in my article views and have a much better understanding of how keywords work since using this tool.

The education I've been getting is also very valuable. I joined in the end of January and took part in one of their training modules. I have learned more with better results in the last month than I have in all of 2012 trying to do it on my own!

The sign up process was simple and I didn't need to pay anything to access some of the best tools I've come across, for free!

You can actually set up a website, have it hosted and market it without paying anything. What I found was if you wanted to learn about the business, paying the subscription fee is well worth it. As you can see on my profile, it's the best education I've paid for (or my parents).

Using Wealthy Affiliate, I found it is possible to make money online, no money out of pocket and potentially build an online business out of nothing. It will just take lots of time, patience and consistency.

Market Niche Overlooked? Not Good For Affiliate Marketing

It's been just over a year since my re-introduction to affiliate marketing and many lessons and mistakes have been made along the way.

Originally, I wanted to create an income out of nothing, but I abandoned that when I became too impatient and wanted to have my own website. It made it much easier to become an affiliate for particular products and to market, so over the last few months I've spent some money for my domain and hosting.

Getting back to my marketing endeavors...

Seems I need to learn things the hard way (ie. my own way) sometimes, so I'm looking at the last year as being very productive in education. Optimistically, I see the last year as opportunity for knowledge.

I haven't earned anything yet, which is why I'm going to weigh heavily on the educational aspect of this experience. Education has a value in and of its own, so I guess it's just a matter of how much I value my time.

Since beginning myaffiliate marketing aspirations, I've come to see many important aspects that need to come together to optimize the efforts put into my site. Market research, SEO, proper keyword research and applications along with working with all the social networks and email marketing all play a large role in promoting a website.

But the one big marketing technique I never implemented was finding my market niche.

When I first started my affiliate marketing campaign and began writing articles, I had all sorts of ideas of what I wanted to offer on my website.

As I was developing my website, I would come across something I would feel complimented my site.

So I added it. So on and so on, I began adding offers from different products, expanding my site by adding pages to it.

I first thought this was good, developing my offerings and hopefully reaching a potentially larger audience.

I found myself overwhelmed. I had read the advice to begin with a focus on a small, reasonable market, but I didn't heed it.

As I was developing my website, I created more work than I was ready to handle. It was a mistake to take on so much when trying to learn the basics at the same time.

Thinking if I used a broad area such as personal development, it would leave me room to go in many different directions.

Sometimes there can be too many directions to go in when it comes to affiliate marketing.

I've found out that if you don't have a specific direction, you can get lost in the vast universe that is the internet. There are to many big guns to compete with so you may never be seen. Very few search beyond the first page of results, so getting pushed back in page rankings from more established companies is very likely.

The plan now?

I have the basics of the site in place. I want to optimize my site by finding a good market niche to implement, but it will have to be one page at a time. See what I mean about creating too much work? But breaking down page by page at least makes it seem more manageable and still gives me a broad area to work in, accommodating my short attention span.

Still not sure what page I want to start with my site, but it's going to use a market niche technique to narrow in on stronger buyers.

I'd at least like to work on the one particular page long enough to measure a result. Then I'll know I'm going in a positive direction.

Affiliate Marketing-A New Year

It's just been just over a year now since I first realistically threw my hat in the affiliate marketing ring. It's been a long year of a lot of reading and research looking for the path of success with affiliate marketing.

You see, when I began this endeavor, I had all intentions of doing it for nothing, primarily as an experiment. I didn't want to spend a dime and test to see how viable it would be to build a lucrative presence on the web without an initial investment.

I started a free lens on Squidoo and began writing articles trying to drive traffic to it. After a few months, I wasn't getting much traffic at all, so I started my own website.

After a few weeks of trying to figure out in what direction I wanted to go in, I established my website in a way I could expand on it. I figured the more I could build on it, the more potential traffic, and in turn, more sales.

This has come with a double edged sword.

I still love the idea of being able to offer help in many different areas, but at the same time, it can be overwhelming.

I still consider myself very new to affiliate marketing, and that is what has given me issues in growing my site to the potential I had hoped for.

Trying to put together a multiple page website while still learning the ins and outs of affiliate marketing hasn't been a smooth process.

It seems the more I learn, the more potential I see, and with that, more to learn. It's very easy to become flooded with possibilities that can easily distract you from your original goal. You see or hear of success in some area, so I would look further into that.

This has kept me from becoming affluent in any particular area, keeping me almost distracted from completing my education from the task at hand. A lot has to do with my personality, but it can also be due to the hundreds of different avenues you can go down when pursuing an affiliate marketing endeavour.

Over the last year, I have learned a lot. I still only incur the one website maintenance expense and still plan on pursuing all the free marketing available.

But if I'm going to truly learn one thing, it's to try to remain focused on the task at hand.

My website has 7 pages right now. I think my best option is to concentrate on one of those pages and work on it. Treat it as my only page for a month or two and then move on to another. Continue writing articles, social networking and any other free networking out there for it. After going through all seven, I'll begin to look at expanding and adding new pages again.

It's hard to stay focused when everything so new and novel, especially with the potential you hear about. So this year, I'm designating focus as my "mantra" to carry me through and continue.