6 ms·
Diskprices.com makes $5k/month with affiliate marketing
https://web.archive.org/web/20231224124818/https://medium.com/@petervoica/how-an-ugly-single-page-website-makes-5-000-a-month-with-affiliate-marketing-c4974a8d1d69 https://web.archive.org/web/20231224124818/https://medium.co...
- nomilk 3y agoArchived version of article: https://web.archive.org/web/20231224124818/https://medium.com/@petervoica/how-an-ugly-single-page-website-makes-5-000-a-month-with-affiliate-marketing-c4974a8d1d69 https://web.archive.org/web/20231224124818/https://medium.co... The website making $5k/month: https://diskprices.com/ https://diskprices.com/
- tonystubblebine 3y agoAlso, here's a friend link that bypasses the paywall. https://medium.com/@petervoica/how-an-ugly-single-page-website-makes-5-000-a-month-with-affiliate-marketing-c4974a8d1d69?sk=v2%2F3d92b3a3-1490-4c5e-a935-3543a78cbda6 https://medium.com/@petervoica/how-an-ugly-single-page-websi...
- cranberryturkey 3y agoi love these simple little money makers.
- politelemon 3y ago> with total disrespect for the user experience Be careful not to confuse user experience with UI aesthetics and pages with padding.
- Swenrekcah 3y agoThe site where they put up this blogpost has less respect for user experience than the simple and functional website they called ugly.
- vdaea 3y agoI can't even read the whole post without registering and he has the nerve of calling other websites disrespectful.
- Lex-2008 3y agorecently I learned that reading the article through archive.is shows the whole content: https://archive.is/Eea8R https://archive.is/Eea8R
- roter 3y agoAnd a beautiful little extension [0] (I use the Firefox one) to click when you visit a page that you want to Archive.is or Wayback. [0] https://github.com/dessant/web-archives https://github.com/dessant/web-archives
- palmfacehn 3y agoIn FF reader mode works fine without any 3rd party extensions.
- jcpst 3y agoI thought what they called ugly was pretty clean.
- unnouinceput 3y agoExactly my point as well when I went to the site. Fast, click here, uncheck there, kaboom, instant change. No gazillion nested divs, precisely to the point of what it says it does. I guess Peter Voica, the article's author, cannot comprehend pages without having blank spaces at edges.
- Gualdrapo 3y agoI know the HN hivemind despises white space and padding and medium width paragraphs and deem them unneccessary and atrocious for some reason, but the design on the site is not that "functional" - on a window with width of 1035px or less, the main table moves all the way down below the filter column - I can imagine someone opening this with a tablet or something like that for the first time wondering where are all the articles until they scroll all the way down.
- Robotbeat 3y agoIt works fine in landscape orientation on an iPhone SE if you zoom out to 50%. I prefer to view websites like this as if my phone was a desktop, and I tend to hate it when that desire is fought by aggressive attempts to reflow everything into a “mobile” format with no way around it. So I think it’s better than many modern websites as far as usability goes.
- Arn_Thor 3y agoI’m sorry but I’m just not going to switch off my orientation lock and turn my phone sideways just for a website to “work fine”. It’s 2024. I expect better
- jcpst 3y agolol! I only type that when something literally makes me laugh out loud. Thank you, this comment made my morning.
- jcpst 3y agoApologies if this is wasn’t a valuable comment. Earlier it didn’t occur to me that the comment about having to turn their phone sideways might not be sarcasm.
- marginalia_nu 3y agoThere's a lot of content you're just not going to be able to partake in then. Tables with more than 3 columns more or less just don't work in portrait mode.
- spaceman_2020 3y agoIf you really want to learn good modern UI design from a business perspective, you need to look at websites that absolutely need to retain users and depend on high conversions to survive. Example: Stake.com. Somehow manages to show a ton of information without feeling slow or sluggish. Isn’t pretty but has basic respect for legibility and whitespace.
- nayuki 3y ago> He created a website that looks like it was made in HTML with total disrespect for the user experience I find that the filtering on diskprices.com works way faster than the typical search filters on Newegg, Canada Computers, and pretty much every e-commerce site I've ever used. Disk Prices is definitely respecting my user experience by being snappy and not wasting CPU cycles and network round trips.
- theosp 3y agoSimple, beautiful website that serves its purpose.
- secondcoming 3y agoHis amazon.co.uk data seems to be missing
- toberoni 3y agoThe website isn't the money maker. It's the backlinks that allow it to rank. Getting them requires a lot of knowledge & work, like publishing articles on Medium or receiving links on HN. Unsurprisingly, it looks like the creator is an SEO-expert with years of experience and dozens of projects.
- marklyon 3y agoI've had good luck with https://shucks.top https://shucks.top. Hopefully he's made a bit of lucre from the links as well.
- andrewstuart 3y agoSo I can't just jump in and copy cat?
- nerdponx 3y agoDo the same for RAM or monitors or just about any tech product that can be hard to shop for.
- marginalia_nu 3y agoProduct discovery in general is a mess. It's not a particularly high bar you have to pass in order to build something that's better than your average online storefront when it comes to product search and comparison.
- amelius 3y agoAlways wondered why you can't find a pair of jeans of a particular brand and size using Google.
- steveBK123 3y agoJeans are probably top 3 worst products to shop for. Mens sizes are literal measurements in inches, ostensibly. However when you look at the sizing chart on brand websites you realize they all have varying levels of vanity sizing - across brands, across fits within a brand, and across years within a fit. Then you have all the confusing nomenclature for fits - skinny, slim, straight, classic, standard, relaxed, boot cut, baggy, flare, athletic, etc.. And then hybrid ones like "slim straight" or other nonsense. Finally, some brands offer different inseams/lenghts for a given waist, while others have fixed ones per waist size so you have to get them tailored after, etc. The shopping experience for me in jeans is to trying multiple brands/fits/sizes every 5+ years, and then keep buying that exact model until it is no long available, then reset.
- Zetobal 3y ago>> He created a website that looks like it was made in HTML...
- assimpleaspossi 3y agoI noticed that, too
- mahesh_rm 3y agoThe website the article is reporting on is a work of beauty. On the other hand, the website the article is hosted on..
- assimpleaspossi 3y agoThis is what happens when a web site, or any business, is actually useful for visitors. Too many sites now only focus on selling someone else's product through marketing. This site focuses on being helpful.
- p3rls 3y ago[flagged]
- yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago> psychologically unhelpful to web creators. What does that mean?
- p3rls 3y agoIt means everyone is already trying to be helpful/useful. It's like telling someone who is struggling with dating to just be themselves. Not useful or actionable advice.
- throwaway63467 3y agoHonestly that site has great UX/UI. Mobile view could be improved but it doesn’t have any distractions and a clear user interface with all the relevant information, so it’s ahead of most over designed “beautiful” websites.
- crabmusket 3y agoJust a few little tweaks would go a long way, akin to the small difference between https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ and http://bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com/ http://bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com/
- bazil376 3y agoSome might say “ugly” but others would say “functional.” It’s getting the job done.
- arter4 3y agoLook, I'm no businessman, but clearly if you manage to attract the right audience and find a way to get paid, you make money. People asking for disk prices probably have looser standards in terms of UX. That's why it works. Backlinks and an audience who actually doesn't care about UX that much. Doing the same stuff in the fashion industry may not work.
- II2II 3y ago> People asking for disk prices probably have looser standards in terms of UX. Perhaps the opposite is true. A site like this works because Amazon is poor at finding products, never mind for comparing prices. Even e-commerce sites that filter data in a similar manner (and typically do a better job since they have more complete product details), this site is both faster and makes product comparisons easier. While it is probably possible to tweak to UX to make it better, I would suggest the success of this site is due to providing a better UX for its target audience.
- arter4 3y agoI mean from an aesthetic standpoint. People interested in disk details and prices may not care that much about material design, responsiveness and carousel with disk pictures. They want to get what they want. For that kind of audience, the simple UX of that website is attractive enough.
- creer 3y agoNot "enough". "More". And it's hard to argue this it's not responsive!
- p0nce 3y agoWell UX is not aesthetics. The linked website _has_ good UX.
- creer 3y ago> looser standards in terms of UX This site has an outstanding UX for its audience and users. This audience cares about UX. They/ we are not shy to tell you that most current web site's user experience sucks. So it's not a question of "looser standards". On the contrary it's a question of paying attention to your users.
- WhereIsTheTruth 3y agoI'm pretty sure this website is not compliant WRT affiliate links, you need to disclose them and be upfront about them
- cranberryturkey 3y agohe does that in the sidebar
- WhereIsTheTruth 3y agoOh looks like i missed it, thanks!
- alvah 3y agoThe few words far down the sidebar don't comply with either Amazon or FTC affiliate disclosure requirements. They may have complied when the owner built the site, which appears to have been decades ago.
- volemo 3y agoBut the site has the "This site is supported by paid affiliate links. Learn more" plaque. Isn't that enough?
- halayli 3y agoAt least I can fully access the page content and doesn't ask me to register to read the rest of it.
- pdehaan 3y agoYet another example that being "ugly" has little impact on utility. This looks right in line (if on a smaller scale) with the masterpiece that is McMaster-Carr https://mcmaster.com/ https://mcmaster.com/
- ilrwbwrkhv 3y agoWhat I really like is the solidity of the whole website. Like things don't shift around and move around. There is no JavaScript moving the element when I'm trying to click on it. No fonts loading with a flash after I already see stuff on the page. Once I see it, it's there for me to click it if I choose to and that gives me a whole lot of trust and faith in the website.
- xnx 3y agoI love the simplicity, but would not be surprised if there's another $X still on the table because there are no accomodations for mobile devices.
- pratnala 3y agoWhy do I not see the 990 Pro on this?
- plagiarist 3y agoI'm seeing a few 990 entries under the .com if I select only M.2 NVMe.
- jamghee 3y agoI'm a bit surprised Amazon allowed this page to do affiliate marketing like this. I had a similar page but much more generalized to laptops and they told me my site had to have some other content: it couldn't just exist to promote the amazon products. If they've changed their stance on this then great!
- cranberryturkey 3y agoi think as long as you say that they are amazon affiliate links its ok
- jamghee 3y agoThat wasn't the issue I had at the time. I had the required disclaimers but they still rejected me because the sole purpose of my site was to sell their products.
- PaulRobinson 3y agoThis has "content". The filters and columns are different to those offered by Amazon's own search experience (the $/TB, for example). Did your laptop selection site just replicate the data from Amazon, or did it try and do something novel? "Content" is not alway descriptions, reviews and the like. It can be aggregation, statistical and calculated.
- jamghee 3y ago>Did your laptop selection site just replicate the data from Amazon, or did it try and do something novel? I thought it was novel. It was basically a guided questionnaire that asked you about your needs and price point and then spit out a laptop recommendation at the end
- stepbeek 3y agoInteresting that this site makes money despite pcpartpicker existing. Gives me hope that there are a bunch of opportunities to build something like this for other hobbies.
- jamghee 3y agoI assume this is using some kind of amazon pricing API under the hood. Does anyone know how to get access to that kind of API without already being a successful affiliate?
- ProcNetDev 3y agoAnyone know what Amazon's policy is on allow api access? They shut down shucks.top.
- xnx 3y agoSidenotes: I'm a huge fan of this type of well-done advanced filtering-faceting. Is there a standard/popular library/tool for this? It's a shame the link to the parent organization on https://diskprices.com/faq.html https://diskprices.com/faq.html is broken. I'd love to see more sites in this style.
- ayewo 3y agoThis web page for comparing EC2 pricing using filtering https://instances.vantage.sh/?region=us-east-2 https://instances.vantage.sh/?region=us-east-2 is open source https://github.com/vantage-sh/ec2instances.info https://github.com/vantage-sh/ec2instances.info
- stevesearer 3y agoThis is interesting to me because I recently made a website for a niche type of product and was denied Amazon Affiliate. “We want an associate site to be one that adds value to the customer by giving them insight on a subject or product they might not get easily.” Listing all of the products available (Amazon and elsewhere) in one place (there are like 20 total ) so a shopper could compare features seemed liked it would suffice. Perhaps I should reformat the website to be like Diskprices and try again.
- muzamil2002 3y ago[flagged]
- muzamil2002 3y ago[flagged]
- muzamil2002 3y ago[flagged]
- paxys 3y agoThe author's description of diskprices.com: > He created a website that looks like it was made in HTML with total disrespect for the user experience [...] As I try to read more of the post: > Create an account to read the full story. > The author made this story available to Medium members only. If you’re new to Medium, create a new account to read this story on us. Please tell me more about this "user experience" and "disrespect".
- geor9e 3y agoIt's free and one click on the Google or Facebook SSO, just in case you thought that was a paywall. If you're refusing on principle, noted.
- tremarley 3y agoYou pay with your data
- hartator 3y agoI have signed in though Google and in the app, there is no way to avoid the paywall. Makes me questioning all the blog posts I posted on Medium.
- geor9e 3y agoOdd, I don't get the wall when logged in.
- tonystubblebine 3y agoThis author specifically and intentionally put this piece behind the paywall. There's no reason to worry about your blog posts on Medium being behind a paywall unless you did the same.
- null_point 3y agoSetting something like this up would at the very least be a fun little project.
- mthoms 3y agoI don't think all that info is available via Amazon's API so the site owner must be scraping Amazon page listings. Surely this isn't allowed? What am I missing?
- kossTKR 3y agoI don't know what's going on here but Amazon normally shuts stuff like this down in 1 second because you're not allowed to make "affiliate sites with no other content" like much of this space. Really not applicable for anyone else than this dude.
- mromanuk 3y agoBrilliant, the site does what I do myself every time I research something to buy. Basically a spreadsheet, where I gather all the data points myself, it's tiresome. Capitalism to work, it's supposed to be done by rational agents. This removes all the emotionality from choosing a product.
- peter_d_sherman 3y agoThis site is a good example of a simple, ethical affilate marketing site. Of course, as other posters have alluded to, setting up a site like this does not just involve creating the web page itself -- it also necessarily would involve SEO and backlinks, etc., etc. Again, as other posters have alluded to. But that being said -- this web page still ranks pretty high in my book for simplicity (and elegance from that simplicity), in a money-making website. It could be argued, successfully, that any website these days, any website at all -- would need visitors -- and if those visitors aren't coming from social media and/or Google ads -- then getting visitors there would necessarily have to involve SEO and backlinks. Unless of course, you have some other creative and/or good way to get visitors to your website... So, an excellent example of what a simple website can do -- if, if and only if you can solve the problem of getting visitors to your website, by one or more ways...
- peter_d_sherman 3y agoAnother great example of an ethical affiliate marketing site (although this one is a bit more complex): https://octopart.com/ https://octopart.com/
- muzamil2002 3y ago[flagged]
- nullbyte808 3y agoI like how it looks. The only thing I would improve is create a table for the data, with alternating colors per row.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]