3 ms·

I think that one of the classic problems with the notion of passive income is the belief that it cannot have any ambition. A case in point is that my wife and

by kposehn 14y ago

I think that one of the classic problems with the notion of passive income is the belief that it cannot have any ambition. A case in point is that my wife and I created a web site 3 years ago. This site has not been touched in over a year, and that was the first and only update to the site in over 2 years. It has been consistently banking $2,500-$4,500 per month for the entire time it has been online. I put in maybe a few hours of time each quarter just to check in on it. Now, there is a catch - you can't just make a site and call it a day. You first have to do market research, come up with an angle, partner with a merchant or five, write a content plan, build it, market it, etc. Now, assume that your time is worth $100/hour. If you spend a full 2 weeks on it at 40 hours/week, you'll rack up $8,000 in overall opportunity cost. At first glance, that is a steep price. However, if you've picked right, you'll make that money back within a few months, probably less. This does mean there is going to be an upfront cost to you in order to get it out the door, but you will also have a better long-run profitability.

helipad 14y ago
What is the site? Sharing is caring.
- steveplace 14y ago
  In this case, it isn't. Sharing would remove their competitive edge.
  - kposehn 14y ago
    Hit the nail on the head there. Affiliate marketing is intensely competitive - the reason I can make a fair amount of money in the field is because we pursue every advantage at our disposal. The plethora of competitive intelligence tools in the field and the low barrier to entry make it extremely tough. However, there is a high barrier to success as well.
    - steveplace 14y ago
      Yup. That's why I moved to my own products and have affiliates work for me, as the stuff I create can't be replicated.
      - markyc 14y ago
        of course it can :)
    - mark_story 14y ago
      Thanks for sharing what you did though, it was a very interesting and illuminating read for me.
      - kposehn 14y ago
        Glad I could help
sown 14y ago
> You first have to do market research, come up with an angle, partner with a merchant or five, write a content plan, build it, market it, etc. It seems like you could make a website about that without some kind of selling angle because those were the first questions I had. I can't think of anything I know to write that anyone would be remotely interested in reading; i have no life, can't relate to normal things like bars or restaurants or whatever people do in their spare time.
- girasquid 14y ago
  Step back and examine your life, and you'll find tons of stuff once you think about it. For example, poking through your history I discovered that you've been through an acquisition: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4329721 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4329721. It probably wouldn't make you a boatload of cash to retire on, but there are probably some folks out there who are interested in learning about Surviving The Acquisition, or What To Do When You're Being Acquired. If you don't feel like you have anything yet - go learn something, and document the process. Others who are learning usually appreciate that, and there's always something you can teach someone.
  - kposehn 14y ago
    Well put.
weaksauce 14y ago
Now you probably wouldn't want to link to the site here but would you feel comfortable expanding on what type of site it is? Does the site update content regularly either via users or scraping? What are your visitor numbers for that kind of revenue? Is it direct sales of physical products?
- kposehn 14y ago
  - It is an SEO site - It has not seen a single update in 4 months - It gets 2-4k users per month - Direct sales of a physical product through a merchant partner The big advantage for a lot of my affiliate sites is I have exclusive terms and other deals. With the one I pointed out, I get paid 40% more than any affiliate would, have my own branding of the product, provide no support and invoice the merchant at the end of every month. They've paid on time, every time for 3.5 years. I have other more successful (and much less successful) sites as well, but this is probably the lowest-maintenance one I have. I'm happy to shed some light on this for people because I feel that here I might be able to help fellow entrepreneurs.
  - JoeCortopassi 14y ago
    How would you view your site, in relation to their product: - Is it articles about that field that point to that product as the best? - Are you a tutorial/more-info for that product? - Is it a "Find out which product is best for you" type configurator? ` I guess what I'm curious of, is what approach you took to make a mutually beneficial affiliate marketing site. Also, do you find yourself spending more time writing code/writing copy/creating graphics? It would seem like the majority of the time for something like this has to be writing copy
    - kposehn 14y ago
      All three actually. In order to do well in paid search or SEO for the long-haul, you've got to provide a lot of clear information and really guide the user. You have to make something people would miss if it didn't exist. The best approach to this day, imho, is not to make a straight-up site any longer. So many people create them that you are one voice in a massive crowd competing for attention. What gets that attention now is unique functionality, ie: software. Focus on developing a unique solution instead of the same-old-same-old. Case in point: RetailMeNot was the most successful of the coupon sites. They sold to WhaleShark for about $36m and had about $1m/month in commissions. However, anybody and their mom made a coupon site, which made any search term for "insert-brand-here coupons" get bombarded with results, all pushing the same thing. They succeeded because they have great social features, deal in printable coupons now, work closely with merchants, etc. As for us, most of my time was at first in copy/video/graphics; that ended up changing to more code related time as we started packing unique features into our sites. Eventually, I figured out that we are a marketing-heavy software company. Haven't looked back since.

by kposehn 14y ago

helipad 14y ago

What is the site? Sharing is caring.

steveplace 14y ago
In this case, it isn't. Sharing would remove their competitive edge.
- kposehn 14y ago
  Hit the nail on the head there. Affiliate marketing is intensely competitive - the reason I can make a fair amount of money in the field is because we pursue every advantage at our disposal. The plethora of competitive intelligence tools in the field and the low barrier to entry make it extremely tough. However, there is a high barrier to success as well.
  - steveplace 14y ago
    Yup. That's why I moved to my own products and have affiliates work for me, as the stuff I create can't be replicated.
    - markyc 14y ago
      of course it can :)
  - mark_story 14y ago
    Thanks for sharing what you did though, it was a very interesting and illuminating read for me.
    - kposehn 14y ago
      Glad I could help

sown 14y ago

> You first have to do market research, come up with an angle, partner with a merchant or five, write a content plan, build it, market it, etc. It seems like you could make a website about that without some kind of selling angle because those were the first questions I had. I can't think of anything I know to write that anyone would be remotely interested in reading; i have no life, can't relate to normal things like bars or restaurants or whatever people do in their spare time.

girasquid 14y ago
Step back and examine your life, and you'll find tons of stuff once you think about it. For example, poking through your history I discovered that you've been through an acquisition: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4329721 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4329721. It probably wouldn't make you a boatload of cash to retire on, but there are probably some folks out there who are interested in learning about Surviving The Acquisition, or What To Do When You're Being Acquired. If you don't feel like you have anything yet - go learn something, and document the process. Others who are learning usually appreciate that, and there's always something you can teach someone.
- kposehn 14y ago
  Well put.

weaksauce 14y ago

Now you probably wouldn't want to link to the site here but would you feel comfortable expanding on what type of site it is? Does the site update content regularly either via users or scraping? What are your visitor numbers for that kind of revenue? Is it direct sales of physical products?

kposehn 14y ago
- It is an SEO site - It has not seen a single update in 4 months - It gets 2-4k users per month - Direct sales of a physical product through a merchant partner The big advantage for a lot of my affiliate sites is I have exclusive terms and other deals. With the one I pointed out, I get paid 40% more than any affiliate would, have my own branding of the product, provide no support and invoice the merchant at the end of every month. They've paid on time, every time for 3.5 years. I have other more successful (and much less successful) sites as well, but this is probably the lowest-maintenance one I have. I'm happy to shed some light on this for people because I feel that here I might be able to help fellow entrepreneurs.
- JoeCortopassi 14y ago
  How would you view your site, in relation to their product: - Is it articles about that field that point to that product as the best? - Are you a tutorial/more-info for that product? - Is it a "Find out which product is best for you" type configurator? ` I guess what I'm curious of, is what approach you took to make a mutually beneficial affiliate marketing site. Also, do you find yourself spending more time writing code/writing copy/creating graphics? It would seem like the majority of the time for something like this has to be writing copy
  - kposehn 14y ago
    All three actually. In order to do well in paid search or SEO for the long-haul, you've got to provide a lot of clear information and really guide the user. You have to make something people would miss if it didn't exist. The best approach to this day, imho, is not to make a straight-up site any longer. So many people create them that you are one voice in a massive crowd competing for attention. What gets that attention now is unique functionality, ie: software. Focus on developing a unique solution instead of the same-old-same-old. Case in point: RetailMeNot was the most successful of the coupon sites. They sold to WhaleShark for about $36m and had about $1m/month in commissions. However, anybody and their mom made a coupon site, which made any search term for "insert-brand-here coupons" get bombarded with results, all pushing the same thing. They succeeded because they have great social features, deal in printable coupons now, work closely with merchants, etc. As for us, most of my time was at first in copy/video/graphics; that ended up changing to more code related time as we started packing unique features into our sites. Eventually, I figured out that we are a marketing-heavy software company. Haven't looked back since.