5 ms·

I agree with the main point of the article. However, I can tell you that your $1M in affiliate revenue on 1.2M UV for a literary blog is way off. Your assumpt

by psadri 14y ago

I agree with the main point of the article. However, I can tell you that your $1M in affiliate revenue on 1.2M UV for a literary blog is way off. Your assumption of 10% conversion is off by at least an order of magnitude. The more likely rate is probably less than 1%. This would bring the total amount to around $100K in your calculation.

aristus 14y ago
I do (much lower scale) affiliate links and book reviews, mostly for the data, rather than the money. But my conversion rate is something like 23%. With a good niche and qualified traffic (eg most traffic coming from people genuinely linking to you because the content is awesome and relevant) 10% is not impossible.
- jonknee 14y ago
  Your conversion rate from unique visitors to sales is 23%? What type of traffic are you talking about? That's absurdly high and would still be high for a site that directly sells something, let alone a site that has a link to a book.
  - j_s 14y ago
    People that do the work to find these types of niches don't usually just announce them to the world on Hacker News.
    - jonknee 14y ago
      The amount of traffic is not a giveaway of the vertical. 23% of a 100 visits is something entirely different than 23% of 1,000,000 visits.
      - j_s 14y ago
        When you said 'type' (of traffic) above I did not think that meant 'amount'. I do agree that amount of traffic is not a giveaway.
        jonknee 14y ago
        Well I meant both how much and what type (as in direct, referral, organic search engine, paid search engine, etc). 23% would be unbelievable for direct traffic like the blog in question has, but less so for search engine traffic (if you have links to what people were searching about they are many many times more likely to both click and convert than if they are just on their daily read through). He/she could also have meant 23% conversion as reported through Amazon which means 23% of the people who clicked ended up purchasing, also a much more believable number.
JamesCRR 14y ago
It's a little more subtle than this I think: he's arguing that across a year maybe 1/10th of the 1.2m monthly unique visitors will buy something. So overall conversion is 1/(10*12) or roughly 1%. Would love to hear from someone who runs a literary b,log though and has better figures.
AJ007 14y ago
Unless someone sees the exact numbers, or has a comparable web site, they have no idea what they really are. The author is building one assumption on top of the other, meaning each step off makes the end result even further from reality. I haven't touched Amazon's affiliate program in years, but from what I remember the % of sale was category based, and many items would pay out in the low single digits. Web site owners soliciting donations while making money from affiliate links, not unusual. Owners making money from affiliate links while not disclosing them, even more common. Journalists attacking bias while making money and not disclosing it, unusual and certainly worth investigating.
- psadri 14y ago
  I was referring to the conversion to sales. What % of people clicking on a link to amazon actually buy a book. What you are referring to is the rev share %: how much of the the sale price amazon shares with the publisher. 10-15% is correct here.
SODaniel 14y ago
I think you are pretty much 100% wrong here. With a active user base and the cookie duration for amazon links 10% isn't necessarily far off at all. This of course takes into account high ticket items purchased with active cookie etc.
- psadri 14y ago
  Not sure what amazon's cookie duration is. But to get enough cookie coverage, a lot of people would have to be clicking out on the links. I simply think that 10% conversion is just way to high. If it was so easy to make a $1 ARPU from a blog, you'd see way more way more bloggers :)
  - jlgaddis 14y ago
    > Not sure what amazon's cookie duration is. 24 hours[0], if I'm reading correctly. > If it was so easy to make a $1 ARPU from a blog, you'd see way more way more bloggers :) If I made $1 ARPU, I'd quit my job and blog full-time. 0: https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/help/operating https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/help/oper...

by psadri 14y ago

aristus 14y ago

I do (much lower scale) affiliate links and book reviews, mostly for the data, rather than the money. But my conversion rate is something like 23%. With a good niche and qualified traffic (eg most traffic coming from people genuinely linking to you because the content is awesome and relevant) 10% is not impossible.

jonknee 14y ago
Your conversion rate from unique visitors to sales is 23%? What type of traffic are you talking about? That's absurdly high and would still be high for a site that directly sells something, let alone a site that has a link to a book.
- j_s 14y ago
  People that do the work to find these types of niches don't usually just announce them to the world on Hacker News.
  - jonknee 14y ago
    The amount of traffic is not a giveaway of the vertical. 23% of a 100 visits is something entirely different than 23% of 1,000,000 visits.
    - j_s 14y ago
      When you said 'type' (of traffic) above I did not think that meant 'amount'. I do agree that amount of traffic is not a giveaway.
      - jonknee 14y ago
        Well I meant both how much and what type (as in direct, referral, organic search engine, paid search engine, etc). 23% would be unbelievable for direct traffic like the blog in question has, but less so for search engine traffic (if you have links to what people were searching about they are many many times more likely to both click and convert than if they are just on their daily read through). He/she could also have meant 23% conversion as reported through Amazon which means 23% of the people who clicked ended up purchasing, also a much more believable number.

JamesCRR 14y ago

It's a little more subtle than this I think: he's arguing that across a year maybe 1/10th of the 1.2m monthly unique visitors will buy something. So overall conversion is 1/(10*12) or roughly 1%. Would love to hear from someone who runs a literary b,log though and has better figures.

AJ007 14y ago

Unless someone sees the exact numbers, or has a comparable web site, they have no idea what they really are. The author is building one assumption on top of the other, meaning each step off makes the end result even further from reality. I haven't touched Amazon's affiliate program in years, but from what I remember the % of sale was category based, and many items would pay out in the low single digits. Web site owners soliciting donations while making money from affiliate links, not unusual. Owners making money from affiliate links while not disclosing them, even more common. Journalists attacking bias while making money and not disclosing it, unusual and certainly worth investigating.

psadri 14y ago
I was referring to the conversion to sales. What % of people clicking on a link to amazon actually buy a book. What you are referring to is the rev share %: how much of the the sale price amazon shares with the publisher. 10-15% is correct here.

SODaniel 14y ago

I think you are pretty much 100% wrong here. With a active user base and the cookie duration for amazon links 10% isn't necessarily far off at all. This of course takes into account high ticket items purchased with active cookie etc.

psadri 14y ago
Not sure what amazon's cookie duration is. But to get enough cookie coverage, a lot of people would have to be clicking out on the links. I simply think that 10% conversion is just way to high. If it was so easy to make a $1 ARPU from a blog, you'd see way more way more bloggers :)
- jlgaddis 14y ago
  > Not sure what amazon's cookie duration is. 24 hours[0], if I'm reading correctly. > If it was so easy to make a $1 ARPU from a blog, you'd see way more way more bloggers :) If I made $1 ARPU, I'd quit my job and blog full-time. 0: https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/help/operating https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/help/oper...