4 ms·

Does that actually make any money though? I often wonder what the purpose of chasing a few bucks here and there is if it doesn't make much and isn't scalable.

Does that actually make any money though? I often wonder what the purpose of chasing a few bucks here and there is if it doesn't make much and isn't scalable. Maybe it does make some money.

leviathant 17y ago
Back when people bought CDs, I'd make several grand in the course of a week each time Nine Inch Nails album preorders went live on Amazon & I posted links on my (well-known among fans) website. Heck, I made $500 off MP3 downloads of the Ghosts album when that came out. This allowed me to get better hosting, and to send money to other people who've helped me with the site, as well as fund contests for readers. The Amazon cookie persists for 24 hours, so if you click on that Kindle link today, but then tonight, go home and buy a defibrillator or 10 camcorders, the guy who slipped his affiliate link onto HN gets the commission on that. I use those as examples because they're things people have bought after clicking through NIN mp3/pre-order links. It's also worth noting that Amazon does a flat 10% rate on Kindle sales for affiliates... all other consumer electronics are a flat 4%. Amazon Associates is like free money if you run a blog, and so long as you're up front about that, I think that's fine. Lots of people are going to Amazon anyway. Posting your own affiliate link to a site like this and not disclosing affiliation is a little skeezy.
- leviathant 17y ago
  In the interest of diffusing knowledge - NIN gives away studio recordings for free these days, and that saw the end of me getting $20-$50 a month from casual user visits to our music/merch page (theninhotline.net/features/merch) Since then, I've changed our merch page around to aggregate eBay searches, and now make about the same from casual viewers as I did when the merch page was Amazon-centric. I also make $20-$60 a month from tshirt commissions through Goodrock. I'm certainly not quitting my day job, but I like that this hobby of mine has become self-sustaining.
aff 17y ago
I managed to get my Amazon.com Kindle affiliate link onto the front page of Reddit. It got several hundred upvotes, and based on my experience with Reddit, at least 10,000 clicks. End result? I sold 4 kindles, and made about $120. Not bad, but don't expect high conversion rates on this kind of thing.

Does that actually make any money though? I often wonder what the purpose of chasing a few bucks here and there is if it doesn't make much and isn't scalable. Maybe it does make some money.

leviathant 17y ago

Back when people bought CDs, I'd make several grand in the course of a week each time Nine Inch Nails album preorders went live on Amazon & I posted links on my (well-known among fans) website. Heck, I made $500 off MP3 downloads of the Ghosts album when that came out. This allowed me to get better hosting, and to send money to other people who've helped me with the site, as well as fund contests for readers. The Amazon cookie persists for 24 hours, so if you click on that Kindle link today, but then tonight, go home and buy a defibrillator or 10 camcorders, the guy who slipped his affiliate link onto HN gets the commission on that. I use those as examples because they're things people have bought after clicking through NIN mp3/pre-order links. It's also worth noting that Amazon does a flat 10% rate on Kindle sales for affiliates... all other consumer electronics are a flat 4%. Amazon Associates is like free money if you run a blog, and so long as you're up front about that, I think that's fine. Lots of people are going to Amazon anyway. Posting your own affiliate link to a site like this and not disclosing affiliation is a little skeezy.

leviathant 17y ago
In the interest of diffusing knowledge - NIN gives away studio recordings for free these days, and that saw the end of me getting $20-$50 a month from casual user visits to our music/merch page (theninhotline.net/features/merch) Since then, I've changed our merch page around to aggregate eBay searches, and now make about the same from casual viewers as I did when the merch page was Amazon-centric. I also make $20-$60 a month from tshirt commissions through Goodrock. I'm certainly not quitting my day job, but I like that this hobby of mine has become self-sustaining.

aff 17y ago

I managed to get my Amazon.com Kindle affiliate link onto the front page of Reddit. It got several hundred upvotes, and based on my experience with Reddit, at least 10,000 clicks. End result? I sold 4 kindles, and made about $120. Not bad, but don't expect high conversion rates on this kind of thing.