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How to Make Massive Money During Q4 2011

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It comes around the same time every year, yet so many of us just let the huge holiday cash cow craze pass us by. I know I’m guilty of looking at the coming 4th quarter of the year and always saying, “Next year I’ll be ready!”… but then I find myself in the same spot the next year, wishing I did more and was ready. One of the major problems with gearing up for the fourth quarter and all the big sales events, is knowing what to focus on. Instead of trying to make money off everything, you have a lot to choose from and focus in on.

Halloween

One of the most exciting and profitable times of the year! Forget about the candy… everyone wants the costumes, and they are willing to shed out the big bucks to get them. Sure, there might be huge Halloween outlets stores in your area, but everyone is really flocking to do their research and buying online. Through the use of affiliate programs, you can simply create a resource web site or blog about Halloween costumes, then earn any where from 10-40% on all referred sales. Some families are buying all of their costumes online, which can bring in orders in the $200-$300 range! If you aren’t ready for Halloween this year, make sure your spook yourself into doing something next year!

Black Friday

If you didn’t have to wake up in the early morning hours to go to work, would you? It’s amazing what people will do to find discounts and deals during black friday. Standing outside of a store for days to find that perfect gift for just a few dollars cheaper. How are people finding the right stores to go to, and those most have deals? Easy… they are looking online. There is a massive amount of money to be made by having your own black friday deals web site. You can offer coupon codes and link directly to online stores… all earning you a commission on each signup or sale!

Christmas

Even if everyone has spent all their money during Halloween and Christmas, they will do whatever they can to scurry up some extra money for Christmas spending. It’s the craziest time of the year and we are seeing better online revenue numbers every year. How long before you get in on the auction. Don’t worry about focusing on Christmas as a whole, but instead focus on the hot items and gifts that everyone is trying to buy. If you can’t find a direct affiliate program to earn commissions on an item, try looking at Target, Amazon and Best Buy.

New Years

Oh no! The year is over… there’s nothing to cash in on any more… NOT! Now you have New Years, when everyone is telling themselves they will look better in the new year, eat better and live a better life style. Sure, it may only last few a few weeks or a couple months at best, but it doesn’t mean people aren’t going to be spending a ton of money on weight loss methods, ways to quit smoking and so much more.

If you aren’t taking advantage of any of these massive opportunities in cash in during the next few months, you really need to look at your priorities. Even if you aren’t ready to dedicate a lot of time into something new, make sure you make an attempt, and it will make it that much easier for you to cash in next year!

Amazon Warns CA Affiliates – It May Pull the Plug on Their Accounts

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Well, I got a nice email in my inbox this afternoon from Amazon, saying that they will have terminate my affiliate account if the new sales tax measure passes in California. Yes, I am set to lose a huge monetization strategy for some of my blogs because I live in sunny Southern Cali. *sighs*

This isn’t the first time Amazon has had to cut out affiliate programs in states. They’ve already shut down those residing in Illinois, Hawaii, Connecticut and North Carolina because they passed legislature similar to California.

The legislature involves a sales tax measure that will ultimately treat Amazon Affiliates the same as retailers with brick and mortar stores – thus requiring them to pay a sales tax.

The email read as follows:

Hello,
For well over a decade, the Amazon Associates Program has worked with thousands of California residents. Unfortunately, a potential new law that may be signed by Governor Brown compels us to terminate this program for California-based participants. It specifically imposes the collection of taxes from consumers on sales by online retailers – including but not limited to those referred by California-based marketing affiliates like you – even if those retailers have no physical presence in the state.

We oppose this bill because it is unconstitutional and counterproductive. It is supported by big-box retailers, most of which are based outside California, that seek to harm the affiliate advertising programs of their competitors. Similar legislation in other states has led to job and income losses, and little, if any, new tax revenue. We deeply regret that we must take this action.

As a result, we will terminate contracts with all California residents that are participants in the Amazon Associates Program as of the date (if any) that the California law becomes effective. We will send a follow-up notice to you confirming the termination date if the California law is enacted. In the event that the California law does not become effective before September 30, 2011, we withdraw this notice. As of the termination date, California residents will no longer receive advertising fees for sales referred to Amazon.com, Endless.com, MYHABIT.COM or SmallParts.com. Please be assured that all qualifying advertising fees earned on or before the termination date will be processed and paid in full in accordance with the regular payment schedule.

You are receiving this email because our records indicate that you are a resident of California. If you are not currently a resident of California, or if you are relocating to another state in the near future, you can manage the details of your Associates account here. And if you relocate to another state in the near future please contact us for reinstatement into the Amazon Associates Program.

To avoid confusion, we would like to clarify that this development will only impact our ability to offer the Associates Program to California residents and will not affect their ability to purchase from Amazon.com, Endless.com, MYHABIT.COM or SmallParts.com.

We have enjoyed working with you and other California-based participants in the Amazon Associates Program and, if this situation is rectified, would very much welcome the opportunity to re-open our Associates Program to California residents. We are also working on alternative ways to help California residents monetize their websites and we will be sure to contact you when these become available.

Regards,

The Amazon Associates Team

I’m still kind of shaking my head. And looking for ways to get involved. Have sales tax laws impacted you in any way?

16 Brilliant Bloggers Talk About Affiliate Programs

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Brilliant Bloggers is a weekly series here at BlogWorld where we look at the best posts from around the web all surrounding a specific topic. Every week, we’ll feature three of the most brilliant bloggers out there, along with a huge link of more resources where you can learn about the topic. You can see more Brilliant Blogger posts or learn how to submit your link for an upcoming edition here.

This Week’s Topic: Affiliate Programs

Affiliate programs are great for making a little extra money with your blog, and for some people, they’re major money makers. I’ve personally used Amazon’s program with some success, and you can also consider working with individuals to promote their products (for example, I have an affiliate program for my Freelance Writing ebook). Affiliate programs are often most closely associated with Internet marketers, but they can work for all bloggers, whether you blog about making money online or parenting or gardening or sports or anything in between. Today, I’ve got some great advice for you on this topic from some truly brilliant bloggers!

Advice from Brilliant Bloggers:

20 Tips I Used To Make $90,336.65 With Amazon by Chris Guthrie

Who doesn’t want to make nearly six figures as an Amazon affiliate? I met Chris randomly for a few minutes at BlogWorld 2010 while making a video about the event, and afterward, I looked up his site – and was so glad I did! To call Chris brilliant is an understatement. This post about his success on Amazon is a great place to start, but don’t be afraid to explore – there’s a lot of gold on his blog. After checking out the site, make sure you follow him on Twitter @ChrisGuthrie.

Are You Practicing “Spray And Pray” Affiliate Marketing? by David Risley

Many bloggers don’t find success as affiliates because they just send out a message (spray) and hope that some people bite (pray). In this post, David talks about the problem with this approach and better ways to make money with affiliate programs than just crossing your fingers that someone will click your link and make a purchase. After you check out the post, don’t forget to follow David on Twitter @davidrisley.

8 Principles for Effective Affiliate Marketing on a Blog by Pat Flynn

I love this post from Pat Flynn because it isn’t the typical “here’s how to rank high on Google for a search term and add affiliate links” post. While that can be a great approach, it’s not going to work for every blogger. Pat’s post instead gives advice on how to be successful as an affiliate with a site full of awesome content. Check it out and then follow Pat on Twitter @patflynn.

Even More Brilliant Advice:

Did I miss your post or a post by someone you know about affiliate programs? Unintentional! Help me out by leaving a comment below with the link!

Next Week’s Topic: Working with a Virtual Assistant

I’d love to include a link to your post next week – and if you head to the Brilliant Blogger Schedule, you can see even more upcoming posts. We all have something to learn from one another, so please don’t be shy! Head to the schedule today to learn how to submit your post so I won’t miss it.

30 Days to a Better Blog: Add Affiliate Links

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30 Days to a Better Blog: Add Affiliate Links

Most bloggers have a group of ads along the edges of their website – in the header, sidebar, and footer. Perhaps they have other banners sprinkled throughout their content. But affiliate links embedded directly in your post can lead to a much larger percentage of click-thrus and add another monetization source. Just don’t overdo it! You want your readers to trust your blog, content, and links – so only add links that are applicable and trustworthy. And only one or two per post.

My personal favorite (broad) affiliate sites that I’ve used are:

When should you embed an affiliate link in your post? Any time you’re talking about a product, group of products, or service! Doing a book review? Add a link to Barnes & Noble. Talking about a product launch? Use an affiliate link. Discussing the merits of pedometers? Link to the pedometer page of Amazon. The opportunities are endless. Alli put together a list of the 8 Affiliates Selling in her 12 Days of Blogging series. Check it out!

Do you use affiliate links and how do they work for you?

How to Start Making Money from Ads on your Blog

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… by Scott Fox, ClickMillionaires.com

How to Start Making Money from Ads on your Blog

By Scott Fox, ClickMillionaires.com

Don’t make the mistake of starting a new website expecting the “big boys” of Fortune 500 company advertisers to show up and advertise. As discussed in my previous post, “Why Big Advertisers Avoid Your Blog… (The Ugly Truth)”, you need to earn their attention by building an audience and traffic appropriate to their brands first.

How to Start Making Money from Ads on a New Blog
If you want to start making money today, here are 4 levels of online advertising you can use even if your blog’s traffic is small or you have just launched a new niche web site:

1. Advertising Network Ads: Your site can start attracting ad dollars today by installing ad code from services like Google’s Adwords or Adbrite. These networks are free to join and will be happy to populate your site with advertising from relevant advertisers immediately.

2. Affiliate Advertising: The next level is to promote products for others in exchange for a sales commission. If you can find products/services that match the needs of your audience, this can be profitable. It is also a revenue strategy that you can start immediately.

Visit Amazon.com, CJ.com, Linkshare.com, Shareasale.com, or find individual companies that offer affiliate programs for products that your audience would like. This can also be a good way to get pro-level “big name” advertisers’ ads on your site because many major companies offer affiliate programs today online.

(TIP: Be sure to disclose your affiliation with these products/companies so that you don’t run afoul of FTC advertising guidelines for bloggers.)

3. Directly Negotiated Ads: If you can find products that are a “perfect” match for your audience, you may be able to recruit your first advertisers even when your blog’s audience is small.

Photo editing software for a digital photography blog or ebooks on weight loss for your weight loss blog are good examples.

A favorite ad target of mine is to look for industry-specific conferences. If your audience is from a particular industry, conference organizers are likely to want to advertise even if your audience is small because it is so targeted.

4. Your Own Products: The most profitable advertising is often for your own products. As a new blogger, you may not have your own products yet. But when you are ready, using your own ad space to promote your own products can be highly profitable. (Plus, there’s no negotiation required!).

5. Fortune 500 Ads: As discussed in my previous post, it’s tough to get major brand-name advertisers to buy advertising on a small website or new blog. But if you work your way through the four levels of advertising above, you can grow your audience and revenues together to reach the point where even the “big boys” are likely to direct their media buying agencies to advertise with you.

All of these advertising sales strategies can help you create a revenue model for a new blog early in its development. As your audience grows, you can work your way through these four levels of advertising strategies. They will help you make money at each step, and eventually
position you for level 5, which is the placement of ads from Fortune 500 corporations with the truly big advertising budgets we all dream about.

What questions or suggestions do you have about this approach?
Which ad strategies have you found most profitable for new blogs?

Scott Fox is the host of the online marketing success coaching community ClickMillionaires.com. He is a serial startup executive, podcaster, and author whose e-business strategy coaching helps solopreneurs, small business owners, and corporations make more money online. He is the best-selling author of two books: Internet Riches and e-Riches 2.0: Next Generation Online Marketing Strategies. Visit http://www.ScottFox.com for free email newsletters and http://www.ClickMillionaires.com for a free trial of his personalized coaching community.

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