A guest post by Andrew Hansen from http://1000NewVisitors.com
If you’re a new blogger, particularly one who’s looking to make money from your blog you’ll know that generating traffic to your blog is, at least initially, priority number one.
But something that gets talked about much less is generating the right kind of traffic to your blog. When I say the “right kind” of traffic, I mean, the kind of traffic that is going to generate revenue. This is one step above “targeted traffic”, this is “money traffic”.
For many bloggers, the thought of trying hard to bring the kind of visitors to your blog that are going to be the most likely to make you money, is a little too “marketer-like”. But as we’re going to see in this post, it’s easy to attract the kind of visitors that are going to make you money while at the same time providing the high quality and value in your blog posts that you always do.
First, let’s answer the question:
What Are “Money Visitors”?
Regardless of the niche your blog is in, it’s likely that it has certain little sects or groups of people that are more likely to buy things than others. (Note that the reason I say this is that whether you’re monetizing your blog with ads or affiliate offers, it’s the people who buy things that are, at the end of the day, going to make your blog profitable.) Identifying those little sects within your niche and occasionally writing something to suit them can unlock hidden profit potential within your blog.
For example, say you have a photography blog. Let’s say some people found your blog online somewhere as they were searching or browsing for pictures of pretty sunsets. Another group of people found your blog while they were searching for a particular model of camera that they were thinking of buying.
In a monetary sense, while both groups represent traffic to your blog, the latter group is more likely to result in income for you, if you know how to leverage it. Those are “money visitors”.
Finding YOUR “Money Visitors”
More or less every niche has it’s “money visitors”. Your job is to locate the sects in your niche, to which you feel like you could provide quality information. It’s by providing information to those money sects, that your blog will become more profitable.
So how do you find your “Money Visitors”?
It starts with a little brainstorming and it helps if the niche you’re in is something you’re interested in personally. Start by asking questions like:
“What do people in this niche spend money on?”, or…
“What do I, as someone interested in this subject, spend money on?”
It’s easier than it sounds. If your niche is dog lovers, they spend money on dog collars, dog toys, dog food, dog beds, dog insurance… and the list goes on.
If the niche is photography, they spend money on cameras, lenses, holidays on which they take photos, and of course plenty more…
Once you have some ideas, you can get into some good old fashion search analytics (not complicated, don’t worry!)
You can take one of the terms you found above (let’s say it’s dog collars) and type it into the search tool at:
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
And see what you find. This tells us that people are out there on the Internet looking for information about these dog collars. And in some ways this is representative of the Internet as a whole. I mean if there are 10 000 people searching for “leather dog collar” in Google, we can safely assume that there are at least some people on social networks, dog lover forums, or other blogs that have a similar interest or intent.
So you scan the list of “dog collar” type terms that people are looking for.
If there’s something there that you think you know about or at least, could know about with a little research, you’re in luck. There’s no limit to the number of these little sects that you can find and capitalize on to make your blog more profitable.
Turning Visitors Into Profit
Now that you’ve found these sects of people that are looking to spend money in your niche market, how do you:
1. Bring them to your site; and
2. Provide them value and perhaps make money from them.
First you scan your list of dog collar “sects”.
Is there anything here that you can write about? Is there any existing content you have on your blog where you could include some info on any of these collar terms and provide an affiliate offer? (searching for a relevant affiliate offer is a little outside the scope of this post). If so, you’re in luck again!
Next, you need to go about doing some search optimization around these terms to attract visitors who might be looking for that particular dog collar or some variation of it.
This can be as simple as making a couple of mentions of the keyword in your post, or as full on as writing a new blog post targeted just to that keyword (this might involve having the keyword in the blog post title, using a wordpress plugin like All in One SEO to make sure the keyword is in the description and keyword tags of that post, and so on). You can even make mention of that post in another blog post of yours, linking to the post with the anchor text “leather dog collar” (or whatever the keyword is you’re trying to target) to build internal links to that post with the keyword you’re trying to rank for.
Then it’s just a matter of finding an affiliate program for a shop that sells some leather dog collars, and slot in a text link or a banner to it, and you’ve increased your profit potential significantly.
Scaling It Up
The great thing about this as a blog profit strategy is that it’s very scalable. Once you’ve found some money sects and worked out how to tailor some content to them and have it rank in the engines (like anything good, it’ll take some time and effort) you can do the same thing for new “money sects” as often as you have time.
If you wrote about dog collars one week, you can write about dog food the next week, dog training guides the next week and so on.
You don’t have to be a big salesman on your blog to increase it’s revenue. By throwing a bit of content out every now and then for your “money visitors” you’ll make sizable increases in the profitability of your blog and increase your readers happiness while doing it.
Andrew Hansen is a blogging an affiliate marketing strategist, CEO of Dreamlife Softwares and blogger at AndrewHansen.name. His free report at http://1000NewVisitors.com shows bloggers how to generate 1000’s of new “money visitors” to their blogs every month without spending a fortune in the process.
Good ideas to start the day! I will for sure need to try the above to increase profits from my blog http://www.money-era.com/?s=profit
Very useful tips there Andrew!
Gives a very good insight in finding the real stream of income for blogs.
With that I think credibility of your blog also important. I mean Hansen, Darren is famous for blogging and for photography. So we know that if we will come to this website even through search engine we have some faith on our back mind.
So to get at that level … 6 months to 12 months is must.
Darren this is really money making ideas and the post is full of potential for new bloggers.
I visited number of blogs and mostly bloggers are running behind the money but not with their blogging niche but with confused niche.
Exp: Blogging about technology and selling shirts on the blog.
Is it right ?
I think no.
What did you think?
one good area for me to think about. i started doing this in my christian blog by including books that my readers can buy from amazon. so far it didn’t work maybe by a little more brainstorming I can find the best keywords to have more money traffic.
but really this is something one must do if one already has considerable amount of traffic everyday
I like the term of Money Visitors, I have created a kind of club for bloggers who writes about money making and make money online and I can notice the changes of my visitors recently because of that!
I think turning visitors into profit is going to be later!
thanks Darren for the great tips, you are the best!
one good area for me to think about. i started doing this in my christian blog by including books that my readers can buy from amazon. so far it didn’t work maybe by a little more brainstorming I can find the best keywords to have more money traffic.
but really this is something one must do if one already has considerable amount of traffic everyday
Sorry, forgot to add great post! Can’t wait to see your next post!
The question is “how do you find your “Money Visitors”?”. Its a big question that most bloggers are still not able to answer. If you are new to blogging and you are able to answer that question and at the same time implement it then you are milliseconds away from success.
This is where we can be wise enough and does a quality research of what people are looking for as of the moment and perhaps consider big percentage to spend money on. Affiliate marketing is indeed an effective way to start gaining without further monetary investments. Good to mention how you can use your interest and own resources in this strategy.ss
I wake up and get this on twitter :) Goodness reloaded :D Thanks for the tips.
Excellent insight into the Money Making. I am tweaking my blog to identify the Money visitors. I am sure some of this advice would be of value to me.
Regards,
Ashwin
Thanks for the tips! If you ask me, it’s a little difficult to get money visitors for a multi-topic blog. Also, I’ve noticed that Google adsense returns good CPR/CPM on blogs with targeted content = targeted audience. What say you?
I love it. Good useful contents to me. I will try it soon in my website http:// http://www.beesz.com
Gambateknek, Andrew
-Beesz.com, Your Source for Social News and networking
Wow.. I really like this post.. As a beginner, I must know what ‘people really like to buy’. From your post, it likelly important to find ‘money visitor’ than fun readers.. I will find this visitor next.
Great article Andrew!
I made this realization subconsciously some time back but have never gone so far as to put it into words. This is one of the reasons I keep coming back to Problogger is because guys like you and Darren have reached the point where you are much more aware of what you are doing than the average blogger. For instance, I’ve known for a while that senior citizens who are thinking of supplementing their income are a good sector for me, but I never thought to target them specifically and to go so far as creating a whole new class of visitor. Money sects! I love it. I think this conceptualization gives professional bloggers a very important tool that will a) save time b) make our blogs more relevant to everyone.
All the best,
R.W.
I struggle with this a fair amount. I’m enjoying increasing levels of traffic to my blog, but the visitors never buy anything or click on ads.
I’m nicheless (a web magazines that has mutliple areas of focus – sports, news, international issues, entertainment, fiction), which makes it a little more difficult to hone in on exactly which segment of my audience is likely to buy things.
A relatively high level of international traffic also make it a bit difficult to cater to the potential buying preferences of my readers.
AdWords is definitely a good place to start, though. I’ve been poking around with it lately.
great information. Finding the right niche is also about finding your community.
This is a great post. It breaks it down. I’ve always told people, “Just because people are interested in reading your website or blog doesn’t mean they intend to do anything; so find out what will make people take action and write about it well.”
Its all about providing value. Money, fame and the rest come later.
Thanks… Andrew Hansen for your nice post…
Shajib
http://www.ebooksdock.co.cc/
Thanks for the tips, I’ve been trying to figure out why my readers like to buy, so far can’t come up with anything good :(
This Was a Great Helpful Post! I just tried your tool for our Post on Camouflage clothing! We will see how it goes!
Targeted traffics are money visitor, daily readers are not money visitor, but a semi-money visitor.
What a terrific post! It is so true that you need to have the right type of visitor if you want to make any money at all.
thanks
Here’s an excellent post that goes in depth on this topic:
How to Pull Traffic with Keyword Targeted Articles
I find how-to posts from people who made it useful in that they let me know how thick the ice is under my feet – am I on safe ground, headed in the right direction? Example: am already using the https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal tool. Seeing it endorsed by ProBlogger in this way ups its value. “Attracting “Money Traffic” To Your Blog” is extremely well articulated, concise and above-average useful, hence “Thank you!” PLUS: EVERYTHING ON THIS PAGE IS DATED AUGUST 28 (THE DOWN-UNDER EFFECT NO DOUBT). WHERE I AM IT’S STILL AUGUST 27. AUGUST 28 HAPPENS TO BE MY BIRTHDAY – SO IT’S LIKE I’M GIVEN AN EXTRA BIRTHDAY. T.H.A.N.K. Y.O.U. ProBlogger!!!!
very impressive post, thanks
http://teratips.com
Money traffic, also known as buying traffic, has to do with the long tail keyword of your niche.
That is why you should do your keyword research first.
Excellent delineation of the train of thought that we need to have in order to funnel money traffic to our site.
Thanks again for the great advice, as someone who’s starting out is important to know how to attract the right traffic to your blog.
i have made a blog a few days back and i want to make some money with it.
Thanks for the post. This is a great tool to use. I’ll make sure I use it before every post I have. I just started my blog about a month ago. My traffic has been a little slow. Hopefully this helps!
Excellent! I don’t focus on buying type keywords very much when that should be a main focus.
Right now I have to admit that I am just happy to see any kind of traffic. Since I’ve only been blogging for a few months with this new blog, I know that it will take time to establish myself first and then I can start trying to work the affiliate stuff. We’ll see how it works.
You need a lot of traffic because the majority of people won’t buy anything.
Mike,
You’re right, the majority of every day traffic won’t, but that’s the purpose of “buying traffic” – it’s the traffic where by nature a large percentage of it IS ready to buy something.
Andrew
Thanks very much for the excellent article. Sometimes we forget the basics..too busy doing things that are not productive.
Thanks Again, Larry
Timely article I was doing some research on my own this week and came to a similar conclusion. I spent so much of my time trying to rank on various keywords doing pretty well on some of them only to realize it should be keywords that “money visitors” would click. Looking through my own analytics I realized that some of my posts while having a lot less views had a huge CPC. Then I finally got it. Thanks for reemphasizing, nice post.
A great post Andrew. I’m at the building traffic stage but it’ll be helpful for me when I monetize to think about the “money” visitors. Will bookmark this post as a reference!
I’ve only made about $100.00 in Google ads in the past year but I’m having one heck of a great time over at my nicheless niche. Let’s say if I had a day-job I wouldn’t give it up.
But my focus may evolve and this article could be very helpful for me, thanks.
It’s actually surprisingly easy to get a crapload of traffic to a blog that will never convert and only burn your bandwidth. Quality is really a lot more important than quantity.
Very nice read, but you should also mention that some niches have more avid clickers than others, for example, knitting has been proven to be less effective at getting a high CTR than Golf or European Travel, for example.
This is exactly what I am looking to do …. seems to the the currently trend at the moment. Converting the traffic you get rather than looking for additional traffic.
Great post thanks Andrew
Great tips! It’s easy to see why this the best blog on the planet! Seriously, though, I have used many of the tips I’ve gotten on this blog to improve my blog greatly. I’ve got my blog up to over 300 unique hits per day in a lttle over two months. It’s nothing big, but a lot of it is thanks to this blog. So, thanks Darren!
You also end up helping readers when focus on money traffic. After all, those people who spend money, they aren’t doing it just for the sake of throwing cash your way!
They spend money to solve their problems or otherwise get their own needs met. When you direct them to products that can help them out, you’re providing a service.
YOu’re also creating a win-win-win-win-win situation that helps you, your readers, the product owner, the storefront, and the economy!
These were some great tips and they really do work. I remember a few years back when I was first starting out with the whole “Make money at Home” thing I was adding popular keywords and posts to get traffic.
After I started getting traffic I started learning that much of my traffic were coming to my sites because they smelled a newbie and wanted to take advantage for links or spamming. No one was even clicking my offers or banners.
I did some research and rethinking, changed some posts, content and keywords then I started getting “Money Traffic”. More sales and clicks. I however did learn a lot from the experience. But people who follow this blog and actually read it won’t have to go through trial and errors like this one.
cheers!
These were some great tips and they really do work. I remember a few years back when I was first starting out with the whole “Make money at Home” thing I was adding popular keywords and posts to get traffic.
After I started getting traffic I started learning that much of my traffic were coming to my sites because they smelled a newbie and wanted to take advantage for links or spamming. No one was even clicking my offers or banners.
I did some research and rethinking, changed some posts, content and keywords then I started getting “Money Traffic”. More sales and clicks. I however did learn a lot from the experience. But people who follow this blog and actually read it won’t have to go through trial and errors like this one.
cheers!
Sorry, forgot to add great post! Can’t wait to see your next post!
Very well written article and I agree that finding visitors that have come to your website expecting to buy something is worth the extra work needed to provide ratgeted content.
Steve
Thanks for the useful tips. I would caution writing for just the money visitors if it isn’t part of your niche passion, because it will show in the quality of your writing. But, writing for them in moderation is a great idea.
Very nice ideas – exactly what I was looking for.