I have good news to report.
All three of my blogs have been improving. Defeat Our Debt is now pulling some rank, the traffic on this blog has spiked since I posted my blogging goals, and my little Coon Hunters Club is getting a lot more traffic, too!
Of course I want to you give updates on all three of these sites, but one by one!
If you’re new to this blog, I had a genius idea to start a niche site about coon hunting earlier this year. As genius as my idea may have been there’s just one teensy problem: monetizing a blog that’s about coon hunting is kinda hard.
The Scoop
My last report on the Coon Hunters Club showed that I was getting around 1500 page views a month. Since that update I’ve only published one blog post and I have done absolutely no link building. But, guess what? My page views have doubled and the time on the site has increased!
Here’s where the Coon Hunters Club is at:
I know, I know you’re thinking that 3,000 page views per month isn’t that impressive. But, I’ve got to remind you once again – the term “coon hunters” is not searched for that much. This means I have some targeted traffic.
And, the crazy thing is that I have been getting a lot of emails from people visiting this blog asking me questions like where to sell or give away their coonhounds………
The Dilemma
The dilemma once again is what on earth do I do to earn money through this site? I have ads slapped up all over the place and they do get clicked. The problem is the payout is pitiful.
I also created an Amazon store and have a few posts up that are heavy with Amazon links. No bites. Not a single one.
The thing is I know quite a few people who are really into coon hunting and they spend big bucks on coon hunting dogs and hunting gear. I mean like some serious dough….I’m talking thousands per year.
What in the world can I do to monetize this site? Do you have any ideas or should I just shut the thing down? I am open to any and all suggestions!
Thanks to the following carnivals for including my submissions this week Carnival of Personal Finance hosted by Start Freelancing Now, Festival of Frugality hosted by Squirrelers, Carnival of Money hosted by Evolving PF, Carnival of Financial Independence hosted by Your PF Pro, Carnival of Financial Camaraderie hosted by Digital Personal Finance, Carnival of Financial Planning hosted by Tie The Money Knot
I think you’ll have to find stores/companies that have affiliate programs that sell the gear that these hunters are buying. If those companies do not currently have affiliate programs, I bet they will within a year. It seems like there are 20+ companies creating affiliate programs each week.
For now I would just keep adding more and more content. It can’t hurt to increase traffic for the time being.
I’ve looked at the sites with really popular gear and unfortunately they don’t have affiliate programs. Maybe if I just keep the site alive until next year I’ll see a bigger spike in traffic and *hopefully* some affiliate programs will be created.
Here are a couple ideas, from the cuff:
-A drop-ship site that sells coon related gear. You don’t touch the gear…it ships directly from the manufacturer. You uplift all the prices a certain amount, give the manufacturer a percentage (as they’re doing the actual work of grabbing the merchandise and shipping it) and give the payment processor a percentage, and you get the rest.
-A craigslist type of site that’s specifically for buying and selling coon related items, even dogs, on a person-to-person basis. The catch is that you get a percentage of each sale. Sellers would have to create a profile first, and have a ranking system, similar to ebay. The benefit to consumers is that buyers will be more confident in the transaction on a $2000 dog if there are buyer reviews on that seller. To gain that confidence via rankings, you’re asking sellers to pay a percentage of the sale (10%?)
I am loving the Craigslist type of idea. Mainly because I have been getting at least one email per week regarding coon dogs. That is a very good idea, at this point I am not really sure how to go about it. I’ll have to research that. Thank you so much for your input though. That really is a great idea.
Coonslist? 🙂
Haha…..like it! I actually was really liking your idea. So, I found a classifieds plugin and put it up. Hopefully over the next couple of months people will start posting and then (if they do) I can charge for highlighted postings http://coonhuntersclub.com/classifieds/
I’m loving all the suggestions I’ve already followed through with a few of them. So I glad I posted this today!
I like this idea about drop shipping. I use to work for a baby retailer that dropped shipped all their furniture items, like cribs. It’s great because you don’t have to take on the inventory risk.
I would personally slap a Google AdSense ad in text, at the top. It would get most clicks and even though the money would be low for now because of the traffic, it all adds up and eventually when your traffic builds up, you will get more.
I would also continue with the Amazon articles. Do some review types of articles for coon hunting stuff (I have never been hunting, so pardon my vocabulary lol). Do a few top lists with Amazon lists (“10 absolutely must have Coon hunting gadgets” and so on). As you keep writing, traffic will increase and more traffic means more money.
Lol your vocabulary is fine! I just went ahead and added Adsense text right underneath the navigation menu. I really should have done that a long time ago!
I actually have a couple draft posts I was working on with Amazon products my only worry is that if I do too many affiliate links I won’t have any more traffic. I think I’ll come up with 10 or so post ideas for the next couple months and do half Amazon.
I really appreciate your suggestions!!
Why not try a bigger banner? Don’t be afraid of the big banners, they perform best. You probably hate them as a blogger and are afraid not to lose potential customers because of them, which won’t happen. Maybe try a big banner under the title of your articles (similar to what Pat has on Security Guard Training HQ – proven to work and not to drive traffic away :D). Give it at least 7 days of trial and then decide if it’s worth keeping 🙂
Regarding too much Amazon, it would probably be a good idea to have just 5 out of 10 with affiliate links and try not to have too many on your front page. Hopefully things will really pick up!
Perhaps you can reach out to the stores and companies that supply coon hunting gear and offer them direct advertising opportunities on your site.
My guess is that coon hunters probably hunt other stuff too. Maybe affiliate links gear for fishing ? Knives ? Tools ? Camping ? Clothing, Car insurance or insurance for motorcycles ?
~ Christie
P.S. Maybe you can contact an ad placement agency and see what they have. Somebody in Sporting Goods would be interested in your site. It is really specialized. Good news, Bad news. 🙂
Good luck with monetizing your site. I would love to know how you do this once you do. I am lucky if I get 100 page views a month.
Good luck with monetizing that site. I wouldn’t shut it down as I think it has potential. I think Done by Forty has a good idea with dropshipping…it doesn’t seem to be too hard to implement.
Though I’m still new at this, I’d work on putting some more high volume search term related posts on the site. You could start with google trends and see what other terms, besides coon hunting, it recommends. I know 90% of my revenue comes from one post that answered a popular search term question. Slapping more ads up won’t do you
Much good it you only have 3,000 views per month.
I don’t know much about “coon hunting” but thought that maybe an area on your page
designated to “Dogs For Sale” with their pictures might work too. Its sort of what the
humane societies do for their adopt a dogs. Just from reading your blog got me to
go to the Coon Hunting one…LOL Thanks for all the info and keep up the good work,
” Your Dog Will Come Home Soon “
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