I’m not keen on cluttering my WordPress installations with countless plug-ins as doing so may create problems with later versions of WordPress plus may in many cases slow down my actual site. I strongly suggest if you are new to the affiliate world you simply stick to 2 WordPress plug-ins.

How To Install WordPress Plug-Ins

Installing WordPress plug-ins is a painless operation. Simply copy the  plug-in files to your server, login to the admin options of WordPress, select plug-ins, then activate the required plug-in.

All In One SEO Plug-in

This is a great plug-in for new affiliates! Once installed, for every post or page you create it makes the process of entering basic SEO data simple. Once you have activated the plug-in ensure you go to the All In One SEO Options as below.

For each post or page you create the following options will be added.

To keep things simply at this stage let’s say we have created a post that we intend to rank for Big Joes Casino.

Simply make sure the Home Title starts with Big Joes Casino. So for example for the Home Title we could have something like. Big Joes Casino – Claim £200 Free Today From www.bigjoescasino.com

Also start the Home Description with your main key phrase. For this example we could use something like.

Big Joes Casino – Exclusive £200 FREE Sign Up Bonus

Finally add keyword such as….

Big joes casino, bonus, big joes, deposit bonus, free bonus

Simple Sidebar Navigation Plug-in for WordPress

Internal links are now more powerful than ever before especially if you can build an authority site.  It is essential that your main key phrases appear on every page of your site. Some sites are ranking for competitive key phrases from internal links alone.

If you have coding skills then you can create your own sidebar menu. If you lack coding skills simply use the Simple Sidebar Navigation Plug-in.

For example I have just read a great article on Blackjack Strategy. The article was extremely well written plus even included a custom chart designed in an easy way so that users could easily follow the strategy. The article contained no call to actions and the only banner was at the very bottom of the page which if I’m honest I would have missed if I wasn’t looking for it. It was clear to me that plenty of effort had gone into creating the article but zero thought had gone into thinking about how to convert the readers of the article. I could clearly see how the superb article could entice readers to try out the system. The sad fact is that I guess many would return to Google to find a decent Blackjack site with a decent bonus to test the system.

Simply adding an extra paragraph to the article perhaps mentioning why a certain Blackjack site would be ideal to try the system, due to lets say a great sign up bonus, or even a good loyalty scheme, which in the long term would boost players ROI, is essential in my opinion. Any decent affiliate will already know that there is always a “fall off” of readers as they progress through any article. From experience it is essential to have at least one call of action in the first few lines of the article.

Let’s say we have an article that starts with the following.

For those of you who want to make their time playing online Blackjack a more profitable experience I have devised and tested a Blackjack system which is proving very successful. Simply read this article plus print out and use the enclosed chart for optimum play.

How about adding a sentence such as…..

The following system has been tried and tested at Big Jims Casino utilising the generous £100 Sign Up Bonus. Claiming the bonus alone will increase your ROI by over 11%!

Of course for the purpose of this article I have just made up the actual increase in ROI so you would have to do a little research to find the actual figure.

Getting back to the article I would add further call to actions in the article perhaps replacing the word Blackjack with Big Jim’s Casino Blackjack.  We do though still have a problem. In some cases perhaps the reader will already have an account with Big Jim’s Casino.  To resolve this problem I would not simply give away the Blackjack chart.  I would perhaps only display a portion of it then offer a full high res printable version free to the user if he entered his email address. Perhaps I would also bundle other charts covering other games such as Jacks or Better Video slots or even slots return to player’s percentages.

Look at your own articles. Are you really doing a great job of converting your readers into real money players or could you do more?

What 10 pages of your site receive the most daily visitors?

How many daily clicks do the above pages receive?

If you can’t answer the above questions honestly, then I’m sorry to say you need to work on the basics before continuing with this article. Check your stats plus try the free version of Clicktale or any similar program.

In reality more visitors should equal more clicks, which should equate to more revenue. Yes it’s as simple as that! The trouble is that many websites are poorly optimised with many webmaster not even having a clue in regards to their high traffic pages or the clicks they receive. A good starting point is to create a spreadsheet and record your click through rate (CTR) for high traffic pages

Click Through Rate = (number of clicks / number of visitors) * 100

Also record your initial real money players (RMP) ratio to visitors and clicks.

(number of RMP / number of visitors) / 100

(number of RMP / number of clicks) / 100

Using the above formulas let’s say we have had 400 visitors, 28 clicks with 5 RMPs.

Our click through rate would be (28/400)*100 = 7%

The conversion rate by visitors would be (5/400)*100 = 1.25%

The conversion rate by clicks would be (7/28)*100 = 25%

If we also have click tracking software such as Clicktale we can also record the ratio of wasted clicks. By wasted clicks I’m referring to clicks that are not hitting our text or even graphical calls to actions. We can also calculate the value of every visitor and of course every click. Let’s go back to our test data but also add that the 5 RMPs generated a total of $523 in revenue.

We had 28 clicks so $523 / 28  =  $18.86 per click

We had 400 visitors so $523 / 400 = $1.31 per visitor

So using our test data we now know that every click is worth $18.86 with every visitor in real terms on average is worth $1.31.

When you start analysing different pages on your site you will find that some pages have far more revenue power than others. Either feed these pages with traffic from other pages with less revenue power or replicate what you are doing on high revenue pages on those that are not so successful.

Test different call to actions on pages and monitor the effects of the changes. Try different types of content on poor revenue generating pages plus of course write content that sells rather than content that does not.

Many webmaster simply don’t write content that sells plus in many cases use weak or no call to actions in their articles. This topic will be covered in my next article.

Take at least a few days to think about the niche of your site. Don’t be afraid to extend the “brainstorming” time to even a couple of weeks if you are not 100% sure. Before moving on to purchasing a domain make sure you do the following.

Check how many existing sites are targeting your idea.

Can you create content better than existing sites targeting your preferred niche?

Are you positive you can monetise your chosen niche?

Do you have enough knowledge to write 2 articles daily about the niche? Prove this to yourself by writing down at least 100 possible article titles.

Read the List Building article. I would strongly suggest you start listing building from the very day you launch your site. Decide on a “hook” you can use for list building?

Research affiliate programs relating to your chosen niche.

Decide which programs you will promote.

Check if the program has a negative carry over policy.

Read the program’s terms and conditions.

Research how well the program is marketed.

Many gambling affiliate have built sites which in hindsight were a mistake.  These mistakes were due to inadequate research or targeting a niche which was simply too competitive. For Gambling Cash Cow I was able to scribble down 100 potential article titles in less than an hour. I also noted that there were very few sites that went into great detail in regards to building a gambling affiliate site, especially targeting those new to this industry.

The success of your list building depends on three key aspects.

The quality of the “hook”.

The quality of the sales pitch promoting the hook.

The quality of the follow up emails.

It’s common sense to realise that the “hook” must be something the users really wants. You really need to entice the users to go the extra mile and enter their email address which is not such an easy task as you would imagine. Think about your own experiences encountering email opt-in forms that appear on websites. How many have you subscribed to from perhaps thousands you have seen?

Form experience I’m not keen on pop-up email opt-in forms or those annoying scripts that float an opt-in form across the screen. Most of these I will close without even reading the promo text. Also it is a fact that the more information you request on your opt-form, the fewer the numbers of subscribers. At the very most you only need their name and email address although even the name is not really required. Add extra fields such as location, date of birth, sex etc and you are simply destroying your sign up rate.

A good tip I will give those who are using some form of information as a hook is to give the information a physical appearance. A good example is that for one of my sites I offer a Slots Strategy eBook. I have had great success just using a custom banner giving the eBook the appearance of an actual book, directing clicks to a sales page with of course an opt-in form.

I have zero graphics skills so I simply posted a contest on the Digital Point webmasters forum only paying a few dollars for the above design.

Aweber offer a great list building package for less than $20 a month. They also have a large range of templates so that your emails look and feel professional. IMO Aweber is second to none for email marketing. If you are on a tight budget then why not use a free script such as the WordPress Email Capture Plugin. This script is simple to set up plus of course will give you the option to try our list building for free.

Once your list starts to build, you can then move on to targeting your visitors with special offers. We will cover that aspect of email marketing in a later article.

Case Study

I was talking to Gerry Poltorak who runs the successful poker news site Poker News Boy. I will say from experience generating poker sign ups form poker news type sites is no easy task. I also reckon many of Gerry’s visitors are repeat visitors whom are even less likely to sign up to a poker room. News type sites can though be superb list building sites. You have to vary the hook due simply to the amount of returning visitors. If you keep changing to a current topical hook, then news sites can build huge lists.

So what sort of topical hook could Gerry use? Well for the last months or so perhaps he could have targeted those thinking about the WSOP. Perhaps an eBook entitled “WSOP Satellite Secrets” with a sub tag of “Win A WSOP Main Event Seat Free”. He could get one of his quality writers to research the best online WSOP satellites including those sites who offer free step1 type satellites.  I have no idea the sort of traffic Poker News Boys generates but even if he only managed to sign up 2% of visitors a day, in the long term the site would create a decent list.

After the WSOP he could then move on to perhaps something like the GUKPT which is a UK poker tour. Create a new eBook featuring most aspect of the tour plus of course how to qualify. He could even talk to the tour manager to get some form of online qualifier for one of the lower buy in events. If you are prepared to ask, you will find that account managers and poker tour manages will work with decent sites, giving you extra incentives to sign up your readers. You have to be a cheeky git, but if you don’t ask you don’t get. It is as simple as that!

So for our key phrases ideally we would like to get as many links to our website as per the example below.

If you intend to sign up to Poker Stars then ensure you claim a Poker Stars Bonus of up to $600. Some sites will even offer you a seat in a $1000 freeroll.

Note how the link above includes our exact key phrase and links to our sales page.

Again I’m just teaching you the very basics. All links are not equal. Many links carry very little or no value whilst other links have immense power. We will discuss link building in greater details in other articles.

On Page SEO – The Very Basics

To give you a basic understanding of SEO lets imagine we have a poker bonus site such as www.tonyspokerdeals.com . We have created hundreds of quality articles for this fictitious webs site that link to our sales pages which we hope will entice our readers to click our affiliate links. Let’s imagine our site has a Poker Stars sales page targeting the key phrases “Poker Stars Bonus”

The actual URL of this page should be the actual key phrase we are targeting so in this case

www.tonyspokerdeals.com/poker-stars-bonus/

For SEO purposes the actual heading of the page should also start with the key phrase we are targeting. So in this case…..

Poker Stars Bonus

It’s also a good idea to start your main body text with the key phrase or at the very least include the key phrase in the first line of the body text. So for example…

Our Poker Stars Bonus code not only gives you a great deposit bonus of up to $600 but also gives you a seat in our monthly $1000 freeroll tournament.

The key phrase should also be repeated at least a few times on the sales page. This is known as keyword density.

For those who are building affiliate sites for perhaps the first time I strongly suggest you use the All In One SEO WordPress Plug-in. This makes it easier for you to enter meta descriptions & meta keywords.

Your key phrase should appear in both the meta description and meta keywords.

To test your on page SEO you can use online tools such as the SEO Doc. This tool will analyse your page and advise you of changes so that your page is fully optimised.

The above are only the basics of on page SEO. I would strongly advise you to use Google to research further in regards to on page SEO and Keyword density etc.

For each click

For each sale

For each lead

To become an affiliate you simply visit the vendor’s website, enter your contact and payment details then wait for the vendor to approve your application. Once approved you are given a unique link that you can easily paste on your website. The links contains a unique tracking code so that the vendor can keep track of commissions owed to you. Signing up to an affiliate program should always be free. If you are asked to make any payment then steer well clear!

There are now dozens of sites such as WordPress.com that allow users to set up their own blog completely free. These free blog hosting sites can be a great way for you to build free links to your own sites at no cost. The key to using free blog hosts is to create quality blogs. Blogs created with crappy content littered with dozens of links of course will not help your rankings. Many of the free blog hosts also are not keen on gambling blogs so you will have to think out of the box a little.

For the purpose of this article lets imagine you have a sports betting affiliate site. You site mainly features UK football with daily content regarding targeting bets of the day. If you created blatent sports betting blogs on free blog hosts you will have an extremely high chance of having your free blog removed from the network. A better approach would be to create fans type site blogs. For instance you could create a blog about Liverpool FC updating it once per week with results, news and views. You could extend your network by creating the same sort of site for dozens of other UK football teams. Of course you are going to have to spend time each week to updating your blogs but as I have said in other articles if you are going to make it as an affiliate you are going to have to put the hours in.

When creating new blogs I prefer to leave blogs link free for at least a couple of weeks to gain trust with the free blog network. After a few weeks though I will slip in a crafty link. Again think about how you do this. Don’t write an abvious article which makes it clear to all you actually own the site you are linking to. Instead simply include a few lines in an article about a the team winning where you made a few quid as somebody told you about a great free bet offer at l com.

Remember don’t turn your free blogs into spam blogs! Add links sparingly! Also remember at the very least to update each blog at least bi-weekly as many free blog providers will remove blogs that are not updated.

To get you started I have included below a list of free blog providers. There are though many more. Remember don’t spam!

http://wordpress.com

http://blogger.com

http://livejournal.com

http://vox.com

http://blogsome.com

http://bravenet.com ( http://viviti.com )

http://edublogs.org

http://friendster.com

http://knol.google.com

http://home.spaces.live.com (MSN Spaces http://msnspaces.com )

http://squidoo.com

http://tumblr.com

http://weebly.com

http://webs.com

PR6

http://blog.co.uk

http://diaryland.com

http://gather.com

http://hubpages.com (Profile points must be 75 for do-follow links)

http://tblog.com

PR5

http://20six.co.uk

http://bigadda.com

http://blog.ca

http://blogskinny.com

http://blogstream.com

http://blogwebsites.net

http://blurty.com

http://clearblogs.com

http://www.easyjournal.com

http://free-conversant.com

http://freeflux.net

http://opendiary.com

http://sosblog.com

http://tabulas.com

http://terapad.com

http://thoughts.com

http://upsaid.com

http://viviti.com

PR4

http://blogeasy.com

http://bloghi.com

http://bloghorn.com

http://blogigo.com

http://blogono.com

http://blogr.com

http://blogstudio.com

http://blogtext.org

http://bloxster.net

http://freeblogit.com

http://insanejournal.com

http://journalfen.net

http://journalhub.com

http://mynewblog.com

http://netcipia.com

http://shoutpost.com

http://thediary.org

Google states that we should not try to manipulate the Google Algorithm by building links.  If we follow the rules set by Google then we should simply produce great content that will attract links naturally. There is no doubt that quality content will in time generate back links, but the trouble is this could take years. By building back links we are in effect at the very least bending the rules set by Google. The art of building back links is to make the back links appear natural to Google. If we overdo the link building process we will be penalised, of that there is no doubt.

Let’s think about how back links will occur naturally. If we have quality content then bloggers will link to our content on their blogs. We may receive back links in blog comments.  Our content may be included in niche directories. We may generate links from discussions in forums. Others sites in the same type of niche may also link to us. Those who use Twitter may tweet about our content. Facebook users may also link to our content, as may well will other social networks users. Video Bloggers may discuss our content including links in their video description. Over time our quality content will generate a wide range of links which will range in quality from very low to very high.

Our job is to simply speed up and mimic the process of acquiring links naturally. We want our links to look natural to Google. We should acquire a wide range of links, with I believe, varied quality.  A great back link profile would include links from a wide variety of sources with a wide variety of value. It is clear that that if a site only has back links from one source, let’s say blog articles, then this is going to be flagged by Google. Also if a site only has high quality back links this also is going to look unnatural to Google. It is also common sense to realise that if we build a 1000 links in a week, this is of course going to look unnatural to Google.

This is of course is not rocket science. You will be amazed though how many affiliates completely destroy their sites with poor link building.