by Ana Hoffman 187 comments

Why Traffic Generation Café Is Not Making as Much Money as It Should



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how to not make money bloggingYour online business is a bridge from your life as you have it to your life as you see it.

In your new life, you might have the time and the money to do EXACTLY what you want when you want.

Or you no longer have to read the menu in a restaurant from right to left.

Or you no longer have to check the price tag before deciding if you have enough room on your credit card to buy something.

Or your assets will finally grow beyond the pizza coupons.

But that will be then.

For now, you are overwhelmed, underpaid, and just don’t get why your busy-ness in your business hasn’t gotten you any closer to the life you wish you had.

And you are not alone.

Popularity Doesn’t Translate into Cash

I was recently reminded in no uncertain terms that, despite Traffic Generation Café popularity, it barely makes enough money to pay for groceries.

comment about making money how to not make money 2

Ouch.

Apparently, I should just join Empower Network and my financial goals will take care of themselves (these comments come from the post I just linked to).

In many ways, they are right.

With my kind of traffic, I should be able to live comfortably off the income, right?

And you’ve been in business long enough to make more than a couple of hundred dollars here and there.

And everyone else in your niche seems to be making money, so what’s wrong with you?

Truth is: we all have our own demons to conquer.

It’s just not always easy to figure out the WHYs, so that we can get down to the HOWs and fix them.

I’ll Tell You Mine; You Tell Me Yours

So, why isn’t Traffic Generation Café not making as much money as it should?

Let’s take a look at my income model for a second.

Affiliate Marketing

Over the last couple of years since I founded Traffic Generation Café, I’ve dabble in a few possible income streams, including:

  • network marketing (yes, that’s how I started online);
  • banner advertising;
  • consulting;
  • odds and ends like writing sponsored reviews, freelancing for other blogs, etc;
  • and, of course, affiliate marketing.

The one thing that I’ve never tried to make money with is launching my own products.

However, the mere concept of spending hours, days, weeks putting together a product that might be outdated by the time it’s actually released or be a complete flop makes me cringe.

I know, I know – we can’t succeed if we don’t try.

But I don’t want to try.

If I am going to stay up all night working on my business, shouldn’t it be at least somewhat enjoyable?

So, launching my own products is off my income list, no matter how profitable it could be.

However, I LOVE to promote killer products that other marketers spend endless hours, and sweat, blood, and tears creating.

I LOVE affiliate marketing.

Food for thought: assuming that you can have your pick of how to make money with your business (and you DO, by the way – it’s YOUR business), what would be your top choice?

What Makes Affiliate Marketing Work?

Now that you and I know how we really want to make money with our businesses, it’s time to figure out what we need to do to make it work.

To be a successful affiliate marketer, I need:

  • the right products to promote;
  • the right people to promote them to;
  • the reason people should buy those products from ME and not someone else.

I think that about covers it.

Food for thought: what are the right ingredients you need to start making money from your preferred income stream?

Why Isn’t It Working for Me?

Out of the three conditions of successful affiliate marketing I mentioned above, the lack of “the right products to promote” definitely stands out to me.

In the past two and a half years, I wrote only about 8 product reviews total.

Yes, I list all the tools I use and trust in my lil’ black book.

Yes, I mention products in my posts as I see appropriate.

But it’s not enough.

Why don’t I have more products to promote?

  1. I don’t promote anything I don’t test/use first.
  2. Testing takes time; a LOT of time.
  3. If I only have 3-4 hours per day to work on my business, and it takes me about 8 hours to write a blog post, and I publish 3 posts per week, plus do some guest blogging… you do the math. It just doesn’t add up.
  4. I really don’t believe we need that many tools to run a successful online business. Just a few core things I mention in my rolodex.
  5. There’s too much junk out there to sift through to find a few pearls.

So yes, I’ve got plenty of obstacles/excuses that keep me from finding and offering more worthy products that would make it much easier for my readers to run their business more successfully and efficiently.

Food for thought: what are the main things that you think keep you from making more money?

Working on All the Wrong Things

The only logical step here is this:

You/I need to decide whether you/I:

1. Continue running our businesses as hobbies, keeping ourselves “busy” doing things that have no direct impact on the eventual success of it?

OR

2. Do we figure out how to overcome whatever it is that’s keeping us from making money?

OR

3. We might as well quit now and forever hold our peace (and stop whining about it).

Now that it’s spelled out in black and white right in front of me, it seems to be laughable that I thought I had excuses for not making much money.

You Told Me Yours

Let’s step back for a second.

Why am I writing this post?

I know your reaction might be “Well, if SHE can’t make it with all this traffic and popularity, then how on earth would I?”

But see, the point is that the road gets bumpy for all of us.

It just does.

It’s what you do with those bumps will make or break you and your business.

By the way, I asked for your “not making money” stories on my Facebook page, and got a couple of links for you here:

Again – not to discourage you.

It happens.

Let your readers pat you on the back.

Then move on.

Side note: we have a lot of fun discussions on my Facebook fan page. I also use it to crowdsource a lot of my future posts.

So if you want to be in the loop or even be mentioned at TGC, make sure to give my FB page a like and follow my updates.

So What’s the Plan?

“You don’t need more time in your day. You need to decide.” ~ Seth Godin

If your problem is that you don’t really know how to make the best of the limited time you have to work on your business, I suggest starting there.

That’s what I did in December.

I stopped doing everything else, including writing/publishing posts, and focused on learning how to maximize my time.

If you are thinking “I don’t have the time to learn how to maximize my time!”, let me tell you: it’s not a choice. If you want to stop treading water that is.

I can’t say I am there, but I’ve learned a lot.

Food for thought: Do you feel like lack of time and too many things to do might be the core reason you feel overwhelmed and don’t get things done? If so, see what I’ve been doing about it.

The Tools

My two best resources of how to set up “systems” that take care of the “busy” things in my business and leave me to the core things that matter were the following two books:

“Getting Things Done” by David Allen

“Work the System: The Simple Mechanics of Making More and Woking Less” by Sam Carpenter

Other tools I’ve been using:

This one goes very well with David Allen’s way of organizing things and it’s free.

It’s even better, imho, than the leading $300+ MindJet.

That’s what I’ve been using to come up with my mind maps here and here, plus used as a basis for many videos like this one.

It’s all a part of my new content leverage system, which by the way, is increasing my search engine rankings and traffic.

I am not quite sure about this one just yet.

It seems like I can do all the same things in a folder on my Mac, but I am still giving it a shot.

Bottom Line

The bottom line is you/I don’t make enough money in our businesses because we don’t take time to.

Again, I can come up with all kind of excuses why that is, but it doesn’t matter.

Don’t make money because you have no traffic?

Then take your time to learn how to drive traffic.

Don’t make money because you haven’t developed authority and trust with your readers?

Then take your time to build an audience business.

Don’t make money because you don’t have a product?

Then stop doing everything else and create it.

Don’t make money because you have no idea how to?

I bet you there’s an app for that!

You see my point though: the only thing that stands between you and online income is YOU.

Random Thoughts

Some of you noticed that I stopped publishing my income reports and asked me why.

Truth?

I let the blood-thirsty EN folks bully me with all those “Who are you to run a blog; you can’t even make any money from it!” comments.

What I’ve come to realize since then is this: I am not the best at making money off my readers.

But I AM pretty darn good at driving traffic!

Thus I run TRAFFIC Generation Café.

It’s not “How to Make Loads of Money Online“ Café.

It’s not “How to Convert 100% of your Visitors into Hot Leads“ Café.

I know one thing and I know it very well: how to get loads of targeted website traffic to your blog – whatever the niche, the size, or the age.

That’s why you are here – learning how to use the knowledge I offer at this blog in your own business.

Here comes some tough love:

So if you like my content, like me (most of the times), why is it that Traffic Generation Café doesn’t make much money?

Are you buying, but not from me?

And be honest with me, I can handle it.

What am I doing wrong?

What am I doing right?

traffic generation cafe


traffic generation cafe comment below

{ 187 comments… read them below or add one }

iain May 6, 2013 at 1:56 pm

In all honesty. I am still new to your site.

However, I did buy Hybrid Connect because of the webinar you did with Shane Malaugh. The combination of information and a deal were hard to pass up.

I hear you on the money making front. I am still new to all that stuff. At the moment I am more worried about building traffic and audience. Once I have established that, I will focus my attention on money.

Like you mentioned earlier, it takes work.

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Ana Hoffman May 6, 2013 at 8:39 pm

Well, you’ve certainly managed to make a mark at Traffic Generation Café, Iain; I feel like I’ve know you for a while. Great job connecting and standing out!

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iain May 7, 2013 at 2:41 am

Thank you.

You do an awesome job of connecting with people and interacting with your audience. Your blog is one of the most engaged in terms of reader to website owner.

High five 0/

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Kelly McCausey April 8, 2013 at 6:40 am

I freaking love your blog posts Ana :)

I love your honesty and transparency and the determination to share something of value.

And the formatting! LOVE the formatting!

(blogger on blogger crush gush now over)

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Ana Hoffman April 9, 2013 at 6:15 am

lol, Kelly; thanks for coming by.

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Nilton March 30, 2013 at 6:53 am

Ana, I love your posts, but I am probably not the right person to give you advice or to put my point of view across, but I think that, being as good as you are, driving traffic to your blogs, why don’t you just join my company and make tons of money?? :)

I have products though, and with your expertise I think you would just become rich (if you are not already) overnight ;)

I mean, seriously making money as an affiliate it looks good as I am learning, but don’t you think that if you joined a company then started driving traffic to your website would be a lot more beneficial to you??…

You are doing everything right as far I am concerned, because you give a lot of good information(gold), but I think that you could do even better if you join a company.

Thanks for all your Blogs!!
:)

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Ana Hoffman March 30, 2013 at 8:12 pm

No companies are good enough for my readers, Nilton. lol

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Jessica Miller-Merrell March 23, 2013 at 6:37 am

I respect you taking the time to build a following and focus good content before rushing to create something just to sell. This is a long term strategy and I can relate as I have done the same thing for my blog. A large percentage of my income comes because of my blog and the opportunities it creates and not product sales or affiliates.

Why not work with some of your favorite products and have them sponsor a webinar or blog series that will generate you income without giving the hard sell. People trust your advice so you can provide resources and get paid this way. You can use my blog for ideas. I stink at selling products but I can write a white paper that is sponsored by a vendor for $7,000. I sell nothing on my blog and yet I have made six figures blogging for the last 2 years. It can happen.

Jessica

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Ana Hoffman March 23, 2013 at 7:02 pm

I do like doing webinars, Jessica – you made a good point.

A white paper sponsored by a vendor? I’d have very hard time imagining anyone willing to pay that much in my niche… Interesting idea though; worth exploring more.

Enjoyed browsing your site, by the way!

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ioan draniciar March 13, 2013 at 2:42 pm

Hi Ana! First of all who am I to give you advice since I’m nowhere near your stature. I am trying to make it online but so far don’t have much to brag about and my excuses are: laziness, procrastination, lack of direction and focus. One day I focus on building my list, the next day I’m trying to drive traffic, publish books on Amazon, create WSO’s, create videos, try offline business, etc. I don’t seem to stick to anything for too long. ADD’s my middle name :)

I recently watched a video recording of a presentation Pat Flynn from SmartPassiveIncome.com did a while ago. In the presentation, Pat talks about how to use FREE in your business to get more traffic, subscribers and customers. Here’s the link to that presentation:
http://www.smartpassiveincome.com/how-to-use-free-in-business

There really are some awesome tips on how to use FREE as an indirect way to make money. He gives some excellent examples of websites that follow this model to make money.

Pat’s website is also providing excellent value and makes money indirectly from affiliate marketing. He also provides monthly income stats for his online business and if you take a look, you might learn how to better monetize yours.

Now if I was a traffic generation specialist like you, I would gather my best traffic generation methods and create an ebook. You could just simply grab your best traffic generation blog posts and turn them into a book.

Then you simply let your readers know about it on your blog, send an email to your subscribers, sell it as a WSO, put it on Amazon. Even better, you could create a continuity traffic generation website and charge a monthly fee.

You are a prolific product creator and you have created awesome content whether you know it or not; all you have to do is package it and sell it.

With more money comes more headache but I’d rather have headache than no money. Which reminds me I need to get off my ass and do something about it :)

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Ana Hoffman March 14, 2013 at 5:07 am

I am definitely a big fan of Pat’s, Ioan.

I think many bloggers were inspired by what he does, but it’s not easy to duplicate, to say the least.

Will keep toiling! :)

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Phil Maguire March 13, 2013 at 1:13 pm

Ana. I would like to say thank you.
Thank you for being honest with us.
Thank you for sharing your struggles with us.
Thank you for showing us that the chant “The money is in the list” is wrong and should be “The money is in the right list”.
However, there seems to be one thing you haven’t done, unless I missed it (in which case I apologise ahead of time):
You didn’t ask us what we would be prepared to buy from you.
I wish you well in your endeavours

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Ana Hoffman March 14, 2013 at 5:03 am

Good point, Phil; I’ve got market research at my finger tips.

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Helene Poulakou March 13, 2013 at 9:57 am

I would LOVE to buy from you, Ana, and I’m eyeing this Thesis theme for quite some time now — but, since the necessary funds for purchasing the hen are missing, I guess I must sit on my egg a little bit longer…

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Ana Hoffman March 14, 2013 at 5:02 am

lol, Helene; completely understand.

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Hugo March 5, 2013 at 3:54 pm

Hi Ana. I would qualify as a complete newbie. I’ve been studying and researching IM for a few months but haven’t done any real work yet. Although I’m probably the least qualified person here to tell you how to increase your revenue, I am also unbiased and uncultured enough to have a clear “virgin” look at TGC. When I found your blog two months ago, I IMMEDIATELY knew I was in THE right place for learning and guidance. The way you write, what you write about and the amazing audience you have immediately conveys a sense of security and empathy. I guess that’s what you pros call engagement and authority. You MUST find a way to profit from that, and lead by example. Or else all we newbies arriving here with our dreams in our hands will be left empty handed – if Ana can’t do it, how can we?
Having said that, my humble suggestions.
1. you seem very good at writing and driving traffic – how about one on one lessons/coaching on blog/IM writing, SEO etc? That way you wouldn’t need to have a product right away but you’d still profit from your knowledge, at your own pace. I foresee lots of happy customers :) Take Danny Iny’s “borrow my brain” as an example.
2. after a few lessons and clients, you will see a pattern of questions, needs, requests, and you will have many materials and resources already set up. From that to a full blown course/book/learning community it’s only a step up. A natural one. Just using the same approach you use to get ideas for future posts, but in a more structured manner. You could launch it with JV’s and affiliates to turn a great profit, as other people mentioned before. But hell, I think that even if you would just advertise it here at TGC would be more than enough money to make it worthwhile.
Let it come naturally and take advantage of what you already build on a daily basis. That’s what I do in my daytime job as a college and online teacher, and it works! Let your students tell you what they want, I guess isn’t much different to letting your audience/clients tell you what they need and are willing to pay for.
Keep doing what you do, we love you.

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Ana Hoffman March 9, 2013 at 7:58 pm

You mean I’ll have to actually work for it, Hugo? :)

I always welcome an objective analysis, and you hit all the right spots.

I did do SEO and traffic consulting in the past, but realized it wasn’t my cup of tea.

My real passion is in blogging itself. I’d be very happy to continue blogging without making a dime from it, but my mortgage company still wants to see a monthly payment – go figure…

I’ll pull it together; one way or another.

One thing you said that really resonated with me – “if Ana can’t make any money with her traffic and authority, how can we?”

I don’t want my readers to feel that way. That alone would motivate me enough.

Thanks for taking your time to comment.

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D. Dixon March 5, 2013 at 2:21 pm

Hi Ana, I know there are more experienced bloggers than I who will tell you that you need to do this or that but let me just offer an observation: who are you comparing yourself to and why? If you’re making x$ per month…who says that’s not good enough? I’m not saying you shouldn’t be ambitious. What I am saying is to run your own race. Building traffic, you’ve got down. Making money online is a new skill because it requires a different skill set. A lot of trial and error, testing, failing, testing, failing, until you hit that stride but it takes time.
As far as what you need to do…you already know. You said it. So why do you need us to tell you? When you are sick and tired of being sick and tired then you will do what you need to do. You can’t force it, wish it, hope it, blog it, whine it into being. When you have the necessary fire under your butt, you’ll do it and tell us afterwards because you’ll be too busy doing to blog about it until later.
Just my 2 cents.

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Ana Hoffman March 9, 2013 at 7:52 pm

Very good point indeed. A lot more people are making a lot less online, plus I am doing it at my own pace.

Did make it for a good post though. :)

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D. Dixon March 15, 2013 at 4:42 pm

It did :) But I think more people are making less blogging but are making more overall because they have multiple streams of income. So just find your way. You can do it

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Michael Charalambous March 4, 2013 at 3:59 pm

I’ll lay this one out as straight as possible, you’ve not explored all money making options. I for one am somebody who would love to see you making more money from a well built, well maintained and well deserved reputation you’ve clearly worked so hard to nurture and grow.

So, you said you’re options are…

– network marketing (yes, that’s how I started online);
– banner advertising;
– consulting;
– odds and ends like writing sponsored reviews, freelancing for other blogs, etc;
– and, of course, affiliate marketing.

Let’s be fair, nobody cares for their main revenue stream to come from banner advertising. Whatever, it’s an “in the background” thing. All the other options are more than viable, and for whatever reason you’re not doing too well from any of them – again, whatever, no biggie.

How do you get around this without sidestepping your morals. I think, honesty, there’s a very simple option here. One of a few which quickly came to mind was…

Make your website subscription based! DONE.

Naturally, there are a thousand things to consider here, but they are for you to personally look into as the owner of the business. Is it the best thing to do? Will i lose a lot of subscribers? Will i piss everyone off? Etc. I’d say personally that you’ve reached such a respectable level now, that enough of your users will be more than happy to pay for your services – the service being teaching.

The idea came into my head SECONDS after reading you had 19,000 subscribers. I like to base everything i do on a “worst case scenario” type thing. Looking at some basic numbers…

– 19,000 subscribers
– $1 monthly subscription

Let’s do a little math here…

Based on a worst case scenario that just 1% of your fan base is actually loyal. In your first month, you’ll make $190. That will continue month-on-month making you $2,280 a year if you keep up the good work ;) and will only continue to grow. More math…

Based on a slightly better outcome… 10% of your readers decide to subscribe. You’ve made $1,900 in your first month, and the number remains consistent month-on-month etc making you $22,800 a year. More math…

Based on a Yearly subscription of $10; 1% makes you $1,900 in your first month, 10% makes you $19,000 in your first month, which in theory keeps you going for a very long time… with it only continuing to grow.

Just image if half of your visitors decide they’d like to pay monthly/yearly? I wish i were you right now! I could go on for ages with this type of theory.

Anyway. There’s a lot to consider here, but i bet you’ll be surprised as to the loyalty of your readers. $10 a year, $1 a month… it’s nothing. People give more to the random homeless guy on the street.

Essentially, the biggest road block is “do i charge for my content” and i think the answer should be yes, of course. However, maybe consider the type of package. Continue to offer content for free, just simply make the really valuable-awesome-best-posts subscriptions only – after all, you do already have a backlog of content worthy of purchasing.

Anyway, let me know if that was at all helpful. Sometimes seeing the math right there in front of you opens up such simple awesome opportunities.

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Ana Hoffman March 5, 2013 at 7:02 am

What I have hard time with is deciding what content I should charge for, Michael. As a result, I end up charging for none.

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Michael Charalambous March 5, 2013 at 8:13 am

Well I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you this. But efficniency, and time management is often about making tough decisions. Once a decision is made, you can at least then go back and alter it if it’s not working out.

As i said above, lay out all teh different options (and there are many here). Then simply evaluate the worst case scenario for each. You’ll find with most that the worst case scenario is still probably not at all bad. In which case, get tough with yourself, make that choice, and see what happens.

I for one, would pay. Maybe do a survey? If your results are more or less positive, it’s a pretty safe sign to go ahead with… based on the math…

As you know, it’s all about testing. Go get testing :D

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Ana Hoffman March 5, 2013 at 8:19 am

It certainly makes sense, Michael.

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Michael Charalambous March 5, 2013 at 8:26 am

Keep us all in the loop, I’d love to hear about your tests, what works, what hasn’t etc…

:) Good Luck!

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Tony Nguyen March 3, 2013 at 11:42 pm

When I first started blogging a few years back, it took me forever to learn how to get good traffic to make some money of the traffic that I spent countless hours figuring out how to. I learnt from many gurus, marketing experts on how to drive traffic. However, there is 1 thing I know for sure, without great content, visitors are just visits. Writing great content + driving good traffic are your strengths Ana. Just keep up the good work.

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Ana Hoffman March 4, 2013 at 6:40 am

Great content I do have…

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Dita from Blogging Spree March 3, 2013 at 5:52 pm

Hi Ana,

I read this blog post with great interest. At the beginning I was very surprised to read that your income was so low. As I finished reading the post and all the comments I can see why, just as many others are seeing it.

Interestingly enough, even before I read this post and learned about your financials something caught my attention as I read the very first post I came across a few days ago.

In that post you mentioned that your favorite keyword tool is Market Samuri. I believe that you mentioned it 2x. Yet not one time did you link to it. That actually surprised me. I already have the tool but others don’t and I feel that you missed an opportunity there. You may have it mentioned in your Rolodex but not everyone will check your resources.

As well Ana, I’d love to read your traffic strategies and would gladly pay for the PDF or a video course. But you do not seem to offer one. You mentioned that you fear that it will get outdated. Of course it will, everything does. But Kim Roach and Jason Fladlien still sell their outdated reports from before 2009. Jason mentioned he does not even know where some of his stuff is coming from.

Every newspaper article, every bit of scientific research that is published is already outdated by the time it is out. If everybody felt that their stuff will be outdated by the time it is published we would still be in dark ages.

I look forward to reading your posts and learning from you. I sincerely hope that you will turn your financials around and in a few short months you will be able to report that your income grew substantially.

Best wishes,

Dita
P.S. I was so glad when you mentioned that it took you 8 hours to write a post. All the know-it-alls boast 20 minutes or even as low as 7 minutes. I thought there was something wrong with me (lol).

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Ana Hoffman March 4, 2013 at 6:31 am

Certainly makes sense, Dita.

And yes, I do take my writing seriously; that’s why I have the kind of readership that I have.

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John Di Carlo March 3, 2013 at 5:03 am

Hey Ana
I cannot believe what I have just read! Clearly, the person you see when you look in the mirror is not the same person that I see in my mind’s eye when I think “Ana Hoffman!”
I have been trawling the internet for two or three years looking for someone who could shine a light into my online ignorance and personal delusions without telling me the Holy Grail could be purchased for $797 or $979 (value $2,797,979.79) or whatever combinations of 7 and 9 they could dream up that day. You have an innate ability to communicate as if you in the here and now and as if you really care (which of course no one can if they don’t know the person at the other end). Think of yourself as an actor….let me explain . Meryl Strep is great but I can see the technique, Meryl trying to be great. When I watch the lesser applauded Kristin Scott Thomas I cannot see the technique. She simply….is. Similarly in your writing. Chris Brogan has great technique in his blog, but I can see the effort. With you it’s natural….I cannot see your technique. In fact it is so natural I am not sure you even have one!! This means that your cred is powerful and ever present. Hey, Danny Iny is a revelation and I am learning tons from his course, but if if anyone else had recommended him I doubt that I would have given him the time of day (which of course would have been MY loss). Do you see my point? I am convinced that whatever product you pin your flag to will bathe in the sunshine of your credibility. All you have to do is believe in yourself. I know that’s far harder than finding someone who believes in you, but I implore you to try; because if you do I am sure that the money you deserve shall flow in abundance

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Ana Hoffman March 3, 2013 at 9:07 pm

Wow, I should pin your comment to my computer screen, John (on second thought, should use tape instead of a pin :) ).

THANK YOU.

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Chris March 1, 2013 at 11:45 am

A lot of what you said sounds similar to what I go through. Just a thought, but perhaps you are spreading yourself too thin with focus on too many different areas? That was/is definitely part of my issue.

I started blogging and creating niche sites about a year ago with help from you and others like Pat Flynn. I am not quite generating the income I had hoped, but I am definitely learning a ton about a lot of different things in the process.

I did a quick inventory recently and since 75% of my income has been in the form of affiliate sales, I’m going to focus my efforts there and do more of what has worked and spend less time on other things. I’m going to follow a set plan/process, follow it through to completion and hopefully can produce positive results and reproduce them.

I find that if I have all these great ideas swirling around in my head, I’ll start in on all of them at the same time, but have very little time to focus on any one item and all suffer. Since that hasn’t resulted in the success I’m shooting for, time to refocus.

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Ana Hoffman March 3, 2013 at 8:36 pm

Glad you found your bottle neck, Chris; going for too many things at the same time can definitely do it to you.

Not the problem in my case though.

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Ariadne Fay February 28, 2013 at 4:08 am

Ana, your content is really good to a fault. I love your integrity that you’re not easily lured into a quick cash and your honest product reviews. For this alone, me and other audiences here would happily buy what you recommend :)

I’m not an expert marketer but here’s what pops up in my mind :

1. I think you can repackage the blog posts into a more condense version as a Kindle.
2. Make your own product that describes your case study. You can post it in CB, DigiResults, JVZoo
3. Or if you have already joined Warrior Forum you can post a WSO.
4. Build more mailing lists by solo ads to strengthen the audience base.
5. Make an interactive premium webinar.

One of a female IM’er with a rare strong integrity I know is Tiffany Dow who I followed for almost a year. And she’s doing really well in term of income. Maybe in some forms, you can emulate a bit of her method (she’s more on PLR though). But overall she keeps a great balance between giving and promoting. Maybe that’s the key, balance + integrity + honesty.

Ack. Just a humble rambling from a non-expert mind :)

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Ana Hoffman March 1, 2013 at 6:52 pm

Much appreciated, Ariadne; your advice is solid despite your claims of being a non-expert. :)

Never heard of Tiffany Dow; will check her out.

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Mike February 27, 2013 at 10:39 pm

Hey Ana,

You know – I would gladly pay $100 bucks for a tool or condensed step by step “Do this, do that, in this order to get traffic book”. I think many people would as well.

I also believe the real money is in creating a product, launching the heck out of it and getting lots of affiliates. Seems like you would have an army here promoting something you put together. If you don’t want to ‘put it together’ – perhaps a JV with someone who will take your info and package it. Another partner who is a pro at launches and another who can gather momentum and affiliates. Boom.. that’s a lot of business. Also, what I’ve realized due to downloading and piracy, you need a back end like private members area, tool or another clincher for retention… Just a thought…

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Ana Hoffman March 1, 2013 at 6:48 pm

“Condensed” is the word, Mike. No one wants to spend money on another long-winded fluff-packed course – I know I don’t.

Love you ideas about JVs. If only they were easy to come by. :)

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Peter March 5, 2013 at 7:27 am

Am just starting out and your blog has been of tremendous help giving me the ability to believe in myself.

Want you to know that your name has the ability to draw JV partners. Since people know you as someone who is credible and has integrity.

Hey Anna I get you must have lost some of your confidence due to the response of Empower network.
But don’t let this get to you considering that you are have the capacity to drive traffic to any site you are told to handle.
Here comes my tip for driving money to your site.

1) Create a Hire Me Page: You can laise with Oni of YounPrePro . He has successfully used this method to generate over $5000 a month. He does this by writing article for companies that pay him about $150 per article

2) You can also liaise with Neil Patel He’s a good guy sure he has one or two tips to share since you can become an SEO CONSULTANT for several top site

Looking forward to your March Income Report

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Ana Hoffman March 5, 2013 at 8:17 am

Thanks for the suggestions, Peter – too bad I am not a least bit interested in doing consulting/services of any kind.

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Nelson February 27, 2013 at 9:36 pm

Hey Ana. I totally love your blog, am a subscriber and have learned so much from you. Just the other day I bookmarked 4 pages to revisit. I am going to be buying some of the products you listed (the template one to be exact) and definitely coming back through your link to make sure you get the affiliate love.

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Ana Hoffman March 1, 2013 at 6:46 pm

Glad I can help, Nelson, and thank you.

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Keral Patel February 27, 2013 at 8:01 pm

I guess you are right about everyone has their own demons to conquer. I get very good at development but then I am totally useless when it comes to marketing. I do well in monetization but then as I am useless in marketing I don’t get enough traffic that could be monetized.

In short I think everyone has his or her pros and cons.

The way you are handling this blog by putting up good articles from bottom of your heart and giving replies to people who comment on your posts is a time consuming job. Maybe that is why your site gets great traffic and maybe you should continue doing what you are doing right now as it makes a person feel bit more close to your site when you add a personal touch to all the things.

BTW I loved those coffee cups in all your posts.

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Ana Hoffman March 1, 2013 at 6:45 pm

Thanks for coming by, Keral.

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Susan Campbell February 27, 2013 at 5:23 am

Hi Ana,

You made money off me from a consultation, which was awesome.

But beyond that you didn’t make money off of me because you didn’t have anything to sell. I didn’t want a tool, in fact, I knew about most of the ones you reviewed.

Last I looked you were going to do a monthly thing now, which is awesome, and I hope you put your best content in that newsletter instead of on the blog where people can access it for free. Because people will pay to get awesome info from you.

That’s how I feel as your reader. :-)

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Ana Hoffman February 27, 2013 at 5:17 pm

You surely did, Susan; thank you!

And you are right; I need to save the best for the best. :)

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Chadrack February 26, 2013 at 9:01 am

Hi Ana,

First, I must say I’m surprise to read that you are not really making much money with this blog. Yes, it’s been sometime I visited this blog but when I saw your blog referenced on a friends blog with this topic, I just had to step over and read it.

Now, having read your post I must say that many bloggers are in this same spot. Working their hearts off but making nothing in return. Many in frustration gave up and their blogs have become some other statistics in failed blogs. I can see that despite this not too pleasant situation, you have remained committed which is a good thing.

However, I must say, from your post, that the problem you have here is a matter of the heart. It is apparent that business is not your area. You are a perfectionist who wouldn’t push out anything unless everything about it is in ‘perfect shape!’ Besides, it is clear that you take blogging to be social connection tool rather than a business and so your content flows in that direction.

Your frankness is very clear in the post but I must say if you are going to monetize this blog and make good returns from it, you re-evaluate WHY you are blogging. I did a post on this sometime in December with this question: Why are you here? Settle this question and then you will be able to really know what direction to focus on. If you are here to have fun, then you don’t have to listen to the types of comments you referenced in the post. But if you really want to have fun and also make money, then you will once again have to learn what it takes to run a blog like a business.

Truth is whatever route you take, you are the architect of your life no one has the right to tell you what you must do!

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Ana Hoffman February 27, 2013 at 2:35 pm

I just like to blog and hope that the money part would just magically fall into place, Chadrack. :)

Hasn’t happened yet, but you never know! And thanks for coming by; pleasure to see you back.

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mitz February 25, 2013 at 10:50 pm

Hi Ana
I did wonder why you cannot make loads of money with this blog. Here are few ideas I thought about: (please don’t take offence)
** Your content is so well written that the reader is wrapped up in your words and not really thinking about buying a product.
** Your readers like you almost too much and are hanging around to see what you think and say.
** Your content is extremely long and goes into many subjects that could be split into separate more focused posts. Like a post about SEO and then only trying to sell one product.

I see your rankings and I know you can rank for anything you post..So it must be either:
*the content
*the call to action
*or the audience

I may have bought my Aweber through your link or Ileanes, not sure..I didn’t want the commission to go to waste.

As a blogger I usually buy through my own link if the affiliate allows this or I get the product for free in exchange for a review. Maybe you have an audience full of people like me..bloggers that know too much and have everything but like your writing?

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Ana Hoffman February 26, 2013 at 5:55 am

Whatever it is I am doing is clearly not working, Mitz.

I’ll take your suggestions to heart.

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Kim Doyal February 25, 2013 at 3:51 pm

Hi Ana,

GREAT post! Nothing endears me more than people being honest about what’s going on, ups & downs and all. I recently wrote a post debating on the direction of my business (just under my name? Giving up the brand) and it stemmed from a lot of reasons, one being the time for money.
The crazy thing is I get the MOST return where I am happiest- teaching and creating products.
I stayed away from creating products for a while (do I know enough, etc.), but my audience wants to learn WP from because they’re everyday users, not coders and programmers.

I would sign up in a heartbeat to watching you teach some of your traffic strategies. And I don’t think it would take you months to gather.
Create a simple power point outline, do a live webinar where you record the video and you’re done.
Just offer the webinar AS a paid course (I’d be more than happy to host w/my gotowebinar for you).

The other thing that came to mind as I was reading about your affiliate marketing was Pat Flynn. He doesn’t have any of his own products but kills it with affiliate marketing because he creates tutorials on using the products he recommends.

I don’t think I’m saying anything new or you haven’t already heard, but maybe think of it as something you’re doing FOR your audience. People who love what you do and are loyal WANT to buy from you. I bet if you surveyed your readers /subscribers with a free survey you’d get some valuable info. about what people want to buy from you and how much they’d be willing to spend.

Oh.. and one more.. (didn’t know I’d be so wordy here). What about an interview? Then you’d have an audio that you could have transcribed, which creates both a PDF AND audio for a product (not to mention potential Kindle book).

In support of all you do,
Kim

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Ana Hoffman February 26, 2013 at 5:44 am

Look at me: even before I read your post, I already have an opinion as to which direction you take with your blog… :) Stick with the brand name! The name gives people an idea of what the site is about before they click over. Unless we are Seth Godin, name brands don’t work as well.

And thanks for your support! I often wonder how it is that Pat is killing with affiliate marketing. If he can do it, then why can’t I, right?

However, other readers noticed that once they buy any aff products from me, that’s it; there’s nothing more to buy.

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Bradley Anderson February 25, 2013 at 12:11 pm

Quick product idea, Ana: ‘The Best of TGC: Volume 1″. :) Pick your 25 best (most popular) posts including any useful comments, and package them into an ebook. Update anything that needs updating. Make sure to include various links inside. Ta-da! New product to sell.

If you want to see what people think of it first (and boost traffic a bit, as well), post it in the War Room at WF (yes, I noticed a while back that you finally joined!). :)

You could probably hire someone on Fiverr to take care of the editing for you.

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Phil M February 25, 2013 at 12:01 pm

Nice post, thanks for the useful information,
I have had a similar problem with my blog where I have struggled to make money from my visitors. I have also tried a lot of differerent and sponsored posts worked well for a while for me but this is not working as well anymore.
It was nice to know about how you make money with this blog,
Thanks for sharing :)

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Sheila Bergquist February 25, 2013 at 12:49 am

Oh Ana…the eternal question for most of us! Why aren’t we making more money? I have been in this crazy business for two years and have made hardly any money, despite building good websites, writing great articles, learning about SEO, keywords, etc…
I see other people build a fairly crappy site and make more in a month than I’ve made in two years. I have no advice or idea why your site doesn’t make more money, but I loved this post because, if nothing else, it made me feel less alone in not being successful.
I love your site, I love your attitude, honesty, personality and will be a devoted follower. I hope we all figure it out soon!

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Ana Hoffman February 25, 2013 at 6:20 am

Either way, blogging builds me up, gets me away from being a mama, a wife, a cook, a housekeeper, etc, so even if I don’t make too much money from this, I still feel like I am ahead. :)

Thanks for coming by, Sheila!

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Scott Stembridge February 24, 2013 at 2:03 pm

Hi Ana, I love following your blog. I enjoy your style of writing and the forthright way you call a spade a spade. You know your strengths and your weaknesses. If you are struggling to move around them why not try a different tack.
As you have said there are not so many great products out there for you to promote, so what about partnering up with some of those who do have great products. Work with them; they produce the products and you bring the traffic, make it a win-win-win situation.
Or find someone who is good at creating great content and license what they produce under your own brand.
Just my opinion :)

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Ana Hoffman February 24, 2013 at 8:35 pm

Not a bad idea at all, Scott. Requires quite a bit of leg work, but doable. Thank you!

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Servando Silva February 24, 2013 at 12:10 pm

Hello Ana,
What’s the whole list pf products you’re promoting?
Could it be that since those are some of the well known products on the IM niche even when people are reading your reviews and referrals, other IMers are getting those commissions?

For example, Market Samurai or Tweet Adder? I read your review but I also try to read a lot of other reviews to confirm if the product is good enough for me or not. That means that the first results on Search Engines are the ones getting commissions and maybe not you?

But of course, you have a loyal reader’s database. So not everything is about SE traffic.

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Ana Hoffman February 24, 2013 at 8:29 pm

When it comes down to reviews, I think you are right, Servando – those who are listed first in Google get the worm. So I am working on listing some of my reviews higher right now.

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Servando Silva February 25, 2013 at 11:16 am

Well great!
What’s your strategy for that? (if you don’t care to share).

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Ana Hoffman February 26, 2013 at 5:36 am

I use my content leverage system to build links: http://www.trafficgenerationcafe.com/content-marketing-leverage-system/

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Bradley Anderson February 25, 2013 at 11:37 am

Just a thought, but I didn’t find your blog through the search engines. It was actually a referral that another IMer made, and I would be willing to be bet most others here didn’t find you via search engine, either. :)

I’ve purchased two items through your ‘Black Book’ page and I am very happy with them. The rest are not useful for my situation, but still great products. But that’s it. You’ve probably made about $20 in commissions from my purchases, and that’s where it stops.

My question to you now: What else am I supposed to buy from you? ;)

Instead of concentrating on getting MORE people here via the search engines (which is great for TRAFFIC, but it’s still playing the numbers game as far as sales go), concentrate more on selling to the people you already have as loyal readers, and who already trust you.

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Ana Hoffman February 26, 2013 at 5:37 am

You certainly made a great point, Bradley.

It all points back to having your own product.

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Rudee February 24, 2013 at 10:35 am

Ana,
My suggestion would be stop sending people away to buy from somebody else. I was reading your new email today and I love the information you provide. Today there was a link for Freddy Krueger of Blogging: How to Write Highly Successful Guest Posts in under 2 Hours. Yes it was interesting, but as I got half way down the page, I realized he was selling something. I left his site as well as yours. If you wan to promote someone that is fine, but create the link that you never leave your site. For most people once they leave a site, they usually don’t come back unless there is something FREE and they decide to bookmark your page.

I love your articles and you have been a great help. I look forward to receiving the coffee break emails.

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Ana Hoffman February 24, 2013 at 8:27 pm

Good point, Rudee; however, since I don’t have a product of my own, the only way I can potentially earn anything at all is by sending my traffic out through affiliate links. That’s the only way aff marketing would ever work.

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Kashif February 24, 2013 at 10:25 am

I am into this dilemma myself. Getting enough traffic but its not converting into revenue. If you find a way out, I am all ears :)

By the way, have you tried Adsense, BuySellAds, Reachli etc? They can generate enough to cover the operating costs, I believe.

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Ana Hoffman February 24, 2013 at 8:26 pm

The problem with these services is sending my traffic away from my blog for pennies. I don’t believe it’s a smart strategy for an IM blog like mine. Definitely works well on some niche blogs though.

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Michael February 27, 2013 at 9:21 am

Hi Ana,

Great post, as always. Sending traffic away from your blog using these methods doesn’t always have to be for “pennies”. Adsense works well if you select the right topics to target and have done the keyword research. Your site is strong enough to that you can generate plenty of “new” traffic just from ranking for particular keywords, in which case you’re not loosing existing traffic but rather converting “new” traffic.

I started my IM career with Adsense and although it is certainly not the only way to make really good money on the web, it does work VERY well when done right. You don’t have to run ads on your entire blog to make it work, you just need specific pages (or posts) that are ranking high for specifically targeted keywords that have a decent payout. The “key” is in the keyword research and understanding how much advertisers are paying for these keywords through Google’s AdWords program.

The advantage that you have, is that your blog is already established, has a good reputation in the IM community and it is “trusted” with regards to Google’s search index. In terms of ranking for targeted keywords, you have an edge over someone trying to do it from scratch. Kind of like aged vines producing better wine than new ones. Take for example keywords like “seo link building” and “link building seo”: Both of these phrases are competitive in Google, have a global search volume of 27,000 a month and cost advertisers over $10.00 a click on average.

What this means in english…is that IF you were to rank in a top position for one or both of these keywords and you ran Adsense on that page, not only would you be getting truck load of new visitors, those visitors WILL click those ads and the payout for each click would NOT be pennies….

Even if Adsense only payed you 50% of the click (they normally pay more even for new accounts) you would be raking in a nice income from traffic to a single page. Note that this will only work IF your page is ranked in the top 1 – 3 position in Googles search index. We all know that’s where the real vloume is at. So… you would first need to either select an existing article where you have written about “seo link building” or write a new one, do the on page seo and THEN you would need to do the necessary link building to get “that particular page” ranking in a top position.

Keep in mind I am only talking about a single page here…

If you pick the wrong keywords and niche’s to go after of course pennies would be the pay out. Again, the real “key” is in the keyword research, proper selection of the keywords and getting those targeted pages ranking on the top half of page one in Google’s search index. The link building does take a little time, but it is WAY worth it.

This works Anna. It does…..You’re sitting on a real gold mine here, you just haven’t tapped in to the “glory hole” yet.

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Ana Hoffman February 27, 2013 at 5:20 pm

You are certainly making a lot of sense, Michael.

To be quite honest with you, I never really tested AdSense at TGC; just dismissed it as something that won’t work for me.

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vicky February 24, 2013 at 7:13 am

Hi Ana,

I haven’t read your other posts as yet. But the kind of authority I have found in this post drives me to think you have a pretty clear mindset as to what you want. And I liked your honesty of admitting what you like and what you don’t. Its true that we alone can either make money or not online and if the our willpower is right nothing can stop us. I will take time reading your other posts too. I can’t tell u where you are going wrong, but I know you will surely figure it out soon and make lots of money then.

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Ana Hoffman February 24, 2013 at 8:12 am

Thanks, Vicky. Welcome to Traffic Generation Café!

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Rory Singh February 24, 2013 at 3:50 am

Hi Ana. I first found your website from your Empower Network Review that you did. Since then, I have found you from Ti’s website and other searches on the Internet for other stuff. I have read some of your articles and have quickly realized that you are very respected by many fellow bloggers. I admire you even though I have never met you. You can get a feel about people just through their writing. Yes you have a lot of traffic and a large optin list. Yes your traffic and readers seem to be in the same niche as you so most likely they already have products similar to the ones you are selling.

Maybe you haven’t found the right products to sell as yet.

Maybe you have a problem with selling to people – making money from people. And that is something that you might need to look into.

You are obviously a person of Integrity and that’s just awesome! So many marketers on the Net are doing so many stupid things for the ‘love’ of money.

I hope you keep on keeping on. We (Internet Community) need leaders like you who are honest, straight forward and who wear their hearts on their sleeves.

Don’t worry, someone of your caliber of a person, will make it big. It’s only a matter of time.

And money isn’t the only form of success. It’s just one very small part of it.

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Ana Hoffman February 24, 2013 at 8:08 am

Sounds like my strategy of “being everywhere” is working. :)

Thanks for coming by, Rory, and for the compliment.

I couldn’t quite tell from your site: are you promoting EN?

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Rory Singh February 24, 2013 at 2:23 pm

Yes Ana I am.

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Edward February 23, 2013 at 9:59 pm

You are great and love your post about Empower Network. You have found a niche that you can make money with . Your traffic generation is your key. This is my opinion but you have a way to make money with your traffic generation. You should capitalize on the fact you can get traffic is what works. Also do not let Empower Network people worrry you. They too are looking for traffic but could not generate the kind of traffic you have. You have done a great job and wish you the best of luck you actually have a gold mine.

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Ana Hoffman February 24, 2013 at 8:04 am

Thank you, Edward.

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James February 23, 2013 at 8:02 pm

Hi Ana,

I’m not sure if anyone pointed this out but just thought that I would chime in. Your readers/audience are pretty well-versed with Internet marketing, thats why they dont buy through your affiliate link.

They might click on your clickbank link, go back, use their own affiliate ID, buy the product, save at least half the price. It happens. Same goes for other affiliate networks, which they probably are members of. I maybe wrong though.

For what its worth, just bought my TweetAdder using your link :)

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Ana Hoffman February 23, 2013 at 9:06 pm

That certainly makes sense, James.

And I truly appreciate your support!

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Michael Shook February 23, 2013 at 12:45 pm

After reading around your site and clicking a few links, here are a couple of things I found that would keep me from buying something from your site.

This is the first one from your tools page:
“Always, always, always do your OWN due diligence before making any purchases.”

Many people who have been around marketing online have seen that there is virtually no way to do any due diligence on marketing products. Everything you read is a review disguising an affiliate link. And people that are new, are looking for someone to trust.

So you are sending people away to other affiliates in both cases and if the other affiliate says something they like better or offers a better bonus, in all likelihood, your cookie is going to get overwritten.

If you want to promote something because you love it, then promote it and stop sending people away to buy from somebody else.

The second one is this, from your commenting form:
“I appreciate and read all comments, even though I don’t always have the time to respond to each one. Your comments are extremely important to me, so keep them coming. Please, do not use just keywords in “Name” field; you MUST leave a real name, if you want to see your comment approved. Thinking of dropping your link spam? Save the effort: your comment will NEVER show up on this blog.”

This paragraph is all about you and your wants and needs. The first word is “I”, the first sentence is a “comma but” sentence, where the second part of the sentence is the real idea, and the first part is an apology for what you are really doing, which is “not replying because your time is more valuable than ours”. And the rest of the paragraph is a threat. The people who don’t know what a “link spam” threshold is, will be confused and the real link spammers running their Xrumer installs are not going to care.

This is your blog, you can run it how you want and you are not under obligation to anyone to explain why you have the policies you do. Want to promote? Promote and stop apologizing for it. Don’t want to promote? Then stop doing it. But be whoever you are going to be, it’s your life and your site and you deserve to have it be the way you want.

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Ana Hoffman February 23, 2013 at 9:00 pm

An interesting side trip into copywriting, Michael.

I wrote that comment “warning” precisely for the reason you mentioned: this is my blog and this is how I want to run it.

Couldn’t quite figure out what it had to do with affiliate marketing though.

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Michael Shook February 23, 2013 at 10:19 pm

I don’t understand what you mean about a side trip into copywriting, Ana.

Of course it is your blog, what I am saying is that you don’t have to tell anyone what you are doing or what your comment policy is, you can just do it. Having the warning there gives a certain tone to your blog and perhaps (I am not sure, of course) that may be part of why people don’t buy as much from your site. It might not be, but it might be worth looking at.

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Walter February 23, 2013 at 10:59 am

Ana,

Great post as always!

I take it that you don’t make enough money because you don’t create products. I am sure there are many more reasons. I am a Kenyan freelance writer and internet marketer with less than 1 year of blogging but my products have earned me quite a good buck.

I agree that you are a Don when it comes to traffic. I don’t think a week goes by before I pass by to check out something new; and I always get something fresh, new and great.

All the best :)

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Ana Hoffman February 23, 2013 at 8:48 pm

I know, I know, Walter; most people earning online living do it through their own products. I just need to kick myself in the rear or stop complaining about not making enough money.

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Walter February 25, 2013 at 12:37 am

Ana,

Thanks for your response. Yes, you should be making millions, without messing up your integrity and authority.

For the record, I don’t always make more money than you. Some months I make slightly more, some slightly less, others much less. I have around 170 guys on my list and get only 200 visitors per day. I also have much less posts than you and have been around for less than 1 year.

I will therefore use examples of guys who actually do make much more than you but you are in the same league.

My most respected bloggers are:

1. Ana Hoffman
2. Mark Ling
3. Neil Patel
4. Kristi Hines
5. Derek Halpern

Let’s look at these for a minute:

1. Ana Hoffman – I got to know about you from some Google search. The first reason I started following your blog was because I saw Kristi’s face and recommendation. I subscribed, got the great PDF report and keep coming back for free traffic related stuff. I have not yet used on any of your affiliate links since I already had what you promote. Your sidebar has other people’s products and reviews. As an affiliate, you promote other people’s products. As one of your top fans, I promote your site, but most guys coming will still not give you much money.

2. Mark Ling – I call this guy my money man. I got to know him through a recommendation from Eben Pagan from his list mails. Mark was doing an AffiloBlueprint 3 launch offer. I didn’t know much about affiliate marketing so I went ahead and bought AB3. This kept me busy for months (till now) learning from him. His strategies work and have made me thousands of dollars. I click on most of his affiliate links as I go through the training. I promote his training as an affiliate and most guys who I refer buy his products and click on his affiliate links while learning.

3. Neil Patel – I knew this guy from Kristi who happens to be my favorite writer on the internet. I saw her name in some QuickSprout and KISSmetrics posts, read and started following Neil. Neil doesn’t sell much, apart from his consultancy and cool software. His sidebars are all about his products and he apparently makes millions from that. He gives lots of free cool stuff like the recent free 45,000 SEO guide. I personally don’t buy anything from Neil but I believe most six to seven figure earners do so he makes quite a chunk from one sale.

4. Kristi Hines – Kristi is my all time favorite freelance writer. I read from her from all over the internet and look forward to her posts. Funny thing, I hardly check out Kikolani – her personal site. I promote her eBook, Blog Post Promotion (thus she makes some money from me) and would hire her as a freelance writer (already got a quote). She seems to make money from her writing, product, contests, affiliate marketing e.t.c.

5. Derek Halpern – This guy is considered a genius by bloggers. He doesn’t sell much but when he does he sells hard. What does he sell? His products e.g. the recent Blog That Converts. He doesn’t have much on his sidebar but stuff to do with his blog.

The thing here is, you need to sell your product or services to make some good buck online; don’t just be an affiliate.

A good product will get you committed buyers due to your authority. They will click on all your links in the product and become your affiliates when your strategies work. You seem worried about it getting to a point where it will be outdated, but, just like Kristi, Mark Ling e.t.c., you can always push out updates in real time, just as you do on your blog and your customers will love you more.

Once again, you are doing a great job here. I am looking forward to buying your first product, Ana.

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Ana Hoffman February 25, 2013 at 6:18 am

Thanks for taking your time to break down your thoughts on this, Walter.

We might know what our readers want, but hearing it from our readers is an entirely different and very helpful thing.

I’ll be giving this some thought.

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Elizabeth Saunders February 23, 2013 at 7:38 am

Hi, Ana. It’s because your experienced readers already have these apps and plug-ins, and your beginners aren’t quite ready to invest in their online business.

As part of the latter group, I’ve looked at things you recommend and signed up for some free trials. I was very tempted by Danny Iny’s Audience Biz Masterclass, but then my offline work exploded and I knew I couldn’t commit right now. Because you share so much great content, I think: When I’m ready for xyz, I’ll use Ana’s link. Therefore you get some income trickling in.

Are you defining success by other people? I’d be glad to have online income like yours right now! But of course you want to keep growing and tweaking.

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Ana Hoffman February 23, 2013 at 8:40 pm

I used to sign up for anything I could get my hands on, Beth, but then all those great courses just sat in my inbox – the timing was all wrong.

So definitely wait till you can get full advantage of Danny’s training and I appreciate you thinking of me.

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Greg February 22, 2013 at 4:53 pm

Ana,

F*&^ing brilliant.

I’m actually leaving part of this comment out, because of fear a lot of folks would read it.

It took me 5 months of DearBloggering to decide I’d AM 1-2 products instead of 10+ with a drive for more.

But it’s hard to get into that upper-tier position where people buy from you and not the other guy. Super hard. Like 100 backlinks is not enough kinda hard.

Just my 2 cents :)

Greg

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Ana Hoffman February 23, 2013 at 8:32 pm

Every once in a while I decide to buy a new product, but can’t think of anyone who promotes it as an affiliate, Greg. Being that one person who pops up in our readers’ heads when they think of buying anything at all is where we want to be.

I like that challenge… You? ;)

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Lars Krogholt February 22, 2013 at 3:02 pm

I really like your honesty and integrity. You are not to be bought for money. This is a seldom found quality in the internet marketing arena where obviously to many folks money (i.e. love of money) is all that matters. Way too many people are willing to sacrifice anything on the money altar. Way too many people are willing to outright lying, tweaking the truth as well as their personal history if just it makes them a bunch of money. Your own moral standard is so high that you have not found many affiliate products worth to promote. And as Ti Roberts writes [tiroberts.com/why-traffic-does-not-equate-to-money/] you could have sold your valuable insights on traffic – maybe through a membership – but you don’t do it, presumably out of generosity. The bar is truly raised high in your court! When you have a new product you’d like to promote – or if you come up with a product of your own – I’ll come rushing in! Keep on doing what you do, but make sure you do not die of starvation, please. Bloggers of your kind are worth taking good care of.
Just one corrective. I do not think matters are quite as black as you paint them. I could mention a few affiliate products worth promoting as for instance some hosting companies or online backup services. But I also understand that monetizing does not only come down to the quality of the affiliate product but also to how it fits into the business model and the niche and theme the blog operates in.
P.S. I read your analysis of Empower Network with great delight. It was very much to the point according to my own experience with EN. And your sarchasm was very appropriate.

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Ana Hoffman February 23, 2013 at 8:28 pm

Truly appreciate the compliment, Lars. I suppose some of us are meant to be broke. :) But not broken.

Yes, there are several products that I personally use (and online backup is one of them), but don’t promote them here. Maybe it’s time to revisit my product list.

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HP van Duuren February 22, 2013 at 6:45 am

Hello Ana,

I do believe that reason that not everybody constantly buys products from you might be (besides also possible Macro Economic factors) that your target audience is probably looking for how to get traffic to their sites.

When they already would have loads of traffic, than they probably wouldn’t be at your site. When they would have loads of traffic, chances are that they also might have figured out a way to monitize this traffic, and because of it have a possible nice budget to be able to buy products from you. Only unfortunately those people probably don’t usually visit your blog.

So possibly creating a Sales Funnel with at the front-end free content and, free downloads, and lower priced products, and some other higher priced specifically traffic generation related products (or probably even beter) - services - at the back-end could be effective?

(because I do think that it doesn’t alway’s have to do with being (time) efficient, because when you are very effective you might not need to bother to much about being efficient anymore.)

Also possibly my posts titled: How to Write a Book Review for Your Blog (that actually made it into the Most Popular list on my Writing Blog) can also be helpful?

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Joshua February 22, 2013 at 5:01 am

Hey Ana,

There’s not much I can say to help you in this issue of not making enough money with your blog since not matter what anyone says it’s all easier said then done and we all have our inner battles to deal with.

Just don’t let the haters get to you. You run a great blog here and you have 90% of the make money online formula down you just have to figure out the other 10%.

Also when it comes to product creation you do not have to be the one to make the product :) You can be the one to give the product exposure and find someone who is willing to spend the time making the product and you go 50/50

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Ana Hoffman February 23, 2013 at 8:13 pm

You are right, Joshua.

We can read what others have done as much as we want to, but it won’t make a difference until we figure out how to adapt and make it unique to our businesses.

Hmmm, not creating the product myself? There’s an idea…

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