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Hi everyone,
I’m not a casino affiliate, but I’m looking for something that has a good chance for success. I’ve been a webmaster for over a year, but did it just for the fun of it. Recently, I started adding affiliate links to my site, all from commission Junction… all nice, family-friendly stuff. I never got a commission, and barely got clicks, even after blatantly urging people to “visit the sponsors”. With over 500 visitors a day, I thought I’d get something!
So I started a website with lots of content for parents, and tried to use it for selling educational gifts through the National Geographic affiliate program.
It’s just sitting there!
If I do make a sale, I’ll get less than $5. I’d have to work my butt off to make $100 per month. Many of the webmasters on the webmasterworld.com forum are going through the exact same thing, hoping their work will pay off some day.
More recently, I signed up for a more mature type of affil program, and made $40 the first day. That’s more like it. I can see myself promoting something that really pays. While I’d like to have family-friendly a site that even my mother would approve of, I’d really rather get paid.
To be honest, I’d rather have no website at all, and try to drive traffic directly to the casino sites through PPC ads. Another post here says that Google had stopped accepting gambling ads, but I see them when I do a google search, so I suppose they’ve changed their minds.
I know most of you have websites, but are there any of you who recommend the pure PPC route?
Also, unlike Commission Junction, there’s a higher risk of getting ripped off by the casino programs. How can I avoid this?
About me: I’m 45 years old, and work in social services (that’s why I tried the family-friendly route first). Financially, I’m sound, and I really don’t need the money now, but I want to build an income that will allow me to retire early, and do more sailing. By “retire” I mean retire from my current job. I’ll gladly keep working on affiliate stuff as long as it pays. Honestly, if I can make enough to match the pension I’ll get, that would be plenty, but realistically, I’d have to make more than that to have a comfort zone that would make it worth the risks.
Anyway, it’s nice to be here. Hoping to learn plenty.
Hello Misternewt,
Welcome to CAP!
Promoting casinos can be extremely profitable. You can see an ongoing poll about income here: http://www.casinoaffiliateprograms.com/bb/showthread.php?t=789
It is hard work. The working environment changes constantly. You need to find a niche for yourself and apply yourself to it.
Sending traffic via ppc can work, but most will agree that having a site that presells is better.
re. google: you definitely cannot send traffic from there directly to casinos. Visit the sites you see advertised to see what they do allow.
Good luck, and I hope you will find everything you need here.
After posting here, I read through the AdWords TOS, and sure enough, no gambling.
Seems like I’m always starting a new website, and never making money, so I was hoping to just spend the money, and move people directly to the sell.
As everyone says, it’s not that easy!
If you still have your website for parents, there is a nice looking aff programs that seems to fit the bill here: http://www.affcommunity.com/showthread.php?p=169#post169
I don’t think you can create good income only using PPC’s without a website.
Personally I don’t think you can create any income at all using that method. The good PPC’s don’t accept casino advertisements. The others will sent you a lot of trash traffic. I think some PPC’s may work under certain circunstancies but always as an extra to other means. The way to go is to create a website, optimize it, and wait, wait, wait. It’s like creating a business.
About the “family-friendly”, I think this is a business like any other. People search the internet for advice on casino or poker room gambling. They want to gamble before arriving at your site. You just point them to the right places. Doing a website about gambling with valuable information for players is a good service to people. Advertising on a PPC without any website is not any service at all and will most likely fit on your “family-unfriendly” category.
By the way, what are a bank doing when promoting credit, and mobile phone companies when promoting mobile phones?
Is this because people need the credit or need the phones? Right now, the answer may be yes. But when they start the business the answer was no. When mobile phones start to appear no one need this, or at least, the vast majority of people. Now a child with 10 years will most likely have one. This is because all that companies worked hard to create the necessity.
Most companies want to create you necessities and want you to subscribe to their services. Most people do not have sufficient funds to pay for all this at the end of the month. Then, there are a lot of credit companies offering you credit. You will end up with more bills to pay, they offer you more, and you will never have the money for all this. This is not family-friendly for me.I see all people in my country with a mobile phone and doing more use of it than they can afford. Why? Because the mobile phone companies try hard. Very hard. They want you to use the phone, they don’t care if you’re spending more than you can afford.
My point is: there is no such thing as a “family-friendly” business in the sense you say. The problem is with all the system we have. Capitalism works this way, good or bad.
I will be more happy promoting gambling related products through a well done website than promoting all types of credit sales. When you buy a product they offer you credit if you don’t have the money. You can pay on 60 months. If you lose your job you will not be able to pay. They are promoting debt. Is this family-friendly? How many companies will fit on this category? And how many employees?
Casinos will not let you play on credit. You can play if and only if you have the money. You will not have a bill to pay all months. This is an entertainment industry, like any other. Off course there are people that spend more than they should. But as I tried to point, that’s exactly what happens on any other products advertised elsewhere, and what every company try you to do.
I hope I’m not being to boring.
Also, unlike Commission Junction, there’s a higher risk of getting ripped off by the casino programs.
I would say this is untrue. Maybe someone with more experience than me can make any comments on this.
Sharpgambler,
I agree with you on the credit pushing “family friendly” businesses.
I also agree that a well tought out and run website does players a big favor and can be very useful.
Dominique wrote:If you still have your website for parents, there is a nice looking aff programs that seems to fit the bill here: http://www.affcommunity.com/showthread.php?p=169#post169Thanks for the link. I followed it, and joined the aff program, but was disappointed to find that they’re part of an affiliate clearing house that has nothing else to offer me. A small new site has to accumulate commissions from various programs in order to get a check, like commission Junction. The shareasale site has very few merchants that would fit in on my parenting site, so I’d have to make all me commissions from that one software company. Not a problem for a larger website, but I might never see a check.
What’s interesting is some of the other shareasale merchants. I saw one that offers 50% commissions, so I checked out their website, and couldn’t find anything for sale! They had Adsense ads on every page, and other affiliate links, but nothing for sale. Where would my commission come from?
But it did one thing for me… it made me want to become a shareasale merchant and get people to link to me for free. :laughcry:
Seriously, the kids’ software looks like a good product, and the free download would help with sales. I’ll give it a shot.
I used to make some money at shareasale.
I haven’t promoted anything from there in a couple of years.
Here’s another way to monetize your site: Sell advertising on it. The easiest way to do that is to put Adsense on it. It won’t be a landslide, but you might make $100/mo. from it.
Once you see the kind of advertisers you’re getting, you can try to sell adspace directly to that type of advertiser for 2 to 5 times what you were getting per month from Adsense.
All the while, you can keep building your site, add a weekly or monthly email newsletter (to be able to keep promoting your site to visitors even after they’ve already left), add a forum (to make the site more compelling, to keep people coming back to increase pageviews, etc.).
Years ago I created a bunch of sites for fun and as a public service. I tried to make them as useful as I could but never saw how I could make any money from them. Now I’m selling ads on them and making enough to live on from that without even counting my other income. If you have a passion for your site, put that passion into your site and I think the rewards can follow. Plus, you’ll feel so good knowing that your site is valuable and that it’s *worth* something when you have both a lot of visitors and advertisers wanting to pay to have their ads on it. It’s a lot better feeling than hoping you’ll get a few sales through some affiliate program.
Good luck, -MBJ-
P.S. If you can find the *right* affiliate program to match your content, it might make more for you than advertising.
