Creating a successful income-producing website

After Digicamhelp was featured on NBC’s Today Show and in USA Today and Business Week, many people contacted me about how to make “a little money on the internet” with AdSense. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to respond to all requests personally, so I’ll share some tips here.

You will no doubt need help along the way, as I did and still do. There is plenty available online in both articles and forums. I’ve listed some incredibly helpful resources at the end of the article.

A brief history of Digicamhelp

Digicamhelp started as a small, 14 page subweb, which I created to help friends learn about digital cameras. A friend and master web developer, Katherine Nolan of InKK Design, encouraged me to expand the site.

My tiny site officially launched in the late fall of 2003, as Digicamhelp.com. Today, it contains well over 1500 pages of digital camera and related information. Almost all pages have one or more AdSense ads on them.

Signing up for affiliate programs such as AdSense is free and easy. Within minutes after placing the ad code on pages within my website, I was making a little money.

I initially designed the site with Microsoft FrontPage. As it grew in size, managing and navigating the site became increasingly challenging, so in 2006, I hired Katherine to put Digicamhelp into a Content Management System.

The process of moving hundreds of pages and well over 1000 graphics from a FrontPage site into a CMS was, quite frankly, a nightmare. I never imaged my site would grow so large; if I had an inkling earlier on, I would have used something like a CMS from the get go. Live and learn.

Building and managing a website is work!

Reading an article or watching a brief segment on television can oversimplify what it takes to create a money-making website. The fact of the matter is that for the vast majority of website owners, developing a website is a lot of work, particularly during the formative years. Managing a website is an ongoing process and is not something that you can “set it and forget it!”

Some of my tasks other than writing content include research, creating graphics, buying and reviewing digital cameras that interest me, editing articles by contributing writers, putting together monthly newsletters, replying to inquiries and answering questions at the Digicamhelp Q&A Forum. Oh, and paying website-related bills and keeping records for tax time.

Content, content, content

The key to a successful website is good content. Write about a subject that you know well, and write about it with a passion. Write about any and every aspect of it. Others who are interested in the subject will find the information and read what you have to say, assuming it’s well written and the pages are relatively attractive.

Traffic, traffic, traffic

Building traffic to a website is also challenging and often takes years to develop. However, it can be done if a person is willing to put in a lot of time and be persistent.

Google and other search engines index website pages, which people may find when doing a search. When they visit a site and like what they read, they’ll not only return but tell others.

Digicamhelp gets some of its traffic from “golden” links, where other sites with a lot of traffic reference and link to this site. The reason they link back is because they find the content useful.

I’ve never paid for professional search engine optimization, which can be expensive.

Advertising a website

Except when Digicamhelp was brand new, I’ve do very little advertising. I use Google AdWords. With AdWords, I can set a daily budget, even if it’s only $.50 per day.

Remember, when using a program such as AdWords, it brings more traffic directly to a site, or a designated page within a site. More traffic means potentially more income.

Creating a website

You can design your own website with programs such as Microsoft Front Page, Expressions or Adobe Dreamweaver. You will need to purchase a domain name and pay a provider to host your site. There are annual fees for both.

Some people use free blogs such as WordPress or Google’s Blogger. These accounts provide templates that can be tweaked by the user. In fact, for those who know little if anything about web design, I recommend they give blogging a try. If you like it, then consider creating your own website or paying someone to develop it for you.

You can use affiliate ads, such as AdSense and Chitika, on many Blogs. Like AdSense, Chitika does very well at my site.

More information about Chitika.

Read the TOS

Whatever affiliate programs you use, be sure to read and understand the Terms of  Service agreement. For example, AdSense disallows the use of competitor’s contextual based advertising on the same page where AdSense ads appear. Some programs, like Chitika, allow you to turn off contextual ads, so they can be placed on the same pages as AdSense. Some TOS limit the number and type of the provider’s ads you can place on a page.

Expenses

For a site like Digicamhelp, there are very few mandatory expenses other than annual hosting and domain fees…and taxes. ;-)  My biggest, one-time expense was having the site redone. Because I can no longer work on the back end of the site like when using FrontPage, I need to hire someone if features or functionality need to be changed or added.

If you’ve read this far

If you’re read this far, you probably have the tenacity to build an income producing website. Like all businesses, whether brick-and-mortar or virtual, a lot is involved and the first year or two, maybe even three, will be the most difficult and time-consuming.

If someone told me a few years ago that I would be making in the five figures writing copy about a subject I love, I wouldn’t have believed them.

You have the potential to make ”a little money on the internet” too!

For more information:

Planning for Success Online by Katherine Nolan - Free, easy-to-understand articles and “How to” Guides about web design, hosting and domain names.

Outfront - the webmaster forum where, with guidance and help of others, I taught myself to use FrontPage. Outfront has forums for other web authoring programs as well. Lots of good, friendly help for beginners and beyond.

WebmasterWorld - a no-nonsense forum for webmasters and others interested in web design; covers almost every topic related to the web. WMW has a number of forums devoted to Google, including AdSense, AdWords as well as other revenue generating affiliate programs. Webmaster World also offers forums to discuss copyright and other legal issues, however information gleaned there should not be a substitute for professional legal advice.