I’m happy to say that last month I managed to achieve one of my aims for 2012 by earning £500 in one month, and to be exact I can report that I earned £501.29 in February from my online niche sites which is just under US$800. When I wrote my aims at the beginning of January I was just about recovering from a Google slap and had earned just over £200 in December and so £500 seemed a long way away but just a couple of months into the year and I’ve done it.
How did I do this?
This month I earned £490.67 from AdSense and only £10.62 from Amazon and that was a result of me deciding where best to spend my time. Whilst the majority of my earnings are from AdSense then it makes business sense to keep my focus on that and try and build on it rather than using my time trying to force a new income stream whilst I haven’t reached my potential with AdSense.
I’ve found it harder to rank for Amazon affiliate sites and even have one site that Google just doesn’t want to index so in a way my hand was forced and I decided to work on my current sites and see what I could do to improve a couple of them. I did also create a new AdSense site and also purchased around 10 new domains to work on in the next few months.
A nice £6,000 pay rise
£500 is a great amount to be earning ‘on the side’ and if this were a regular income then it would effectively mean a £6,000 payrise for me! You wouldn’t turn that down would you? Of course there is tax to come from that but I’m lucky in that my only expenses are my hosting (£16 a month) and buying domains (£7 for 2 years). I write the majority of my own content and spend perhaps £10 a month on content writing and create any backlinks myself or using Fiverr ($10 a month).
I’m only looking up now and fingers crossed I can make further improvements to my income reports.
Can a theme improve ranking?
As I mentioned earlier I looked at ways to improve some of my sites and one of these is a 6 month old site which was earning around £2 a month and using the CTR Theme. I know this site has a bit more potential so I thought I would experiment and give it a new theme. This meant a refresh and also sorting out the menu structure slightly, but didn’t involve any new content. This was simply about site design and structure which is something not always taken into consideration with SEO. Here’s what happened over the month:
This led to the site earning £11.23 last month. The above graph is from Google Webmaster Tools and shows search queries on Google for keywords to my site. As you can see from the graph, visits aren’t amazing (about 16 a day) but my site is ranking higher and with a bit more work and improving the content I am hoping to see further improvements.
Of course this could be down to a Google algorithm change but I doubt it as I installed the new theme on 13th February and the change was almost instant. Take from this what you will but I will certainly be focusing a little more on site design and menu structure from now on rather than just content and links and perhaps this could rejuvenate some of your older sites?
The Future
I am constantly being told that AdSense is unstable and shouldn’t be taken for granted and whilst I agree with this I think it can apply to any income, even your 9-5 salaried job, and so whilst I’m looking to branch out I mustn’t neglect what is providing the majority of my offline income. The future then is more AdSense sites but perhaps it’s time to start working on something ‘bigger’, perhaps a community site, which is something that Google is favouring. What are your tips on this? What do I need to do?
great post, it’s good to see how others are doing, and how they are making money online. I actually don’t use adsense at all. I only have affiliate sites, and you’ve got me thinking that maybe i should be using adsense too! Well done.
AdSense is great if you find the right niche as they can be quite easy to rank and tend to look after themselves. The content doesn’t need to be amazing either in most cases as you really want people to stay on your site for as little as possible and leave via the AdSense adverts which will hopefully be what they’re looking for.
I have got a few domains that are ripe for affiliates, but I think content is more important for these as usually you want to engage the visitor and get them to trust you so that they make a purchase through your links on your site.
Thanks for popping by.
Adem´s last post ..February 2012 Niche Site Income Report
Good progress Adem. I like to read these posts about success as it gives encouragement to others.
I haven’t had much success with Adsense but then I’ve always focused on Niche sites that are more suited for Affiliate products. I agree I think it depends on the niche.
My main thoughts around these adsense Niches are; why invest time and money into small niches when you can invest that into something of more value, obviously there will be more competition and take a little longer to get there but the rewards will pay off.
Good luck with building up your income.
Gary Yeardley´s last post ..Oh! What’s Occurring
Thanks for the comments Gary. I’d agree that niches are short term, and simply skimming off the top, so it would be great to work on something that was long term, a brand, and had visitors and contributers who had real passion. Whilst I’m doing this in my spare time I don’t have the committment to something like this but if the right oportunity came along then I’d roll with it.
Adem´s last post ..February 2012 Niche Site Income Report
I know what its like working on sites part time and holding up a job as I do it.
Think about websites as a business. If you buy something worth investing into, then invest your current income into a decent site, whether you have to outsource the work, such as the content, the link building/seo or the web design.
It takes some balls but hopefully you’ll have something valuable and also something with an income stream.
You will need to also work out your ROI to make sure the investment is worth while.
I’m still learning how to see this as a business rather than a second income from small niches.
Gary Yeardley´s last post ..Oh! What’s Occurring
Always great to see inspiration like this Adem. How many sites and pages per site are you working with now for your adsense?
Congrats again on a stellar month!
TRENDS´s last post ..Stick To It – FTF01
I have a couple of big sites earning the bulk of my income and a handful earning smaller amounts. I now need to get my other sites developed and earning more money.
Adem´s last post ..February 2012 Niche Site Income Report
Nice one Adem, glad to see things are still improving.
Completely agree with Gary, invest your extra income into a decent site, one to be proud of and one that you can get real links for, not fiverr links. You won’t regret it.
Hope things continue,
Ian
I guess niche sites are all a little bit about cheating the system as we’re creating sites not because of personal interest but to facilitate putting ads on them and earning money. But I am putting useful info out there so it’s not too bad.
It would be great to have a website that was BIG and was a destination website but I couldn’t do this my myself and would look to collaborate on something like this but I don’t think that’s going to happen at the moment.
Wow! thats all i can say… wish i was earning this amount! it shows hard work pays off!
I think you should look into physical products also as well as adsence.
I ve tried community websites in the past but never got one off the ground! Phpfox is a good script!
Keep up the hard work and the updates
Ian
I have couple of sites promoting Amazon products so have branched out into that a little, but I’m making better money off AdSense so moved my concentration over to that for the moment.
There is better money to be made from Affiliate sites and I have got some in the pipeline but it’s all time dependant on when I can get those developed.
Adem´s last post ..February 2012 Niche Site Income Report
Good stuff!
You are catching me up and will probably overtake me next month at this rate!
So am I right in understanding you only spend $10 per month on fiverr gigs for your backlinks but are able to rank well enough to make £500 per month? That is pretty good!
I just advertised a fiverr gig in a bid to make some money from my UAW account but so far no one has bought it.
Good luck for March!
Joe´s last post ..Monthly Round-up: February 2012
Hi Joe,
Catching you up! I think I’m reaching the peak with the number of sites I’ve got though so not expecting an increase this month.
I’ve tried to add real value with my sites and so they are ranking well for organic searches with very minimal backlinking. If a site is not shifting though then I’ll get a fiver gig to help things along.
Adem´s last post ..February 2012 Niche Site Income Report
That is good that you are doing well without backlinking.
This fiverr gig might be of interest: http://fiverr.com/joe3000/submit-an-article-to-unique-article-wizard-to-get-your-lots-of-backlinks
Joe´s last post ..Is Cloaking Affiliate Links to Amazon Illegal?
Very nice, Adem! Definitely £490.67 from AdSense is awesome. I know there is a lot of potential with Adsense and I’m working hard toward my goal – $1000 a month.
Thanks for the sharing and I love to pick up some tips from you as well.
Kent @ Niche Site Tips´s last post ..MMO Monthly Report February 2012