This is a guest post by Daniel McGonagle who writes about SEO and link building at LinkvanaReviews.com
If you have a blog running WordPress, then you probably know how powerful blogs inherently are for getting traffic and rankings. However, you can make more money from your blog almost instantly by making a few design changes.
Obviously I am talking about improving conversions on your blog pages, but I’m not going to bore you with another Google Analytics video, or some cool new “must-have” stats-tracking plugin. If your site tracked everything via Google Analytics and analyzed your traffic stats only to discover that conversions are still not as high as you’d like them to be, then there must be something wrong with your content right?
That’s what many people are led to believe when they strive for increased conversions on their blogs….
How To Instantly Make More Money From Your Blogs;
Making Your Money Pages
Money Pages and just plain old WordPress pages are made because they were deemed important enough to YOU, the blog owner, to make this content a page instead of yet another blog post. Most blogs only have “Contact” and “About” pages, whereas blogs that make money have also included money pages as part of the design.
Making Your Money Pages, THE SIMPLE OUTLINE:
- What’s the goal of your site?
- What is the most important thing you’re trying to achieve with your blog traffic flow/funnel?
- How are you going to implement global navigation options that help your site perform better?
The answers to these questions will help your blog make more money but there’s a missing element here that a lot of bloggers are missing out on, and is the crux of this article.
How To Instantly Make More Money From Your Blogs;
Designing Your Money Pages
One thing Google Analytics or stat tracking software cannot tell you is that Blogs by design are not conducive ot high conversion rates. The reason for this is that the default site layout for most blogs is very distracting to the human eye.
Most blogs have sidebars with links to recent posts, your pages, displaying banners, social bookmarking icons, Twitter icons, area for leaving comments etc…. Most if not all of these “distractions” need to be removed from your money pages if you want your blog to convert better.
If you don’t have money pages on your blog, then you might be expecting new site visitors to stumble across some of your posts to find a “buy here link” but the reality is that people are mostly “lazy readers” and this is verifiable via AWSTATS in cPanel or other traffic tracking software. It doesn’t matter how good your content is, the majority of your readers will only read 3 pages per visit at most.
Therefore you need to develop money pages and find ways to constantly direct people to those pages via on-site interlinking.
Money pages that convert well don’t have comments, icons, or sidebars, so remove those and watch what happens.
What do you say? Are you making money with your blog by specially created pages? If yes, how well it is converting? Have you implemented the tips provided in this article?
That’s for sure, we should neglect adding sidebars, footer links etc on product pages, but highly recommend to have testimonials or customers reviews, feedbacks or ratings etc on money making pages
.-= Anil Gupta´s last blog ..Successful Affiliate Marketing Tips for your Blog =-.
Yup, it will be really helpful for the new buyers to decide about the product. But I really don’t suggest people from posting fake reviews, testimonials on their money making pages by themselves. It really sounds uncool…
I agree with the fact that the links on sidebar and twitter button distract the users. At the same time they help in getting the user to understand your blog better thereby establishing a certain amount of credibility which helps in closing a sale.
Can you please share some examples of good money page designs?
.-= CNA training´s last blog ..Finding the right CNA Training Programs =-.
Have a look at mine: http://www.smartbloggerz.com/product-review/
Though they are not fully completed in terms of designs but this could help you understand how to create a good money page.
Hey, you say that good money page design don’t have borders and comments, but yours have. Do you still have good conversions?
.-= Lana Galileo´s last blog ..SEO tips and mistakes you need to avoid =-.
?? Don’t look at http://www.smartbloggerz.com/product-review/ go to the pages which are linked to it on that page..Those are the money pages. Those pages don’t have sidebar but have a comment form since I wanted and they are providing me good amount of affiliates sales.
WordPress 2.9.1 and later has the ability to create custom layout based on your blog category, so you can actually remove your sidebars, comment area’ and everything for categories you designate as “money” for example. With wordpress you can make your “money” pages/posts look like flat html pages so they don’t give readers any distractions. The only problem is you need to know a bit of php to implement this, or have a friend who can set it up for you. (Maybe some blog themes will be created and available that already implement these type of features).
.-= Dragon Blogger´s last blog ..Removed Captcha Plugin For WordPress =-.
Or the other workaround you can do is create a new php file with no sidebars and other distractions. Then you can choose it as template on your selected pages. Here’s a hack I am using: http://wordpress.org/support/topic/314019
This is a great post. I would like to see an example of a money page and also hear a little bit more on how to get people to go look at them. It sounds like a wonderful idea to me. I do not like the cluttered up blogs with all the sidebars etc. It is too hard to find the content
.-= Marg´s last blog ..Book giveaway, Buckley’s Story =-.
Have a look at my money review pages: http://www.smartbloggerz.com/product-review/
Nice tips, I agree with you on cleaning sidebars and unnecessary stuff that disturb the visitor’s eyes, and this way will work to enhance earnings on blogs that has a small amount of traffic.
.-= Hesham @ FamousBloggers´s last blog ..I have a Blog, What should I do Next? =-.
That sounds so much more logical. Also I read this ‘no leakage policy @ Income Diary that there should be no link leading outside your site expect a affiliate link.
.-= King Sidharth´s last blog ..A How-to on Hardcore Motivation =-.
Yep, this would help to remove any distraction which could cause the person to move over that link instead of your affiliate link..
One other advantage it gives that you will have no outgoing links and hence the page will appear better on search results as it will have better value i.e it will help in seo.
I am interested in reading of someone’s personal experience regarding their money page. For my blog and website, removing the sidebars footers, etc would make the money pages appear out of place and incomplete.
Money pages should be created as “pages” not as a “post”…And “pages” really don’t have much attention from your regular readers and it won’t look bad..Have a look at some of my review pages: http://www.smartbloggerz.com/product-review/
But as a blogger first we have choose what products we will sell on the money page and there after we will have to design the money page. But we have to fully onpage optimized the money page.
.-= chandan@work at home jobs´s last blog ..Advice and tips on work at home =-.
Hmm, I don’t know if I agree with the idea of having your money pages without a comments sections. Comments, believe it or not, can give you a great deal of credibility. If the product on the money page that you are selling is good, you will get positive comments; if its bad you can always delete them and there is nothing unethical about that. Good post, thanks for the tips.
.-= Blogger man´s last blog ..Submitting your blog to directories =-.