Putting shopping ads on personal blogs is all the rage lately in blog monetization. Critics of the tried and tested advertising programs like Google Adsense claim these new ads better performing and more effective. Personally I don’t see the draw of placing shopping ads on a blog that doesn’t sell products.
Sites like ShoppingAds, WidgetBucks, and TTZ Media all promise cash for clicks on their shopping advertisements.
I have a few problems with all of these programs:
- the advertisements that convert well are generally quite bulky
- the advertising is impossible to target to my niche (working at home)
- i don’t think advertisers will see great returns from generally untargetted traffic
Before you jump all over me, I’m not saying these programs are terrible, they’re only terrible if you write a blog about making money online. If your site is about the latest news and products coming out in the digital camera industry, you’ll see great success. Any product based site will likely see better results with this than something like Adsense. If you disagree with me and still think that the shopping ads are the way to go on your non-product site, then consider going with the Amazon Affiliate Program.
CPM aside, you’ll be getting 4-10% commission on the items sold through your links. Its up to you to get a strong CTR but imagine earning $25.00 from a click instead of 0.25 cents!
If you use Wordpress, here’s some handy plugins to help you make more money through the Amazon program:
TicTap Contextual Advertising
TicTap Contextual Ads
The TicTap contextual advertising plug-in for Wordpress blogs allows you to easily add contextual ads promoting Amazon products to your blog. You simply need to download and install the plug-in and then add some code to your blog where you want the ads to appear. You will then be able to set the Amazon ID’s and configure some aspects. Keep in mind you don’t need Wordpress to use their services. A simple block of code can be placed on any HTML page to participate.
Amazon Media Manager
Amazon Media Manager 1.5
The Amazon media manager allows you to add specific Amazon products to your Wordpress blog. It is a very configurable tool and is easily customized for your blog. It will keep a list of the products you have chosen so that you can easily decide which products you want to display and how you’d like to display them.
WP Amazon Context Link Ads
WP-Amazon
This is another contextual advertising plug-in for Amazon products that allows you to quickly look up and add amazon products to your posts.
All three of these options are great alternatives to the PPC offerings out there in the shopping ad niche. If you’re already using shopping ads, try blending in some Amazon affiliate links. You might be surprised with the resuts! 
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bloggernoob responded on 27 Nov 2007 at 6:53 am #
not a fan of shopping, widget, or ttz. slows down the load time and it doesn’t perform. ttz looks very unprofessional. i guess cause its a by johnchow. not a giant internet company. But it looks like one guy made it. Well shoemoney was able to make auctionads look better. I don’t like google adsense much either. I think the best way to monetize is affiliate links. take more work and you need to find a way to get it to work, but better payoff. adsense or adbrite only bring in a few dollars on make money blogs.
WhyDoWork responded on 27 Nov 2007 at 6:58 am #
I agree that affiliate links are a great way to monetize. Private ad sales (like 125×125 buttons) are also a great way to earn some money from your blog and keep all the profit.
KatieaMosher22 responded on 27 Nov 2007 at 9:30 am #
what are the best ads then for a blog about making money online?
Terry Didcott responded on 27 Nov 2007 at 12:38 pm #
I also agree that affiliate links are the best money makers, but if there’s room for a variety of different flavours, then I’m all for test driving new stuff for a while on my blogs to see how they perform.
I’ve always found Amazon quite a poor performer - maybe it’s just me or my placement. WidgetBucks is very slow to load and a real pain, although I have made a few dollars from it, but I won’t be putting my name down for that new Mercedes just yet!
I’m currently trying Bidvertiser for PPC. It’s a lot of work but you have the one advantage over adsense that makes all the difference in my mind - the ability to open the clicks in a new tab/window so you don’t lose the visitor on your site. You can also configure which ads you want to see and which you don’t so you can target the higher paying ads only. But I think a lot of people are put off because that side of things is really time consuming and fiddly - just right for me then!
Terry
sue responded on 28 Nov 2007 at 3:46 pm #
Sales and Marketing Productivity by Chet Holmes
Two furniture stores open up in a town on nearly the same day. One is totally tactical and the other is very strategic. If you go in to look at couches in store one the salesperson tries to sell you a couch. Tactical. Over a four-year period, this store grows at about ten percent per year, mostly driven by the increasing costs of furniture.
In store two, of course they try to sell you a couch, but the management constantly trains the salespeople to sell the store. “First time in our store? Well, let me tell you about it.” And while the salesperson is on their way to the couches, they pitch the heck out of that store. They tell you about the history, the owner’s devotion to service, why they have lower prices than their competitors, how well trained they are on furniture construction and how that benefits you as the consumer.
The purpose of this buyer education is to create brand loyalty. Over time, this store builds a large and loyal following of customers who automatically come to them first when they are interested in any type of furniture. When you shop for furniture, you probably go to various stores with little or no brand loyalty. Or you may see a sale in the newspaper and go because of the sale. But if you had a relationship with a store that stood behind their product like no other and could thoroughly explain the differences in furniture quality (and there’s quite a bit to know) and even offered expertise in decorating, you might have an affinity, a loyalty, a preference for that particular store. When you needed furniture, you would go there first because of the relationship that they purposefully built with you. Over a four-year period the tactical store remained a one-store location and the strategic store opened six locations.
People will even pay more if they perceive there is a greater value or a deeper reason for buying from one provider over another. I cannot tell you how many times I’ve helped companies step up out of the commoditizing world in which they live by being more strategic. In a moment I’ll have you do an exercise that will really pound this idea home. Let’s do a little more set up so you get as much as possible out of the exercise to follow.
Here’s a question I want you to answer: When your buyer looks to purchase your type of product or service how much of an expert are they? When I ask this question in front of a large audience, everyone pretty much admits that in any given purchasing situation, the average buyer is not much of an expert. For example you are probably not much of an expert at all about carpet cleaning, are you? If most of your buyers are not experts at what to look for in your product or service, this opens a gaping strategic opportunity for the brilliant strategist to capitalize on.
I call this the science of setting the market’s buying criteria. Basically it means that every
buyer can be taught how to be a better buyer of your type of product or service. Using the
carpet cleaning example, the buyer calls in with loose or little buying criteria at all. The
salesperson then resets that buying criteria by educating that consumer about the EPA
studies on the importance of clean carpets to the quality of the air and life in your home.
You can do this for your company with profound results.
Chet Holmes has worked with over 60 of the Fortune 500 companies as America’s top marketing executive, trainer, and strategic consultant. Chet is the author of the best selling book, The Ultimate Sales Machine (#1 business book on Amazon, #1 Sales and Marketing book on Amazon, and also on NY Times best seller list). Chet has identified and developed the 12 core competencies that are proven to provide the main structure of truly great companies and he has developed more than fifty proprietary methods to implement them. To learn more about how to double the sales of your company, go to http://www.howtodoublesales.com