David Fiske A subtle blend of affiliate marketing and web development

Articles About Website Purposes

07/10/08 - Doom And Gloom Or Good Prospects?

The credit crunch is synonymous with doom and gloom - food and energy price hikes, job cuts, loss of share value, loss of financial security....

For affiliates, it can be synonymous with a drop in traffic and a drop in revenue. Less money to spend overall equals more spent on essentials and less on luxuries.

I've already commented on how Christmas sales are likely to be poor (although Christmas in a manic time where a lot of cash is splashed) but there are some segments in the affiliate market that will thrive regardless of this downturn. More

10/03/08 - It's All Complimentary

Stuck for a website idea? Seen something on another site and thought 'I could do that'? The chances are that you could. But what would be the point? Okay, you could take some traffic away from your competitors but if they've been established for a few years, that's going to be tough. Plus, is it really going to make you as rich as you desire?

Instead of copying, why not try complimenting? More

12/11/07 - People Buy For 2 Reasons

People buy things to satisfy at least one of two things: wants and needs. It is important to understand this to develop your affiliate websites and to help understand your market. More

23/10/07 - Affiliate Website Ideas - Part 2

Time to look at another market for website ideas. Having just read that Mothercare has launched a social network site called Gurgle, I'm going to look into the topic of child birth. More

23/10/07 - Affiliate Website Ideas - Part 1

After yesterday's article, I've decided to take a look at some sectors and suggest what affiliates could do to develop an online presence that makes a profit.

Today, given the success of Gaming Alerts on Dragon's Den yesterday, I will take a peak at the gambling sector. More

22/10/07 - Stuck For Website Ideas?

It's natural not to know where to start when developing websites. At least for "real world" businesses like Tesco or Argos they know what their website will have on it - company information, product information and an ordering system. Even Domino's Pizza do online ordering now.

But as an enterprising affiliate, what do you set websites up about?

Here's a few tips. More

09/10/07 - You've Got Three Choices When It Comes To Affiliate Marketing

The way I see it, you have 3 choices when you want to pursue a career in affiliate marketing. One is quick but costly, the other two are cheap but time consuming. More

24/09/07 - Recipe For The Perfect Affiliate Marketer

It's nearly been a year since this blog was set up. I've nearly averaged 1 post per day - some good, some bad and some that don't fit into either of these!

So it's fair to say I've seen a lot happen over the past year. Plus, I've read a lot of posts from other marketers I class as "expert".

Therefore, I thought it would be apt to write a post about the perfect affiliate marketing business model. More

21/08/07 - So What Exactly Do You Do Mr Affiliate Marketer?

The idea for this article came to me last night whilst I was thinking about all the thing's I've got to do (very busy chap lately!)

Friends and family outside of affiliate marketing keep asking what exactly it is I do all day, "you know, apart from sitting around?!"

We can all roll off a definition of affiliate marketing (if you can't, what exactly is it that you do all day?!) but have you ever broken it down to gain a different perspective? More

08/08/07 - Do You Like A Big One?

Kirsty recently wrote an article about the effectiveness of different sizes of websites.

Here's my take on whether size matters. More

09/05/07 - Build A Profitable Website

Today's seminar is a reflection of the article How to Build an Affiliate Site You Can Sell for $1M by Andy.

It's probably a good idea to read the above article first to get the gist of what I'm explaining here. More

25/04/07 - Target Your Website

In past seminars, I have developed roadmaps for finding niches. They are all archived so if you have missed any of the older posts, you can find them there.

In a nutshell, I said find something you are passionate about and stick to that.

But I'd now like to extend that. More

18/04/07 - Glorious Hot Weather = Less Sales?

Perhaps it's just the market I'm in but the lovely hot weather we are experiencing seems to have had a negative effect on my sales across the board. More

17/04/07 - Two Heads Better Than One?

I've been reading a lot recently about affiliates who are joining forces and building sites together.

Is this the way forward? More

13/04/07 - I Feel Like a YoYo!

I'm not sure about you but sometimes I feel like a YoYo.

PPC, SEO, List Building, PPC, SEO, List Building... More

11/04/07 - Visitors, Customers and So Forth

A quick overview of visitors, customers and so forth. More

28/03/07 - Re: What would you do if the bottom fell out of your niche?

Keith Bond wrote an article about the effects of a niche 'bottoming out'.

The upshot was don't stick all your eggs in one basket.

But there's more of a tale here! More

21/03/07 - Cashback Sites The New Black (Or Silver or....)

Anyone know what's the new black? A few years ago silver and lilac were the new black. Perhaps black has regained control?!

Anyhow, a thread on the A4U Forum has prompted this seminar. More

16/03/07 - Becoming Authoritative

Becoming authoritative is more difficult than you could imagine!

Which area to focus on, how to get visitors there and how to make sales are all valid questions. More

02/03/07 - Developing Feasible Ideas

I have explained how to determine what a profitable idea is.

I would like to offer some more advice on learning from the pros. More

02/03/07 - Too Many Ideas - Deciding The Most Profitable Ones

As an affiliate marketer, I have times when I cannot come up with fresh ideas. New websites that I haven't seen on the net. That's not to say they don't exist, it's just they aren't marketed well if they do exist!

So what criteria should you be concentrating on to ensure a profitable site is created? More

20/02/07 - DVD Rental

Apologies for no posts yesterday. I've been busy making my voice heard about St David's day and road pricing.

I spent the majority of yesterday constructing an online DVD rental website. More

15/02/07 - Dragon's Den

Everyone else is talking about it so here's my take.

The Lings Cars pitch intrigued me. The site does too.



At first glance, it is the most ugliest site in the world. It is messy and disjointed. However, when you look deeper, you notice a few things we can all learn from. More

12/02/07 - The Newbie Affiliate Syndrome

I'm not new to affiliate marketing but I am new to creating a living from it. £50 a year from friends and family helps but it covers a week's shopping, and not a Christmas shop at that!

Having posted over 200 messages onto A4U Forum, I appear not to be alone in this. A lot of people find it easy to make a couple of quid but when it comes to making a consistent liveable amount, they struggle.

There are several effects of the Newbie Affiliate Syndrome (I've just created a syndrome. Yippee. I've got the same feeling I suppose scientists have when they discover a disease!). Here they are... More

09/02/07 - Getting Started As An Affiliate

Kieron Donoghue of UK Offer has posted a blog article worthy of your attention.

He explains the Do's and Don'ts of becoming an affiliate. I seem to have done the Don'ts so maybe it's time for the Do's! More

07/02/07 - Do Blog Based Affiliate Websites Make More Money?

There is an undeniable trend towards blogs. Everyone used to 'have to have a blog'. Now everyone 'must have a blog'.

So can affiliates jump on the blog bandwagon and profit from it? More

07/02/07 - Another Niche Site

In a drive to have a portfolio of niche websites, I have spent 2 hours getting Gifts of Crystal up and running.

It is crafted around Price Tapestry and Nucleus CMS.

It centres around Swarovski crystal products. More

29/01/07 - Another Shopping Site

I have 'launched' Smart and Green, a Shopping Portal.

Whereas Compare Sat Nav is a price comparison site, Smart and Green is more of a virtual catalogue.

So why did I bother and how much will this benefit me? More

29/01/07 - Another Week...

Refreshed after a weekend break, I am getting a move on.

The David Fiske project was designed to prove whether there is room on the Internet to make money through affiliate schemes.

The answer so far is there certainly is scope but it takes a very long time to crack the code. More

27/01/07 - 3 Sales in 2 Days

Okay, nothing really to shout about but it is better than no sales!

The total amount of sales is now 11, and has bumped the conversion rate up to 0.35% (today) from the average of 0.20%.

In other news, I am currently working on a massive shopping portal using data feeds for anyone and everyone.

The potential of this is huge as each product has it's own SEO'ed .html page, with an SEO'ed URL. More

21/01/07 - A Change In Tactics

Computer Chooser is up and running and as of next week, will benefit from at least one day a week of full devotion.

It has also managed to get into Google in less than 3 days which is good going!

I have added Google AdSense to Computer Chooser and the advertisements that appear s far are promising.

I have had around a third of the total number of advertisers come back and A-OK the site but I need the other two thirds to come back soon. As with most sites I build, I am using Tradedoubler as the main affiliate source. More

19/01/07 - Computer Chooser Launched

The first of my two new sites (Computer Chooser) is now available at http://www.computerchooser.co.uk

As promised, I will now reveal what I have in mind for it and why I chose to built a site about computers. More

12/01/07 - New Themes

I have decided upon what it is I am going to devote several months of my life to full time.

I will have three sites in my empire:

• Compare Sat Nav
• A property related site
• A computer related site

I am aware that these markets are huge so I will be focussing in on small niches.

So why have I chosen these areas and what benefits can I deliver? More

11/01/07 - A More Definitive Explanation

Let's stop and regroup.

I have 24 hours left on my Wordtracker account and have to come up with either one or several good niches to tackle.

I have come up with some ideas but they are proving to be over populated areas, or in all fairness, not strict niches. More

10/01/07 - Perhaps a Little Overambitious

Perhaps I have bitten off more than I can chew!

The diet website idea is no more. After doing some keyword research, the KEI values that Wordtracker retrieves are all less than 1 (i.e. don't touch these with a barge pole).

I suppose I shouldn't be too disappointed! But it does mean I have to go back to the drawing board. More

10/01/07 - Entering the Property Market

I have decided upon the second and third site to be added to my humble empire.

The choices go against my own advice of choosing niches but hopefully I can pull this off.

Price comparison works for CSN but it requires a manual update every Monday. It is imperative that this update is made otherwise my prices start falling out of sync with the real world.

So the two new sites will primarily consist of static content. More

09/01/07 - More Writing About Passions

Okay, so during the last lecture, I briefly explained that if you want to make money on the net, you need to write about a passion.

I already have a consumer electronics site (namely Compare Sat Nav) and so am looking to diversify and create a portfolio of affiliate based sites.

The first question has to be "how many sites are we looking for"? More

09/01/07 - Write About a Passion

There is no doubt about it, to be seen in the search engines, you need a lot of well ordered, well titled, keyword optimised pages with well written content.

At the moment, I am playing a sitting game waiting for Google's indexes to be updated with my html page names instead of the old "?q=..." blurb.

There are tasks I can carry on with. I can research even more keywords. I can add more static content. I can add pretty pictures. I can exchange links.

But with my new ambition of having a portfolio of David Fiske sites (an empire if you will), I need to come up with some lucrative ideas for other sites. More

08/01/07 - Popular Affiliate Niches

In deciding what else I can invest my time in, I suppose it would be worth looking at what other affiliates are doing with their time.

Using Lee McCoy's website as a starting base, I will take you on a magical mystery tour of sample websites and determine which markets are therefore probably best to leave along (at least in their raw form - niches should be OK). More

06/01/07 - Can I Make a Living Here?

I suppose I should have asked this a long time ago but did I didn't!

Is it feasible to assume with a lot of work, Compare Sat Nav and any other affiliate sites I set up can earn me a reasonable income?

I understand that it takes a lot of work but given that, is the idea feasible?

I posted this to the A4U Forum and here are some of the responses I received: More

05/01/07 - The Website Child Theory

I want to share one of my theories with you. It is a theory that states that all websites are like our own children.

We conceive an idea about our website. It may start with “wouldn’t it just be easier if…” or “I’ve thought of a niche idea…”. However it starts, it is an idea that is conceived.

You set around creating your site. You bolt bits on, you may integrate API’s or embed external content. After careful manipulation, you end up your baby – a fully functional website.

Here is where people fail. More

21/12/06 - Understanding Your Limits

Important lesson in internet marketing. Well, not so much marketing but more so working for yourself.

If you are working by yourself to get something decent earning you an income, you have to remember how precious your time is.

The reason I say this is that sometimes you have to remember to not go over the top when creating your site.

I had an email from Play.com saying their January sale has started today (21st December 2006). More

21/12/06 - Researching Niches

I have covered researching niches in some detail in the early lectures.

However, I wanted to let you know of a free email service that suggests topics to you - every day!

I have been registered with them for about 2 months and they do have some good suggestions. More

30/11/06 - My Niche

I have talked about how to find a niche and ensure it is profitable.

Now it is time to find mine.

The aim of the demonstration site is to be a profitable site. I want you to use it as a test site - to explore it and see the tactics I have used. I want the general public to use it as a shopping site. I want them to choose me over anyone else. More

29/11/06 - School Starts Now!

OK, here we go. This is where the learning starts.

Before we can do anything creative (or fun), we have to find an opportunity.

Opportunities exist everywhere and anywhere. They can be small opportunities or huge ones.

In terms of this project, we are looking for a niche. More