Alright, back to the grind. We have our niche and keywords chosen, domain and hosting purchased, and Wordpress is installed and ready to rock. Now – we need our plugins.

Plugins are one of the main reasons I build almost all of my affiliate sites with Wordpress. They make life much easier, and in some cases allow me to fluff out otherwise thin sites with images, video, and even auction listings much more quickly than if I had to add these elements in by hand. Over the months, I settled on a group of plugins that are included in my default install Wordpress package. Here’s the breakdown…

Flexi Pages
This little gem makes adding lists of Wordpress pages to my menus quick and painless. This is a big help when using Wordpress as a CMS for a static site instead of a blog because you tend to end up with a ton of pages.

Google XML Sitemap Generator
Just like the name would have you believe, this baby cranks out a Google XML sitemap and updates it as you update your site.

Search Pages
Again, since I’m making pages instead of posts, I need my search feature to scan my Wordpress pages instead of just posts.

Sociable
Super easy social bookmarking.

Google Analytics for Wordpress
Any “white” site I make has Google Analytics installed, but tagging outgoing links is a giant pain. Luckily, this will do it for me.

RSS Footer
Any hand updated blog should have this installed. It allows you to add a piece of text at the start or end of each post in your feed. Perfect for adding in a “This post is from..” line with a link to your blog. There’s no chance of you completely stopping scrapers from grabbing your content, but the amateur ones won’t take the time to wash the links out of them. So, you might as well use them for some backlinks.

Permalink Redirect
Duplicate content is a nightmare. It is by far one of the top problems we see when taking on clients. Sadly, Wordpress and other blog systems are notorious for creating mass amounts of duplicate content. This helps eliminate that headache.

Crawl Tracker
Keep an eye on how much you’re getting crawled. For large sites, this factor is incredibly important. If you’re not getting deep crawled, you’re going to have chunks of your site totally missing from the index. If your crawl rate is too low, you’re in some serious need of new links. As a side note, when using Wordpress for a static site where you write new pages instead of posts, there’s a really easy way to trick Google into crawling the hell out of your site without having anything look strange to your visitors. I won’t write the whole process out unless enough people request it, but let’s just say you’ll figure it out if you think about where blog posts are displayed when Wordpress is used for a static site.

Well, now that my link dropping and apparent love for Yoast’s work is over and done with, why don’t you go ahead and download each of those and get them loaded up into your Wordpress installation.

(Our last plugin that we’ll be using for this project is phpBay. However, that deserves a post of its own.)

Now, each of these plugins have their own installation instructions, which you can get by clicking the link for each. However, the usual process is as simple as unzipping the plugins and ftp’ing them into the /wp-content/plugins/ folder. Just make sure you go to the plugins section of Wordpress and activate each one.

Next time we’ll look at phpBay and how we’ll use it on our sites.

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After a week of vacation, and then a second week spent frantically catching up on the backlog of emails and work that poured in while I was away, we’re back on track and ready for part three of our series. As a recap, in Part 1 we covered brainstorming a topic, as well as potential monetization methods. In Part 2, we covered finding and buying a domain name, as well as keyword research.

In Part 3, we’re ready to cover installing Wordpress as the CMS for our affiliate site. This may be a step a lot of you can skip, as Wordpress is really simple and once you install it once, you should be able to install it again without any issues in just a few minutes. For those of you who had never used it before, read on.

What we need to do is set up a MySQL database and user for Wordpress. Many hosts now offer cPanel, which makes this task a breeze.

Just click on the MySQL Databases link…

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We want to…
1) Add a new database (write the name of this down somewhere)
2) Add a new user and password (write this down as well)
3) Add the user to the database with all privileges

Simple enough, right?

Now, since we’re going to be using Wordpress, head on over to Wordpress.org and download yourself the latest version. (Make sure you keep up to date on these, new security updates are added pretty often as exploits are found. And, you know… blackhats looking for quick link injection opportunities. Which I’d know noting about. For the record. Ahem)

So, you’ve downloaded Wordpress and have it saved on your hard drive. Now we need to do a bit of editing. Don’t worry – they have made this as simple as possible. All we want to do is look for the file named “wp-config-sample.php” and open it up in Notepad (or whatever your editor of choice happens to be.) Right up at the top we see…

Now, all you need to do is put in your database name, user name, and password. These are the items you just made a few minutes ago. Aren’t you glad I made you write them down? Insert those into the fields labeled ‘putyourdbnamehere’, ‘usernamehere’ and ‘yourpasswordhere’. Like the note mentions, chances are localhost will be fine. If you run into trouble with this, contact your host and they should have an answer for you quickly. If not – it’s time to look for a new host. Now, after we put the three new items in, we want to save the file as “wp-config.php” and get rid of that “sample” that was on the end.

That’s it – you’ve just done all the editing needed. Now, we need to upload Wordpress to our host. You’ll need an ftp program for this. Personally, I use FileZilla since it’s free, easy to use, and available for windows and linux so I don’t have to get used to two different interfaces when I switch from my laptop to my desktops. In 8 years, I’ve yet to find a feature in any of the non-free FTP programs that I’ve needed. Don’t buy one. Seriously. As for your ftp information, it should have been provided by your host. You will normally connect to ftp.yourdomain.com with the username and password you received when you purchased your hosting account.

After you’ve uploaded all the files, you’ll want to go to: http://yourdomain.com/wp-admin/install.php and click to install Wordpres.

Fill in your blog title, and email and then hit install. Write down that username and password combo – you’ll need it to log into Wordpress. Don’t worry – you can always change it later on. Congratulations, your site is set up, and ready to be tweaked, filled with content, and monetized.

In Part 4, we will cover uploading new plugins and themes to Wordpress so that you don’t have to keep the standard template. I’ll also share a pack of the free seo plugins I use with every installation of Wordpress, plus recommendations on a premium plugin or two.

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In my last post, “Launching a Simple Affiliate Site – Part 1” we covered selecting a topic, as well as making sure we had multiple ways to potentially monetize the site. This week, we’re going to cover keyword research, buying a domain, and getting hosting.

There are plenty of premium keyword research tools out there that come with a monthly fee. However, one of the goals with this guide is to keep costs as low as possible. With that in mind, my first stop for keyword research was the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. In the text field for “descriptive word or phrases” I enter a few of my base keywords. Since the site topic is “Philadelphia Eagles Jerseys”, my initial keywords are: Philadelphia Eagles jerseys, Eagles jersey, Eagles jerseys. I also added in the phrase “New Jersey” in the filter options to keep out a million New Jersey keywords.

Once the results are returned, at the bottom of the list there is a link to export the result to .csv for Excel. Now that I have my keywords in excel, I sort by average search volume, then weed through the list by hand and remove any keywords that wouldn’t make sense in my site. In this example, I got some keywords like “nba jerseys” and “hockey jerseys”. After trimming my list down, I’m left with 25 or so keywords. These will serve as the focus for the pages of my site. Any of the more generic keywords like “authentic jerseys” will be modified to fit my site topic. So, “authentic jerseys” becomes “Eagles authentic jerseys”. Once I get my keywords more targeted to my topic, I break them down into relevant groups. This step is really similar to what you would want to do if you were creating a PPC campaign. The keywords get broken down into tight, relevant groups. I already have my keywords sorted by search volume, so it’s easy to identify what the most important words in each group are. The groups ended up breaking down into the following areas: General, Authentic, Cheap, Custom, Replica, Throwback, Kids, and Players. These will serve as the main categories for my site, with the general keywords being the used on the home page.

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By this point I have both my topic, and a list of keywords to target broken down into relevant groups – now it’s time to find a domain name. Glancing over this list, the phrase “Eagles jerseys” appears an awful lot, and for good reason – it’s the main focus of the site. So, let’s see if EaglesJerseys.com is available…

Well, EaglesJerseys.com is taken already, and is currently the home of a junk parked page, complete with a pop up. However - EaglesJerseys.org is available for $10. At this point, I can do a few things. I can either email the owner of eaglesjerseys.com and make an offer on the domain, I can pick up one of the other TLD’s for a very minimal cost, or I can continue my hunt for a better .com name.

In this case, I’m going to go with the .org. I think I can safely assume the current owner is going to be asking way more than the domain is worth, especially for our purposes. My main goal for the site will be to get it to rank for the base keywords “Eagles jerseys” and “Philadelphia Eagles jerseys” - so EaglesJerseys.org will work just fine. Using the coupon code OYH1, I get 10% off my GoDaddy purchase, and we have ourselves a domain name. Now, it’s time to shop for hosting.

Because we’re really only looking to make a simple affiliate site, a small shared hosting package should suite our purpose. No need to go and drop $200 a month on a dedicated box to serve up 25 pages and some banners. For budget hosting, I have had good experiences with CyberWurx.com and SuperbHosting.net. Both can have you up and running for less than $7 a month. The Superb Hosting blog plan is $42 for a year, and comes with a $25 credit for Yahoo’s PPC program. Either of these two hosts will provide us with everything we need to get a Wordpress site up and running, without any issue at all. As a side note, when shopping for a host keep in mind there is no such thing as “unlimited bandwidth”. I’d be cautious with any hosts who promise this. They’re going to cap you at some point – try not to buy the sizzle. As I mentioned, I can personally recommend either of the two hosts I mentioned, but feel free to try out any on your own.

Once you pick your host and purchase your plan, we’re finished with phase two. At this point we have our topic, a list of potential monetization methods, our keyword list, a domain, and a hosting account. Next week we’ll cover installing Wordpress, setting up our plugins, and adding pages to our site.

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Over the coming weeks, I’m going to provide a step by step guide for launching a fairly simple affiliate site from start to finish. We’ll cover brainstorming ideas, keyword research, picking a domain, monetization methods, hosting, Wordpress as a CMS, Wordpress plugins, on-site SEO, and promotion. Let’s get started…

The first step for developing any website is picking a topic or theme. Building a site about something you enjoy isn’t absolutely necessary, but it will go a long way towards helping you stay motivated throughout construction and promotion. For my example site, I’m starting with the broad topic of football. Personally, I can’t wait for football season to start back up.. I promise, it has nothing to do with the beating I’m taking in the office fantasy baseball league. However, we have one small problem, “football” is way too broad of a topic – so we’ll need to get more specific.

There are a lot of ways we can go at this point. We could cover any of the following:

• The history of football


• Rules of the game


• NFL teams/players


• College teams/players


• NFL draft


• History of the Super Bowl (Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, etc)


• Greatest moments in pro/college football

etc, etc, etc

Essentially, anything related to football can be turned into a website. However, which topic is going to most easily lend itself to a monetization plan? With our football example, online ticket sales and memorabilia are where the money is flowing. (By memorabilia I’m referring to everything from shirts, hoodies, jerseys, hats, blankets, collectibles, etc) Since this is meant to be an introduction series, we’re going to chose a fairly specific topic: Philadelphia Eagles Jerseys.

So, before we launch into keyword research and buying a domain, let’s make sure we have an idea of how we’ll actually make money from our jerseys site. For a site like this, we can use any or all of the following…

• NFLShop.com’s affiliate program (CJ)


• Dick’s Sporting Goods affiliate program (CJ)


• Champs Sports affiliate program (CJ)


• eBay affiliate program (Internal)

If we want to branch out a bit more…

• Adsense


• Lids.com affiliate program (CJ)


• GrillsDirect.com and iGourmet.com affiliate programs (perfect for tailgating or game parties) (PJN)

If you’re up for it, any online sportsbook with an affiliate program would work. You’ll have an audience that likes the Eagles enough to search for a jersey to buy, so they may very well be interested in betting on some games. The payouts for gambling sites are also pretty impressive, BetUS.com pays out 50% of all revenue earned from the people you refer. A few die hard Eagles fans betting during the playoffs is sadly a very good way to make money.

Overall, I’d say 9 separate options means it’s a pretty safe bet that we won’t be short on ways to monetize our traffic. So, we officially have our topic – the next installment will cover keyword research, purchasing a domain name, and getting our hosting in order.

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The bald author of this post is Ian Howells, Director of Search-Engine Optimization for Pepperjam.  Ian has been with Pepperjam for 1 1/2 years and most recently assisted Pepperjam’s CEO Kris Jones in writing “Search-Engine Optimization: Your Visual Blueprint to Effective Internet Marketing.” Aside from Search-Engine Optimization, Ian has been involved in internet marketing since 2002.

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