Today I wanted to share a method of affiliate marketing that I applied to my own portfolio of sites right before taking on the job with Dating Gold. Essentially it boils down to creating “user review” esque blogs based on your experience with a product. Is it a new idea? Not at all. Is it saturated? Depending on who you talk to, just about any affiliate method is “saturated” but I’ll tell you this… it’s effective; both in earning money and climbing the SERPs. I will try and break this method down to every little detail so that you can get a clear picture of how I worked this angle and how it was effective for me.

Firstly, our “review blog” is going to be focused on dating, written by me in the first person. You need to grab a domain. Let’s say the domain is “HowJayGotLaid.com” or “MyExperienceWithAmateurMatch.com” or some variation of those… after all, we’re going after the dating market. From there, you then need to create a wordpress blog and implement a simple theme that you feel comfortable customizing. You’ll want to thrown in some useful plugins like the all in one seo pack (among others if you choose to do so). Now it’s time to start writing content.

I would suggest you start with an “about me” page and do a write up to allow your visitors to really feel like they know you, the writer. You can work this a few different ways. I would do stories of how “I” had a hard time overcoming shyness and therefore decided to give online dating a chance and (of course) it was (as Borat would say) “great success!” – It’s important to come off as a “work in progress” story and to mention that “I use this blog to document my success one date at a time – as a kind of personal dating diary” and “now I wanted to share my story with the world.”

From here, you can begin with the actual posts. I think its common sense to keep your affiliate links as discreet as possible. We’re writing this as though we’re writing in a personal diary, not spamming the hell out everyone. Some common blog topics and points of interests to help fill content:

-Clearly identifying your problem. “I was a shy guy, not bad looking; I just didn’t have any game. One day I decided to change that by cleaning up my act and seeing what online dating had to offer.” Tell some stories about how you shyly failed at meeting girls before this, in the real world.

-How you came to joining Amateur Match or whatever site you decide to promote. “I googled a ton of different dating sites but I finally decided on joining xxxxxxx dating site because they have such and such features and they cater to adult dating and that’s something I might want to satisfy my needs, etc.”

-Justifying paying for a dating membership in the first place. “I would spend my weekends buying videogames and playing those and I finally realized that for the same price of a videogame (if not less) I could at least be searching for girls in my area and allowing them to notice me!”

-How chatting online helped improve communication skills talking to women in real life. “I was always so shy but I gained confidence chatting to women online from the comfort of my own home… I noticed that confidence stuck with me as I interacted with women in my everyday life. This one day at Starbucks I found myself staring at the pretty barista right in her eyes and smiling proudly instead of paying and quickly getting out of there without ever making eye contact.”

-Benefits of being able to chat to more than one girl at a time. “The great thing about being a member on this site is that I can talk to as many girls as I want and see who I click with the best. In the real world this is almost impossible!”

-Throw in a few stories about the funny messages you got from gay men trying to hit on you and how you laughed it off and politely denied them. Once again, we’re trying to make this as real as possible and not go for the direct sale. Going slightly off topic and including things like “well today I didn’t have any time to work on my game – my job at xxxx was just waaayyy too exhausting! I came home and went right to bed!” is good too. Or “Today Josh and I were playing basketball and he mentioned how annoying his girlfriend is, I hope I don’t end up that unhappy when I find one lol!”

-Give out advice on how you personally made your profile as appealing as possible. “I decided to not upload any of the drunken party pics of me and my buddies in college and instead went for a more subtle approach. I think it was a good choice so far. Afterall, at the end of the day, I’m looking for a girl I can bring home to mom, not just a one night stand!”

-Some of the dates I went on – “I decided to take Veronica to this little known coffee shop after she mentioned how much she loves a good cup of Joe…” and take it from there. Tell funny date stories, how hard you had to think about what to wear, what cologne you put on, how you had to clean your car beforehand to make sure it looked good etc.

-After meeting the girl. – “Well Vernoica and I have went out on two dates so far…” and “here’s my next date idea ________ what do you guys think??”

-Adding in the occasional fake comments to a question like the one above seems to help. Once again, just don’t make it totally obvious.

-Add in dating tips for other guys in the same boat as you. Tips and tricks you learned along the way and now you’re passing along to everyone. “I should have filled the gas tank up yesterday because I was five minutes late picking up Veronica! There was nothing I could do, it was either stop and get gas before picking her up or running it to empty later on in the night! Guys, don’t make the same mistake I did, she was pissed lol. But I made up for it by taking her to a movie she ended up loving!”

Ok, ok, you get the idea by now (hopefully).

With those topics above you could easily fill a blog with 20-30 posts over a period of time, if not more.

I would advise against placing banner ads on your blog. I would suggest sticking with only text links (but feel free to do it both ways to see how your traffic reacts to it). Sometimes people will come to your site and read every single word you post, other times they are lazy and might only click on the flashy dating banner that caught their eye. Like I said, do a test and see how the clicks fluctuate.

The great thing about this method of sending traffic is that you can apply it to almost anything. Weight loss (just think of the stories you could tell with some before and after pictures), restaurant reviews (once again stories of restaurants you visit), clothing, etc. The possibilities are endless… both in adult and mainstream. I applied this method to a gambling themed blog once along with dating. It was based on “my adventures at the horse track” and stories of gains/losses that day and which horses I bet on and why I bet on them in the first place at various tracks throughout the country. At the time google allowed adsense on it (not sure if they still do) and I made a killing on that along with promoting gambling affiliate programs.

I was told by a friend of mine that this method is even better from the perspective of a female. This is something I have not dabbled in yet, but I can imagine that if you can come across as a legit female you may see conversions double. If I were to do this I would write it as a female who just moved to a new city for a new job, she works all the time so she doesn’t have free-time to find men on her own. Therefore, she joins xxxxxxx dating site and writes stories of the men she’s met and the dates she’s been on. Who wouldn’t want a female perspective of the dating scene and the in’s and out’s of what a women wants? You could keep it as mainstream or as steamy as you wanted from that angle.

The only downside to doing all of this is that you cannot half-ass it. This is a blog you may not outsource to a writer. Your writing needs to flow and sound as real as possible. It also won’t get picked up in google right away, either. However, if you stick with it, put in the writing effort, you will see the results in due time. I’d say an average post will take 20-30 minutes and needs updated every three or four days. Granted, that’s not a long time, but if you find yourself faced with writer’s block, it may become frustrating.

The plus side is this is a great way for new affiliates to get their feet wet. Anyone that can write can do something like this. Google seems to love blogs, especially ones like this.

Hope these tips help!