Also, I’d like to point out that what is considered very successful in affiliate sites, like 30K/month, is not that much when compared to what is considered very successful eCommerce businesses.
It doesn’t really depend on the site, it never will, it depends on the one who runs the site, “you can do anything you set your mind up to…” and if you set your mind up to it, you will, sooner or later, reach your goal, to make money from a certain site needs alot of knowledge, experience and most of all intelligence, you can’t make money from a site over night, it needs alot of hardwork and especially time, don’t dream too much for I do not believe in dreams, I believe in goals that MUST be achieved sooner or later, wether anyone likes it or not, that’s just my way of living, and I love it, if you want to achieve something so much without working really hard on it, it’ll forever remain a dream, so, as I said, it doesn’t depend on the site rather than on the owner/runner of the site… that’s just my 2 cents…
Magic2k2,
If you are looking for money, you need to find yourself a good job.
Creating a website is not going to make you money over night.
YOU HAVE TO LIKE WHAT YOU DO. Maintaing a website is like having
a part time job. You have to add new pages, add new contents,
fix bugs, response to people comments, etc. It’s a lot of works, the
bottom line is you have to enjoy what you do.
Hope this helps.
Johansson has hit the nail on the head. ECommerce sites will usually outdo advertising sites, for the simple fact that you are the final person to extract money from your members. You won’t have to share this revenue with anybody else, unless you’re spending ad dollars.
Think about this for a minute. Where do you think all of your ad dollars come from? More ad sites? I dont’ think so. Every dollar that you make came out of someone’s pocket, whether it be a consumer or business. Without something to sell, advertising dies. It’s that simple.
I’ve done both. All I can say is, I hate having my business depend on some ad broker. If they decide to change the payout rate, I’m screwed. If they go belly up I’m screwed. If they can me, I’m screwed. Your success is basically dependent on someone else’s success, and that to me is not a good business to be in. I’ve seen my shares of ad brokers going under.
Look at Google. They’ve got it right. They are their OWN ad broker! No middleman to take a huge chunk from.
When you’re selling something though, nobody can take you down except yourself… well perhaps your billing processor, but usually that’s due to your own fault, and switching is easy.
Another misled poster who interpreted this as a newbie “HOW CAN U GET RICH QWIK!” post. It was far from that. I asked the most “efficient” type of business to make money online and that was lost on nearly everyone. I’ve been running websites on topics I love for 8 years, and only started thinking about making money from them in the last 2 or 3. I enjoy this very much, but I want to diversify into other areas where there is more money to be made. I have several websites that require maintenance. I don’t think I want more at this point. I’m launching affiliate stores that whaddya know, do make money over night! It’s not impossible. If you can get good SERPs, you can make money in your sleep from affiliate stores.
Clearly e-commerce sites have the potential for most income, but I don’t know if they are more “efficient” than affiliate stores considering all the extra work required for e-commerce compared to a run-itself affiliate store. I think that depends on the individual and the resources they have available, and what they want to put their time towards.
Oh and I should point out, most ad brokers these days are looking to RAPE you. Many want 50%+ from you, and many shave your clicks with one excuse after another. What are you going to do about it? Nothing is what. Go ahead, argue with them about how many clicks/views your sending them. Good luck. 
The ONLY ad network I can honest vouch for is Adsense. The worst? popuptraffic.com.
Yeah, right…
Nonsense of course, and plainly obvious nonsense, since many of the most profitable sites only offer advertising in addition to their core free product.
Still, the best way to make money is being a destination site offering the end “thing”, be it gambling content, adult content, final pharm ordering, etc.
“Also, I’d like to point out that what is considered very successful in affiliate sites, like 30K/month, is not that much when compared to what is considered very successful eCommerce businesses.”
30k a month isn’t even worth talking about. That isn’t significant money on the Internet. It’s a decent amount for a person, sure, but its not even in the game.
“I asked the most ‘efficient’ type of business to make money online and that was lost on nearly everyone.”
Actually you seem the most lost. To think “I’m launching affiliate stores that whaddya know, do make money over night!” is “making money” is a relative joke.
The most efficient way to make $10 a day is not the most efficient way to make $10,000 a day. And the efficient way to make $10 is hopelessly inefficient overall.
“Clearly e-commerce sites have the potential for most income…”
Again, don’t ignore reality. Ecommerce, defined as selling physical products, doesn’t have the profitable potential (even pharm) as online gambling and adult content.
Love it! I’ll get right on it! Thanks for your wisdom :agree:
-Laura
Maybe you should take that up with some members of this forum who do just that and make real good money.
The term “efficient” is obviously relative. I wouldn’t wish to have to manage a company so large that it was bringing in $10,000 per day. A couple 100 per day would suit me just fine and you can do that simply selling other people’s crap online.
Interesting concept. Do you sell it as fertilizer?
“A couple 100 per day would suit me just fine and you can do that simply selling other people’s crap online.”
Efficient is only subjective with different priorities. You seem to be thinking efficient equals “quickest” without any valuation of the total return too.
The quickest way for me to have more cash right this second is to run outside and get my neighbors returnable bottles from her recycling bin on the curb, then jump in my car and go to the redemption center several blocks away. But this is both hopelessly inefficient and anti-profitable for me. Better for me to use the same time tweak a webpage to get more visitors, or put up a new one, or send an email to an advertiser with current rates. These are efficient and far more valuable.
So, if you want to make three bucks, run to my neighbors trash (and stop at mine too), grab the bottles and rush to the redemtion center. But if you want to efficiently make significant money on the Internet, build a business where you provide a destination where people go to get something they want.
It’s not like you have to choose between making $3 and $1000s. There is a middle ground. If I can launch no maintenance sites that make a couple hundred a day, I consider that very efficient. My priorities are in limiting the amount of work I have to do.
Everyone is talking about ‘efficient’ ways of making money but no one has defined what they mean by efficient.
I’ll say efficiency is broadly defined as: Output/Input
We measure out site’s output by dollars. Simply put the higher our checks are the better we feel. I don’t think that anything else (other than some sort of personal satisfaction) comes out of websites we run.
As for inputs, those are tougher to calculate and quantify. We’ve obviously got our time. We put in the hours to build sites, advertise, trade links, bring new products, and send emails, etc. But there is more to that… we also input money into our projects. Furthermore we’ve got an oppurtunity cost with our time and money. We could using our time and money in a different (and maybe more productive) way.
All of this efficiency talk needs to be put in perspective. Money comes to us over a period of time. We don’t simply make $10,000 each and every month. I know what drives alot of web publishers and ecommerce people is the fact that what we do has an exponential growth and profit curve. Entrepreneurs know that their site/product/idea will generate it’s most optimal returns later on in the future as opposed to now. We sometimes loose money in the present because we have some great expectations of future profits and potential.
To sum up:
Efficiency = output/input
Output = $$$
Inputs = Our own $$$, time, effort, opportunity costs
There is an expectation that at somepoint our output (profits) will grow so fast that it will lapse the amount of input we need to put in and that defines success.
Well that’s my view on things anyway
Good content site will make the most money anyday
cmpolis, did you not read the posts on this thread?
How much money do you spend when you visit a content site? NONE because they aren’t selling anything
How many times do you click on banners from a content site? FEW
How much money do you spend when you visit an ecommerce site? LOTS since that is generally your purpose for visiting them
How can you possibly justify your claim that a good content site will make the most money any day? Good content sites require high maintinance and constant updating to keep visitors returning. An ecommerce website simply requires you to change the list of featured products once in a while and maybe add a few new ones. As long as your products are good and the user experience is good, visitors will keep returning no matter what. Please back up your claim with some evidence.
“If I can launch no maintenance sites that make a couple hundred a day, I consider that very efficient.”
Fine if you want. You were talking about most efficient, and that sort of philosophy and money, while decent, is simply not in the ballpark of higher producing, efficient money-making producers.
“How much money do you spend when you visit a content site? NONE because they aren’t selling anything”
That’s absurd. Content sites sell their own content one way or another.
“How many times do you click on banners from a content site? FEW”
Nonsensical generalization, and not relevant anyway.
“How can you possibly justify your claim that a good content site will make the most money any day?”
Because they do. Ignoring reality is simply bizarre. Yahoo, Casino on Net, Jenna Jameson, these are examples of content sites that dwarf ecommerce sites.
“Please back up your claim with some evidence.”
Yahoo shows what, 800 million profit. Party Poker approaches an IPO with pure net profit of 350 million last year. Google makes 400 million. Those are publically available numbers. Ebay and Amazon are in that ballpark, but both of those have significant content elements.
Nice post, oalhajjar. Just wanted to say that.