Can you earn $5000 with 50k monthly traffic?

[Ababilstar]

Suppose, you have a blog on safety niche.
You are getting 50k visitors per month.
Can you make earning to $5000 with this traffic?

 

[janky]

Definitely possible, I have one which was not the best niche choice making me $140 for every 1K visitors. Not the best commission either, they pay only 3-8% per sale. With 50K visitors that's $7K per month.

I had one a few years ago in a very competitive niche, making $1 per visitor, so that would be $50K with 50K visitors.

It all depends on your skills and experience. The site that is making now $140 for every 1K visitor was making only $90 a few months ago...

 

[Ababilstar]

Definitely possible, I have one which was not the best niche choice making me $140 for every 1K visitors. Not the best commission either, they pay only 3-8% per sale. With 50K visitors that's $7K per month.

I had one a few years ago in a very competitive niche, making $1 per visitor, so that would be $50K with 50K visitors.

Did you use any other monetizing method excluding Ads and affiliate marketing?

 

[janky]

Almost 100% affiliate marketing. Ads bring in less than <10%. I didn't really focus too much on info content for ads.

 

[JamaicanMoose]

Yes, I have Amazon Associates sites earning more than that with less traffic.

 

[Ababilstar]

Yes, I have Amazon Associates sites earning more than that with less traffic.

Do you use low competitive keywords? How many articles are there?

 

[Ryuzaki]

@Ababilstar, I'm the inverse of @janky. I'm doing like 10% affiliate marketing and 90% ads these days, and I focus more heavily on info content. And yes, I start with low competition keywords and move up as I age and get more links, trust, and topical authority.

My most recent project just popped 50k visitors last month in the worst possible month (1st month of Quarter 1) for ads. It brought in just under $2,000 USD at an RPM of $34.50. In Q4 it was doing $54 RPMs and hit $2,000 with only 36k visitors. If you use that $54 RPM, it would have made $2,700.

So yes, $5,000 is definitely doable on 50k visitors, especially if you're targeting higher value products / services with high commissions (or you own it with higher margins).

An example of this type of project is an old short-lived one I had that did $160,000 revenue on ~5,000 visits. It's all about targeting the right demographic with the right offer and value and pricing and conversion optimization, etc. That's $32,000 RPMs if we call it 5k visitors. This obviously wasn't an SEO project, but goes to show what's possible with paid advertising online, etc. Easy come, easy go, though.

Sites with paid traffic and the right offer, brick & mortar businesses, and especially businesses with accumulating recurring revenue like a SaaS software or hell, a bug spraying business or attic insulation business, etc.... those can really ramp up the RPMs to astronomical levels, especially with optimized landers and so forth.

 

[CCarter]

In Day 9 of the DSCC: Monetization it goes over a lot of your questions.

Generally there are 4 types of websites:

1. Lead Generation / Data Collection: This is monetized when a user give some data and that data is sold to a customer/client. Think call centers.

2. eCommerce: This is physically selling products or services. (SAAS fall in here).

3. Brands: Think Coca-Cola, and P&G, these websites usually has a commercial intent.

4. Informative / Entertainment: Think Facebook, Wikipedia, eHow, Magazines sites, and websites which without user generated content or pure "Authoritative" or entertainment content would not exist. The main purpose of these sites is to inform and connect with people. To generate revenues off these types of sites, you'll employ advertisement models, affiliate marketing models, and even lead generation / data collection. These types of sites are more flexible on what they can do to generate money since they can come at their specific niche from tons of different angles. They can employ multiple facets of monetization without hindering their overall purpose - but they'll still have to keep the main purpose in mind.​

Each type of site has pitfalls and things you should not do on them, example "Toys R Us" was an eCommerce site yet was running Google Adsense on their pages, literally driving customers from buying toys on their site to their competitors. WTF.

"Toys R Us" is no longer around, at least not in it's original format.

Since you didn't specific what type of website you have in the OP, I'm just going to assume it's an affiliate type of website so the last one: informative/entertainment scenario.

Monetization is either an advertising or affiliate route. Eventually it can turn into an eCommerce route IF you can create a product/service that fits the end audience.

So can you make $5000 from 50K?, Yes - of course. How you get there depends on how you monetize the traffic - and to an extend how you generated the traffic.

If you go down the affiliate route, at average 5% commission from Amazon, you'll need to generate $25,000 in sales to Amazon from your traffic.

However if you sell a $50 product that you own and take 90% profits home, then you'll need to generate 112 sales from your 50K audience a month.

In my humble opinion, perhaps it might be easier to sell 112 items versus $25K worth of goods, perhaps.

There is also the advertising route (Google Adsense and display networks), you gotta do the maths there too though. @janky has some good numbers above to start off calculations with.

Perhaps you guys all shouldn't be going into affiliate marketing or advertising since it's bottom of the barrel type of returns. Unless I'm missing something convincing 112 people to buy an item versus $25K worth goods across thousands of users seems a bit easier. BUT you do have to come up with an idea on the product/service, and that can fail.

 

[Ababilstar]

I focus more heavily on info content

I was also planning to do so. And doing it also. Isn't it the right thing to do in the beginning?

I'm doing like 10% affiliate marketing and 90% ads these days

Look, I've just started. I don't have enough experience with the earning.

I think running ads is easy. But do they yield more earning than affiliate marketing with same traffic?

 

[Ryuzaki]

I think running ads is easy. But do they yield more earning than affiliate marketing with same traffic?

Traffic has different "quality" levels.

If someone searches "how do I type better?" you can make money by showing them ads or you can try to sell them a software that teaches them to type. Some will buy the software, but the traffic isn't as "hot" and ready to convert to buy the software.

If they search "best learn to type software" they're way more likely to buy the software and buy a more expensive piece of software.

It's all about the targeting the right people. That's built into search terms, it's built into your paid advertising, etc.

It will be harder to make a sale to someone who's not looking to purchase something than someone who is already looking to make the purchase. That's what I mean by "quality" of traffic.

You want to match the right monetization to the right traffic.

People with no intent to purchase and are looking to be entertained are good targets for using display ads, because you don't have to ask much of them. They either view the ad or click the ad and nothing more. Just watch out for people that are likely using ad blockers, like tech or gaming fans, etc.

 

[Ababilstar]

Perhaps you guys all shouldn't be going into affiliate marketing or advertising since it's bottom of the barrel type of returns. Unless I'm missing something convincing 112 people to buy an item versus $25K worth goods across thousands of users seems a bit easier. BUT you do have to come up with an idea on the product/service, and that can fail.

And CCarter comments here!

I was acquainted with avalanche technique by a successful person, and I got to know about you. I always feel like I've got something real good treasure when I read any of your writings.

As I am very new and a full-time student, and my study is not relevant to these stuffs, I know almost nothing. I always try to know about SEO and Google things.

Nowadays, I google "CCarter SEO". Yesterday, I found an article about you. This made me think. What am I doing? What should I care?

I'm really confused about what to care and what not to...

You want to match the right monetization to the right traffic.

That's a good thing.

However, I'm asking another silly question. What's your opinion about amazon?

If there is some other affiliate programs with 5-10% commission on that product, what would you do?

 

[Future State]

However, I'm asking another silly question. What's your opinion about amazon?

If there is some other affiliate programs with 5-10% commission on that product, what would you do?

With Amazon, the user probably is already logged into their account. That's less friction on the conversion and they'll probably buy some toilet paper while they're at it. It's like going to Walmart for one item. Good luck.

Is the extra products and conversion rate enough to outpace the extra 2% - 5% you'll get somewhere else? Usually, yes.

But Amazon doesn't carry everything and there are lots of high quality stores out there for physical products, and even more for non-physical that pay better. It's a case by case basis that you'll have to investigate when you get there (you should start there, really).

 

[iamkingsleyf]

What's your monetization method?