Hey everyone! Just wanted to write a quick post today about my record eBay Partner Network (EPN) earnings for March. I hope this post encourages you to continue working hard towards your own affiliate marketing goals, while seriously considering eBay Partner Network as a great affiliate program. You may recall that my eBay Partner Network earnings have been volatile in 2010. After some of the volatility ended, my EPN earnings started to rock. In late 2010, I did really well as I received big bonuses from eBay due to my year over year growth (didn’t blog about the bonuses). In March, 2011 (see screenshot below) I’m thrilled to announce that my EPN earnings came in at $1,861.86. That’s my best non-bonused month ever!
Affiliate Marketing Works, Even If You Have a Job
I wanted to write this post for two main reasons. First and foremost, I wanted to show that someone with a full time, demanding job can still do really well in affiliate marketing. I work super hard in my full time job (and I love it!), but have also been able to build up a really sweet affiliate marketing business. I earn monthly passive income from EPN and also other affiliate programs such as Google AdSense, Commission Junction, Amazon Associates, ClickBank, and others. The skills I learned have even helped accelerate my corporate online marketing career since I have more value to add. My strategy: Build great websites with great information that offer significant value to the user. I now own 100+ active web businesses. The money did not come easily, but now I’m receiving a good deal of free SEO traffic. My EPN earnings have basically zero cost attached to them so they’re pure margin. My advice: Stick with affiliate marketing. Even if you have a full time job, you can invest a few hours each week for a few years (I’ve been in the affiliate marketing game since 2007) and then you’ll hit gold in the long run.
You Should Seriously Consider eBay Partner Network
Second, I wanted to highlight EPN as a great affiliate network. eBay Partner Network can be volatile (just look at March 31 in the graph below and you can see that my CPC tanked on the last day of the month) but my results have been super overall and I couldn’t be happier. My strategy: Focus on niches you’re passionate about, and review and recommend products and sellers on eBay that you’re personally passionate about. Better yet, review products and sellers you’ve personally done business with! Once you build that bond with you users, the quality of clicks you send eBay will be tremendous and then eBay’s quality click pricing will reward you. eBay will over-reward those affiliates sending the best quality clicks, clicks that convert! Looking for another great affiliate network to check out? I recommend CPA Tank, a great network operated by my friend Vito.
Image in this post © PPCIan.com
Wow, that is great! Specially compared to the 09 one you posted up that is totally awesome! This is motivation to pick back up on my affiliate stuff that I started with ClickBank :^)
Thanks so much, Darren. Really appreciate the comment! Yeah, EPN my earnings have come a long way since 2009 and 2010 and I’m super excited about it. 🙂
That’s cool! I’m going to have to check out the EPN sounds like something very worth looking into 🙂
Fun Fact: According to SpyFu, eBay is #12 of the top 100 biggest SEM spenders at a whopping $59,697.06 I believe that daily Budget is just with Google too 😮
Congrats on the earnings. Are you coming out west for SMX Advanced again? If so we should meet up again and talk web stuff again.
Thanks so much, Chris! I very much appreciate the comment. Yes, I will definitely be at SMX Advanced Seattle again this year. Very much looking forward to connecting. Great work on your blog as well, I have been reading closely.
All the best,
Ian
Awesome insights on affiliate marketing and your EPN earning. Congratz and keep up the great work!
Kevin,
Thanks so much for the comment and kind words! I very much appreciate it!
All the best,
Ian
Hey Ian, how many sites are you using the ebay partner network with? Just curious as that is a very healthy rate of return. 🙂
Jason,
How’s it going? Long time! 🙂 (Side note: I have been keeping up with your blog, and great work!) My EPN earnings are basically coming from 1 site. I currently own a portfolio of 100+ web properties (and even more domain names), but there are a few big names in my portfolio that dominate my earnings. The site driving my EPN earnings is one of my largest sites. In the future, I hope to roll out EPN to more of my sites, it’s just a function of time. I have typically found Google AdSense to be the easiest starting point (super easy to set up compared to all other affiliate programs). However, once I’ve got a critical mass of traffic, it’s probably a good idea to start testing programs such as EPN on more sites! What’s new on your end? I’m really hoping to make it to one of your SoCal domaining meetups this year – I will try my best. Thanks again!
All the best,
Ian
Nice job! So this is from marketing via blogs and just recommending eBay products/sellers on your niche blogs that just get SE traffic?
Hi Jan,
Thanks so much for the comment! 🙂 My eBay Partner Network earnings come basically from one large authority site that I run. This is a site I started a while back (around 2007) and have ramped over the years with consistent, high quality content. It’s not a blog, but is a static website (meaning it takes me twice or three times as long to get articles uploaded, but is totally worth it since it’s a more customized look, feel, and experience for my users). I tend to leverage two strategies: Recommending products that users should check out on eBay and also recommending products (and sellers) I have personal experience with. I have an established connection with my readers so they trust me. And, I am very careful to only give good recommendations and advice. Many of my readers are repeat visitors. It’s all about the long term for me – driving quality for my users and ultimately my advertisers as well. Hope this helps!
Thanks again!
Best,
Ian
that is tremendous Ian! I personally don’t use ebay and im more of a clikbank guy but this is truly awesome!
Fazal,
Thanks so much for the comment! I have noticed you commenting over at John Chow so thanks so much for checking out my blog. EPN has been very good for me, and I have a presence on ClickBank but definitely a long way to go as compared to EPN. I’m looking forward to checking out your blog and picking up some ClickBank tips. Thanks again!
All the best,
Ian
Saw that you’re going to be at SMX Advanced, I’d love to meet up and get an Interview if you’d be available for one!
John,
I’ll definitely be at SMX Advanced Seattle this year! Let’s meet up for sure. I’d be delighted to do an interview, and am honored that you would ask. Thank you so much and I’m looking forward to it!
All the best,
Ian
Congrats on the nice earnings. Would be interested to see an example site of yours in a future post, to see how you have EPN incorporated. (though I wouldn’t expect that you’d want to reveal your big earner)
Accidental Domainer,
Thanks so much for the comment and suggestion! I really would share my sites, but most of my EPN earnings come from one single site. That said, let me see what I can do in the future. I like your suggestion and believe this would make a really great post! 🙂
All the best,
Ian
According to the screenshot 1213 clicks resulted in $1861 in earnings which is $1,53 per click pretty pretty good considering that average earnings per click is around $0,18. Are you driving paid or free traffic to their website or both?
Dmitry
Hi Dmitry,
Thanks so much for the comment! 🙂 I’m driving organic traffic exclusively. My earnings come from an authority site where I review products that one can purchase on eBay. I then leverage eBay’s Partner Program to link to the products. Because my users trust me and I provide great advice, they are converting really well, which in turn is rewarded with higher EPCs. I’m very excited about EPN and my next post will feature a summary of my earnings for the last 3 months with some strategies to try.
All the best,
Ian
Great one Ian, I been starting reading your post, I would like to know how do you increase your EPC, mine is stuck at $0.13
I’ve just started using ePN over the last couple days and my two days of earnings were 119 and 71 for a total of 190 dollars. It’s been so easy that I’m beginning to wonder if I’m breaking any rules the way I’m doing it. It’s not a method I see a lot of, or really at all so I’m wonderin how I can find out if what I’m doing breaks any rules without throwing myself under the bus?