How a product directory created a new stream of revenue on my blog
My Mind Mapping Software Blog is focused on a specific type of productivity software that isn’t well known, but is growing in popularity. I have populated it with a variety of posts covering news and trends, as well as “pillar” articles and product reviews. Because there are over 20 commercial mind mapping software products, a small universe of plug-in programs that extend their capabilities plus a relatively new class of web-based mapping applications, I realized that prospective users of these tools needed help understanding not only what’s available, but how it can benefit them. At the same time, all these vendors need to be more visible to prospective buyers.
To meet both of these needs, I developed a unique and lucrative solution: I created a Mind Mapping Product Directory page, where software vendors can post a 50-75 word summary of their product, along with a logo or “box shot” and a link to the URL of their choice. It gives vendors a way to tell their story, in their own words on the most heavily-trafficked site about this software genre. And it meets the needs of my readers by giving them useful information about some of the more obscure tools in this product category. I charge $800 for a one-year listing; participating vendors can send me edits whenever they want.
Pricing & Promotion
Many of these software vendors are small companies, so I wanted to make these text ads affordable. So I experimented with the price point of US$800 per year, which works out to less than $100 per month. By making it a one-year commitment, I reduced my administrative overhead (no sending out invoices every 3 months!). In addition, by encouraging them to pay me via PayPal, I could also realize revenue faster than if I invoiced these vendors for their ads and waited for them to send me checks. I used my own mind mapping e-books as the initial “paid” ads, so that prospective advertisers could see a sample of a paid listing.
I promoted the Mind Mapping Product Directory via e-mail to all vendors of mind mapping software, add-in programs and web-based solutions. I crafted benefit-oriented copy that emphasized the importance of acting quickly on this marketing opportunity. I told them that the ads would be placed based on the order in which I received their ads and payment - and of course the first 3 to 4 ads would appear “above the fold” - the most valuable positions in this new directory. I also created a call to action statement at the bottom of the directory page itself, which encouraged vendors to contact me if they were interested in running an ad on this page.
I got several takers initially, and continued to promote the benefits of this product directory to the software vendors periodically via e-mail. If they had cash flow problems, I offered the opportunity for them to pay me in two $400 installments. This brought in several more ads. To increase the perceived value of this advertising opportunity, I replicated this product directory on my InnovationTools website. I also replicated its content, without pictures, in my weekly Mind Mapping Software Update e-newsletter, which is sent to over 6,000 people every Thursday. This helped bring in several more paid listings. In all, I signed up 10 software vendors in the first year, resulting in $8,000 in revenue for a minimal amount of work.
In the meantime, I was discovering some serious limitations of the Typepad platform upon which my blog was hosted. For example, I couldn’t tell how many visits my product directory was getting, which seriously limited my ability to develop a compelling sales pitch. So I made the move to WordPress, which worked out extremely well. I soon discovered that, according to Google Analytics, the product directory was the third most popular page on the entire blog! So clearly it was popular with my readers.
When it came time to solicit software vendors for renewal after the first year of the directory’s operation, I emphasized the amount of traffic the page was receiving (an average of 900 views per month as of December 2008) and its position as one of the most heavily trafficked pages of my blog. I offered them a $200 discount if they renewed, as a way of thanking them for participating in this program. All 10 vendors renewed, which came as a pleasant surprise to me. Most advertisers will try almost anything once - the trick is to keep them coming back. This proved that the product directory wasn’t just a one-time fluke, but a sustainable new revenue stream!
Next steps
Since my early successes with the Mind Mapping Product Directory, I have replicated this concept several more times for other product and service categories on InnovationTools.com, with good success. My most recent experiment, which I’m now trying on a new Innovation Consultant Directory, is to:
1. Randomize the paid listings. Once you get beyond 3-4 paid listings, the early adopters “own” the area above the fold, making it less attractive to subsequent prospects, whose ads would appear further down the page. By giving all paid listings an equal opportunity to appear at or near the top of the directory, I’m hoping to attract more paid listings.
2. Add a an alphabetical list of text-link only (unpaid) vendor names below the paid ones. To increase the value of this directory to my readers, I surmised that the directory must represent the total universe of possible service providers as completely as possible. This is an attempt to do that. I can also show prospective vendors that they already have a “free” listing in the directory, and that they have an opportunity to “upgrade” to a paid listing. From a sales standpoint, this is like giving away a small freebie in hopes of getting at a bigger sale down the road.
3. Emphasizing the directory within a larger, value-added context. Like the mind mapping directory, this innovation consultants directory now has a track record of traffic that I can promote to prospective vendors, and I’m also looking at ways to “wrap” other opportunities around it in terms of thought leadership - such as reminding them they can submit articles and white papers to InnovationTools.com.
No matter what the economic conditions, all companies large and small need to do a cost-effective job of differentiating themselves and demonstrating to prospective customers why they offer the best solution. During a recession, customers still have problems to which they need solutions.These product directories are an affordable way to position themselves in the minds of buyers.
Chuck Frey is the author of The Mind Mapping Software Blog. He has written numerous articles and reviews about mind mapping software, and is widely regarded as one of the leading “gurus” of this technology. Chuck is also the founder of InnovationTools, the largest, most extensive website focused on business innovation, creativity and brainstorming.
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I am happy to be the 1st commenter.
Thank you.
Refreshing to see a source of creative new ideas that are NOT filled with hype, exageration and sales pitch. Keep it up and I will be a steady reader.
Nice to know that there are other options to make money in blogs other than the adsense and ads. Looking forward to more success stories.
Thank you. It’s the creative way to make money in blog. Good story, isn’t it?
Thank you for share…………
i love like this…
nice story…..
Great story, nice to see different way people make money from their sites, look forward to reading more stories soon
“Excellent Idea” I love hearing about REAL success online.
Its nice to know that there’s marketers out there willing to share
their success without charging for the information.
“excellent story” this blog is a hit in my book
Great story! That’s a creative way to create a reliable revenue stream.
One thing you might want to try is offering a full page review (written by you or by them) that can be linked separately on the side of the page as well as within their short ad on the directory page that would provide more in-depth information for your readers and provide another source of revenue for yourself.
Great story. What traffic levels would an advertiser require to invest in a new blog is something that anyone else planning to follow this example would have to consider. Having said that this is a great example of thinking out of the box and also an example to the rest of us.
Interesting twist on blogging, and one which I hadn’t thought of.
Great to see a different and successful approach to blog monetizing.
Very instructive post and eye-opener. You just gave me an idea for developing a new niche blog.
Thanks Chuck
A truly fine article. I really enjoyed the content. You now have my old brain spiraling towards some new ideas. Or at least I hope so. Thanks so much.
I think I’ve got a nice free lesson. Thanks for share.
tanks chuck for your information, nice inspiration…
[...] is the link to their first post - http://www.maxblogpress.com/maxblogger/26/product-directory-revenue/ - Chuck Frey talks about this website/blog The Mind Mapping Software [...]
It seems there are no limitations to the ways we can all make money online if we think outside the Adsense box. Very interesting article Chuck.
i will try
http://egytic.com
What a fantastic idea! Which I’d thought of that idea myself years ago when I had a software website. This is definitely a winning strategy. Will keep this idea in mind for my next niche blog. Thanks for providing this case study.
Awesome share! It gets the creative juices flowing again, that’s for sure
Thanks for the share! Is there any blog theme available for Product Directory? I looking for such theme.
It’s amazing how you are on the verge of doing something only to find that somebody has been doing that same thing successfully. This is a great encouragement indeed. Thanks for these story. Please keep them coming.
Great site Chuck - a very well planned & designed way to own a niche online.
I forwarded the link to a friend who I am sure will love it.
Do you profile FreeMind on your site? I couldn’t find it with a (admittedly) cursory glance. At the moment, it’s the application I use.
It’s not as glossy or slick as MindManager, but as a basic (free) tool, it does a fairly good job.
Eran
The strategy seems to be nice. But take a look at the website: there are 11000 backlinks to the main page: that’s probably the best idea. This number of backlinks was obtained in less than one year!
The idea is good: you don’t even need visitors to follow your blog - just to make advertisers purchase your space
So how did he get all those backlinks in one year?
Hi Chuck,
Great advice and a wonderful example of adding a revenue stream.
One quick question. Did you run the directory through some form of plug in or custom design it? I like the idea of rotating ads at the top to keep it fair for all advertisers.
Thanks again for sharing!
Mark
Great ideas on the product advertising pages. I was surprised that you were able to get advertisers to pay without visitor statistics.
Side note: I love mind mapping and use it often in my site design/content generation process.
Tony
Thanks for sharing your success and for including great tips for how the success can be replicated. Like @Tony Stai, I use mind-mapping software (in this case, the open source FreeMind), and recommend it as a business productivity tool. I will be sure to check out your blog/directory for more information.
Very interesting Story…
check out this
Thanks everyone for your positive comments! The ads in the product directory on my blog don’t rotate yet - it would be wonderful if someone could develop a WP plug-in that would make this easy to implement. Is anyone out there willing to take this on?
The place I HAVE done the random rotation is on an innovation consultants directory on my InnovationTools.com website, where I had my developer code something custom for me.
The key to getting advertisers to pay is to emphasize that you’re already THE gathering place for information on your niche (hopefully that’s the case). That enabled me to position my blog as their best bet for eyeballs and prospective buyers.
I’m also leveraging the fact that there are too many vendors in this product category - the smaller players really need to be more visible, and I give them a way to do that, in their own words.
Another factor seems to be the ease of implementation: anyone can put together 50-75 words and a product shot, whereas a banner ad (if you want it to look good) usually needs to be produced for you by a graphic designer, which can be expensive for a small business. So the text-only format is very convenient and painless for vendors to put together.
Finally, I believe trust plays a role in the success of this product directory. I have written about and reviewed many of their products, and they know that I am passionate about this software niche. So they’re willing to try it out. What surprised me was the number who renewed for a second year, even in the absence (at least initially) of traffic numbers.
Hi Chuck, what a great way of monetizing your content. A great way of getting a WIN - WIN - WIN for all involved.
Your readers get a great set of content, your advertisers get a prime targetted audience and you rake in the advertising.
Well done and i think you have given us all food for thought.
Well done Pawan as well for setting this up on MAX BLOG PRESS
Richard
Now that is what I call a whopping idea. It doesn’t take much time to set up, it is elegant and it delivers great benefit to both advertisers and visitors.
Thank you Chuck for opening this door, and thank you Pawan for showing it to us.
Wham.
What a great story and example of thinking out of the box. Thanks for posting it.
Bo Tipton
The Ornery Marketer
Chuck - there is a plugin that re-posts your most historic (oldest) post as a new post. If your directory was a seperate WP blog you could create a post for each product and apply the plugin to activate on a schedule.
I just did a quick search, after failing to find it on wordpress.org, and found this-
http://www.dagondesign.com/files/dd-scheduled-post-shift.txt
rename it to dd-scheduled-post-shift.php and stick it in the plugins folder.
I don’t know if this is the latest version. I use this plugin on a datafeed site that has a limited number of products
Hope it helps,
Terry.
Chuck,
You are really generous to share this useful piece of strategy. Not everyone is so kind to do this.
I realize you are using 4P of marketing to handle your products, most impressed!
Ren
Well, this is the best post I have read in a while.
Online business is not an easy thing to do,
ideas like this one can make it come true.
Thanks for sharing!
Online community is all about out of the box ideas and effective marketing. This is a good product … best of luck.
What a great, innovative way to monetize a niche site. The thing I particularly like is that Chuck started a blog about something that’s obviously his passion and about which he knows a great deal. From that personal interest, he successfully found a way to make real money (not just AdCents, typo intended) from it. I love inspirational success stories like this! Keep ‘em coming!
Cathy asks “How did he get that many backlinks in a year?” When I do a Google link check, it shows me 426 sites pointing to my blog, not 11,000. The blog is actually more than a year old; it was hosted on Typepad for 2 years before I moved it to its own domain. Backlinks are a result of writing compelling content on an ongoing basis. I haven’t done anything special beyond that.
Your sites and products are cool
Hi, Chuck. Pleased to hear from you!
Great site this http://www.maxblogpress.com and I am really pleased to see you have what I am actually looking for here and this this post is exactly what I am interested in. I shall be pleased to become a regular visitor
good, but practically how to do it is still a question.