Anyone have luck with paypal donations on niche websites?

MyOwnDemon

MyOwnDemon

Face Rocker
Jan 28, 2007
3,529
27
48
Iowa
www.sitestomp.com
So, I have this niche paranormal website. Over the years I've tried a variety of different things. Mainly adsense which is decent but not great.

Lately I've had a little bit of luck w/ related clickbank products. Made a few sales here or there via reviews on my site.

My traffic consists of a lot of return visitors. People who have been visiting the site for years and check out all the updates. They send me emails with content (stories, videos, etc) to put on my site and I try to keep an ongoing relationship with my better visitors via email.

Lately I've been toying with the idea of a paypal donation link where people could donate money to the site. Has anyone tried this on niche sites and if so, have you had any luck with it?
 


It works real well if you have a passionate audience for your subject matter. Ask for help covering hosting fees. Set goals you want the site to reach, things you'd like to get for it.

It helps if you are giving your readers something that they perceive they can not get somewhere else. Cult of personality works.
 
Take the best stories you've already published, add in a few (~1/3rd of ones you've published) that you haven't published, and self-publish a book.

Total time spent: 1 to 2 days.

Sell the book on the site a la "Shit My Dad Says" and "Texts From Last Night"

Profit.

If you've already been building an email db and Twitter/FB following for the site, it would help in marketing the book immensely.

Bonus: tell the people who've submitted stuff that you've included in the book that their submissions will be published. They'll pimp that shit out via FB and Twitter as if they'd won an academy award.

Edit: do it right and don't sell your soul to Amazon. Get your own ISBN so you retain all rights. You can only get them in blocks of ten but its worth it since you can always have a 2012 edition, 2013 edition, etc. and profit year after year doing the same thing while growing your site.
 
Beach Affiliate said:
Take the best stories you've already published, add in a few (~1/3rd of ones you've published) that you haven't published, and self-publish a book.

Total time spent: 1 to 2 days.

Sell the book on the site a la "Shit My Dad Says" and "Texts From Last Night"

Profit.

If you've already been building an email db and Twitter/FB following for the site, it would help in marketing the book immensely.

Bonus: tell the people who've submitted stuff that you've included in the book that their submissions will be published. They'll pimp that shit out via FB and Twitter as if they'd won an academy award.

Edit: do it right and don't sell your soul to Amazon. Get your own ISBN so you retain all rights. You can only get them in blocks of ten but its worth it since you can always have a 2012 edition, 2013 edition, etc. and profit year after year doing the same thing while growing your site.
Click to expand...

Is this something you've done personally, Beach? It's a fantastic idea if you have the right kind of audience.
 
IceToEskimos said:
Is this something you've done personally, Beach? It's a fantastic idea if you have the right kind of audience.
Click to expand...

Not exactly like that but close. I usually find the market, grab the traffic, then sell them the "thing." (then the next thing then the next then the next)

Rarely do I have the opportunity to jump in to an existing, engaged traffic source to drop something into their lap like that.

But since this guy has his traffic already sitting there and engaged, he doesn't have to jump through the hoops. All he has to do is "pre-launch" the book by creating some hype and buzz. Makes things infinitely easier.

Heck, he doesn't even have to come up with the content. It's already there. He's sitting pretty.

Especially if he uses the initial sales from his following to push sales on Amazon. The sales from the book will feed traffic to the site and the site feeds traffic to the book.

It's not a bad situation to have. Especially when you consider he can do this once a year quite easily - especially since the more people he has coming in, the more stories he'll have to publish both on the site and the next book.
 
Beach Affiliate said:
Not exactly like that but close. I usually find the market, grab the traffic, then sell them the "thing." (then the next thing then the next then the next)

Rarely do I have the opportunity to jump in to an existing, engaged traffic source to drop something into their lap like that.

But since this guy has his traffic already sitting there and engaged, he doesn't have to jump through the hoops. All he has to do is "pre-launch" the book by creating some hype and buzz. Makes things infinitely easier.

Heck, he doesn't even have to come up with the content. It's already there. He's sitting pretty.

Especially if he uses the initial sales from his following to push sales on Amazon. The sales from the book will feed traffic to the site and the site feeds traffic to the book.

It's not a bad situation to have. Especially when you consider he can do this once a year quite easily - especially since the more people he has coming in, the more stories he'll have to publish both on the site and the next book.
Click to expand...

This is a solid plan for monetizing sites that don't have immediately apparent commercial potential. I like it.
 
I'm in the same boat, and after 3 years I can tell you that it doesn't work. Period.

I have a website with flash tool that people use and keep coming back to. 400 uniques daily. Put the pp donate button in 2009 and got 2 donations of $10 each since. I also write plugins for FF, with the donation button - none gives a shit.
Tried the clickbank stuff, lots of clicks with no luck. Mind you, most products in the site niche suck, so that could be one of the reasons.

The only thing that made money, is selling a few links on it on monthly basis - it's PR5. They email me, I don't contact anyone.
I'm planning to build an app for it since it's a tool, but just can't squeeze the time yet.
 
Beach Affiliate said:
Take the best stories you've already published, add in a few (~1/3rd of ones you've published) that you haven't published, and self-publish a book.

Total time spent: 1 to 2 days.

Sell the book on the site a la "Shit My Dad Says" and "Texts From Last Night"

Profit.

If you've already been building an email db and Twitter/FB following for the site, it would help in marketing the book immensely.

Bonus: tell the people who've submitted stuff that you've included in the book that their submissions will be published. They'll pimp that shit out via FB and Twitter as if they'd won an academy award.

Edit: do it right and don't sell your soul to Amazon. Get your own ISBN so you retain all rights. You can only get them in blocks of ten but its worth it since you can always have a 2012 edition, 2013 edition, etc. and profit year after year doing the same thing while growing your site.
Click to expand...

Hey, this is actually a pretty awesome idea but most of the content sent to me isn't really original. While I do have a few unique stories/pictures in the mix, most of it isn't.

Still, this got the wheels in my head spinning and I am thinking of doing something similar or simply asking my readers for unique stories for an "upcoming book".
 
MyOwnDemon said:
Hey, this is actually a pretty awesome idea but most of the content sent to me isn't really original. While I do have a few unique stories/pictures in the mix, most of it isn't.

Still, this got the wheels in my head spinning and I am thinking of doing something similar or simply asking my readers for unique stories for an "upcoming book".
Click to expand...

People love this. Do it.
 
Beach Affiliate said:
Take the best stories you've already published, add in a few (~1/3rd of ones you've published) that you haven't published, and self-publish a book.

Total time spent: 1 to 2 days.

Sell the book on the site a la "Shit My Dad Says" and "Texts From Last Night"

Profit.

If you've already been building an email db and Twitter/FB following for the site, it would help in marketing the book immensely.

Bonus: tell the people who've submitted stuff that you've included in the book that their submissions will be published. They'll pimp that shit out via FB and Twitter as if they'd won an academy award.
Click to expand...

Do this ^ and make sure to publicly delay the launch at least once for whatever reasons you prefer.
 
1. Buy every WSO on WaFo
2. Refund and keep the product
3. Torrent them
4. Post torrent links to WaFo
5. Include begging 'READ ME' txt file asking for PayPal donations
6. ??????????????????
7. Profit!!
 
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