Originally posted on my internet marketing blog here. Finding (or creating) new advertising ideas have always been a challenge. However, getting paid to advertise a website is even tougher, but there are ways. This post will cover one of those techniques, which is template distribution. I purchased a coded WordPress template on Sitepoint for $50. I then created a a thread on the DigitalPoint forums selling links on the template. I sold two links for $100 each (in just a few hours) in the footer of the template prior to distribution. People like to buy the links because every time someone downloads and uses the template to their website, they’ll get a backlink to their site. One interesting point is, that by distributing a WordPress template, I’ll also receive technorati links as well. I added a link to my site in the footer as well and also added the following code to the CSS template: /* Theme Name: JetSTAR Premium Blue Theme URI: http://wordpress.org/ Description: A Premuim Theme for Wordpress. Version: 3.5 Author: Internet Marketing Blog Author URI: http://www.virtualmarketingblog.com/ */ That code places a link to my site in the backend of WordPress when a user installs and also places a link to my site on some template distribution sites, such as themes.wordpress.net. Speaking of distribution, there are a number of sites to distribute the template too – remember that the more people that download the template the more users and backlinks you’ll receive to the website. I distributed my template at: * Sitepoint * Digitalpoint * Webmaster-talk * Namepros * Webmaster Talk * Weblog Tools Collection * Wordpress.net In a little over four days, the template has had about 200 downloads, about 200 unique visitors have visited my website as a direct result from the template, and there are about 10 technorati incoming links to the website as a direct result form the template distribution. Buying the template, selling links, and distributing the template took about three hours of my time and I profited $150. It was very well worth it and I’ve started to purchase more WordPress templates. You can download the themplate at http://themes.wordpress.net/columns/2-columns/2032/jetstar-premium-blue-35/
I agree, it does take time designing good templates though, once you get comfortable with the design you can create some real works of art that are worth every penny you charge for em. You get the link, so many shady peeps will remove it though.
The only thing I would worry about is sites that do not do good search engine practices. I would hate to have my links on adult site or casino site because google will lower my rank. Other than that free free links are nice let alone someone paying you and linking to your site.
Great point and honestly one I hadnt thought of. Hopefully the positive links and out-weigh any shady ones. As of now, there are no backlinks from shady sites. I purchased the unique template for $50, sold 2 links for $100 each. I profited $150 + got free backlinks and traffic. Thanks for the positive input. Feel free to visit the blog and leave your comments their as well.
^ This is an important point! People will be using these templates for all kinds of purposes. The other issue is that the majority will be removing the "credits" at the bottom of the template.
Where have you read that google will 'lower your rank' if your site appears on pron/casino sites? If this was the case then every man and his dog would be putting links to their competitors sites on shady domains. The only way googles going to think your in a bad neighbourhood is if YOU link to bad sites, not vice versa.
would that count if you let's say have a link to their site through your link and in case if they do decide to change their site to something else, you can easily cut them off?
As far as linking from shady neighborhoods, Im more talking about having my site related to a porn / casino site - could be bad for brand imaging.