Hello, About 1 month ago I started the idea to make some money with google adsense. The niche I'm writing is about web hosting, seo, ppc, affiliates, general marketing, etc... all about making money online. But now I'm extremely confusing, my initial plan was to build a forum (in the signature) and add 50-100 articles, after start promoting. I was reading about forum using adsense and I noticed many people saying that the CTR is very poor, due "ads blindness" and other factors, so it's very hard to make a good money. So I changed my mind I now I'm thinking of using drupal or wordpress/blogging to build my site and after integrate the forum. What do you guys think? Is better/more profitable, continue adding content to my actual forum or create a blog or static site with my content and later adding a forum just for discussion? My goal is to make $500 per month or maybe $1000 until the end of year. I have a lot of content here to write. I just don't know how to structure my site to make it more attractive. Thankfull for your help.
I prefer Forums all the way. They are fairly easy to use. A software I'd recommend would be MyBB if you're new to forums. If you're ready and can handle the codes go with phpBB (one I use).
Forums are hard to start with no traffic. Actually, they are pretty much impossible to start. So go with the other option.
i prefer you to go for wordpress blogs because earnings with forums is much better if you add vip and all other stuff but it will consume to much time to grow choice is yours blog with quick income or forums with long term income
Move your forum to mydomain.com/forum and setup a wordpress blog in the root. if you're using Wordpress for your blog you can use the WordBB plugin to integrate the blog with your forum. This way you can have the best of both worlds. I would also recommend starting off your forum with a limited amount of categories, so even if you have a small amount of activity it will atleast look a bit better. You can also go for the Mingle Forum plugin for WordPress if you don't feel like integrating mybb with wp.
Your topic is stupid, you're a newbie and want to teach others about something you have no idea about. Plus the topic is not interesting with adsense. Finally, don't do a forum, it's not good with adsense, at least it's very often not good with adsense and always require a lot more work. The goal with online earnings is to have the best worktime/money ratio you can. This is not with a forum on technical topics that you'll have the best ratio possible.
dcristo Yep, this is what many people are saying, it's the reason i'm changing my initial plan... mrrocky314 Everybody says that forums are profitable if you add a paid private area, and other stuff and not with google adsense. So who am I to do the contrary? lol icde Great tips, thanks. I'll move my forum to mydomain.com/forum and focus not on the forum but in the main site. Sitepoint.com is very sucessfull doing this way. It's a fact that it's hard to make a forum popular with no content. I believe would be necessary hundreds of usefull topis on my forum. JamesColin Yep, I'm a poor newbie and you a guru. Can you tell me how to become millionaire overnight? ha ha ha Ok, seriously, everybody that I've asked says the same, forums are not profitable with adsense. Now my last doubt: wordpress or joomla/drupal? Is blogging style or statict website more sucessfull with adsense?
I hope it helps. It's been a long time since I used MyBB and WordPress together, but as far as I can remember, the WordBB plugin allows crossposting your WordPress articles to your forum. So instead of starting new forum threads, write blog articles, cross-link between the blog post and forum thread and use the forum as for comments. This should increase the forum activity, without much effort from you or your members... mmm. Now I'm thinking that I should try it out.
I agree 100% with EVERYthing mentioned here. Your niche is not a good one for Adsense and neither are forums. Use wordpress for your CMS and pick a different niche.
Stick with forums they are a good way to make money off adsense and people love getting a link to thier website from them and users like to contribue though it is hard to start but just keep with it i'm helping a friend of mine do a forum it just takes time.
icde I didn't knew about this plugin. You gave me a great idea. indyonline Why pick a different niche? This is about something a have any knowledge.
For content management i would recommend you wordpress, it is the most used open source. But also, as many persons said above forums get popular faster, and i would recommend you vbulletin it is also the most safest.
As everyone is saying in their own terms, forums can work, but with a high amount of work, so the worktime/money ratio evolves differently than other types of web properties. You'll see faster results in income growth with other means. Now about the topic of earning money online, I called you a newbie and you called me a guru, now it's true that you could and should have a blog around where you can write your earning journey. That's cool, helpful, and can become profitable as well. But the main work should be done on EASY topics, for non technical audience. It's the easiest way to generate mass traffic from western audience, which is needed to earn well with adsense and other ad networks.
i don't understand why you have changed the topic. web hosting is a good keyword and their CPC is also good. but their competition level is too high. have you checked it via any tools? like adwards? i don't know the recent situation. yes you can easily make 500$/month by using just adsense.
digitalwebman06 No I haven't checked using any tool, i'll do it. I would be very happy if I could easily make $500 per month, but i don't believe it will be so easy. ForgottenCreature Nothing will going to make my forum so unique, my goal is not make $1000 per day (of course I wanted, but it's very difficult). Just want to make some money. yep, some innovative idea would be essential to make more money...
I'm using wordpress now + mybb forum. This is my first experience with adsense, I have other doubt now: If my site is not about a very specifc niche probably my earning will be lower, right? For example if I talk about affiliate marketing + web hosting. I'm creating a site a about general making money topics but I'm not sure if it will work very well. I've made some money with other ways, but never using adsense, I'm a newbie with this. lol I would stay happy earning few hundreds per month, enough to pay my server and help to invest in my other sites....