Getting Ready for Christmas

XMas
It might only be August but there are only 134 days left until Christmas andif you haven’t started getting ready yet you’re leaving it a little late.

The Christmas season is the most profitable time of year for many on-line businesses. In order to profit it from it to the max you’ve got to be prepared and cater for the gift needs of your visitors. When buying gifts you generally buy them for other people (unless you’re a lonely greedy bastard) so your not just targeting your visitors but your visitors family and friends. So what can you do to be prepared:

  • Affiliate programs, if you generate most of your income via CPM or CPC networks now would be a good time to start exploring affiliate programs. It’s much easier to sell products in the Christmas season so if you have the traffic you can make more in commissions than selling your visitors to somebody else.
  • PPC - If your new to PPC now would be a good time to start practising with a few test campaigns, if you get it right you can make a ton of green without even having a site
  • Advertising - Many publishers increase their advertising prices at Christmas, but with networks like BlogAds you can buy a spot for 3 months which means you can often get them before the prices go up.
  • Targeting any Christmassy keywords, build the page now and get link building (maybe a bit late for this one).
  • Market research, what’s hot and what’s not, ask the kids what they want for Christmas, is it an unsaturated niche that’s just begging a dedicated site, my daughter is angling for an “Electric Scooter”, could that be this years big hit
  • .

Merry Christmas :) .

About Al Carlton

Al quit the 9 to 5 rat race in January of 2007, before then he was a software engineer and systems architect of financial system. Nowadays Al spends the days running his various businesses and experimenting with different ideas and opportunities.
Al can be found on twitter at AlCarlton.

Comments

  1. Christmas came around quick this year. I am looking forwards to testing more things this year with regards to sites with affiliate programs and such. Last year was fairly good but I was also very new in to things last year.

  2. My daughters eyes just lit up when I asked her what she wanted for Christmas :)

    This will be my third making money online Christmas and if it follows the percentage improvements of last year should be an absolute killer, I’ve learnt a fair bit in the last 12 months,

  3. Last year was my first Affiliate Marketing Christmas and one of my sites did fantastic via PPC during November and December, it just about breaks even through the rest of the year in PPC (so I switch it off), and its had time since last year to start getting natural traffic, so this year I’m hoping to really take advantage of this site for Christmas as I was only just starting with Affiliate Marketing and PPC back then.

  4. My Job revolves around online stores and have seen just how much revenue is created during the two months of christmas :)

    Last year was the first year doing my own sites & selling stuff was the last thing on my mind, this year though I’m gonna make some hay while the weathers good :)

    I picked up a domain/site relating to a popular kids product that will be launched early november.

    With a little work I’m expecting good things from that.

  5. Seems to me the best place to be is with sites that sell or talk about items. Good plan to have some items in place for the season. Would not have thought of it since I am still getting the basics in place.

  6. This will be my first year with a site to talk about products for the season, thanks for the heads up on getting ready for it - may it be a good one.

  7. Talk about a timely post. I was just driving to work and was thinking about Christmas Affiliate marketing. I have several ideas in my head I need to get into ether.

  8. Too early to talk about Christmas. But, I would say it is never too early to plan. It’s probably the best time to take advantage of the UK summer sales and prepare them for Winter celebration.

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