In previous posts, we discussed several ways to receive free targeted traffic to your affiliate dating sites through banner exchange and directory submissions. Today we will discuss keyword research. Keyword research is a required step for any online project you create, and is the very first thing you have to work on even before you purchase your domain name, which will be based on your main keyword. Let’s face it, the dating industry is a tough, competitive market, and targeting mainstream dating sites can be very difficult with millions of competing pages you will have to outrank in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). However, White Label Dating Solutions is the only dating affiliate provider that allows you to create an unlimited number of niche dating sites, tailored to your own requirements and targeted to your chosen markets and keywords. With hundreds of criteria that you define when creating your dating sites, you will be able to decide exactly what members you want the database to filter out of millions to start your marketing campaign based on a very specific theme with few competition instead of a broad one for which you will never rank.

Now that you have the ability to create niche dating sites for which you can rank more easily, it is time to dive into keyword research. Why keyword research? Simply because you can’t just create a website and hope that it will hit the top three spots in the search engines. You first need a strategy. By doing keyword research accurately, you will find out which keywords are worth targeting and which ones are not, which ones have millions of competing pages and which ones have only a few hundred thousands, which ones have millions of daily searches and which ones don’t generate any traffic, etc… There is a lot of keyword research tools out there that will allow you not only to find these precious non competitive, heavily searched keywords, but will also help you analize all sorts of data related to these keywords so that you can pick the ones that are worth targeting. When you find a set of profitable keywords, you will be able to look deeper into thousands of variations of these keywords, based on daily searches performed by the millions of internet users who surf the web every day and find easily the golden ones. Most keyword tools will also return data such as KEI (Keyword Effectiveness Index), which basically compares the count result with the number of competing web pages to pinpoint exactly which keywords are most effective for your campaigns. The KEI is very important since it will help you determine what keywords are not worth targeting, both because of a low search volume or a too high number of competing pages.

With this in mind, the next step will be to start doing some keyword research to find profitable niches/markets and build your niche dating sites with White Label Dating solutions based on your keywords. It is free to build dating sites and they can even host them for you, so there is absolutely no start-up fee or any cost involved with them. As to keyword research tools, they usually charge a monthly membership depending on the subscription you choose, the one I use the most is called NicheBot, it is the cheapest one out there and the subscription is based on your actual research, so you don’t have to pay if you don’t use the service for some time. By clicking here, you will be granted access to a special offer I give to my readers/customers, a $1 trial offer so you can try their service and see if it fits your needs.

As a conclusion, keyword research is a step that you don’t want to miss. Every single affiliate marketer, with experience or not, will tell you that this is the very first step that you have to work on whatever the marketing strategy you use. Keyword research will help you rank for highly searched keywords no matter if you use article marketing and press releases (we will discuss this method in the next dating affiliate course), pay per click marketing (PPC - this is also something I will write about), search engine optimizatoin (SEO - also something that needs to be discussed as this is a VERY effective way to receive free targeted traffic), etc… Well, that’s all for now. I hope you enjoyed this post, feel free to leave your comments and I will gladly answer your questions and concerns. Also, as a way to thank you for checking this blog, here is a free ebook that will show you exactly how you can pick winning keywords every single time. Feel free to share it and give it away in any way you wish as a free bonus to your customers and newsletter subscribers or to your “Internet mates”. And once again, the link to the $1 trial offer mentioned earlier:

Download “keyword jackpot” for free

Try nichebot keyword research tool for $1

Thanks for reading, and we will talk soon!

Exchanging banners through banner exchange programs is a very good way to get free targeted traffic from related sites. However, there are a few aspects you should take into account before you rush towards the first banner exchange program you find.

When you register to this kind of service, you should consider registering to more similar programs. The first thing to take into consideration is the kind of banner exchange you are joining (most of them are free banner exchange programs). Targeted banner exchange services are better. How often do you think your dating banner will be clicked if it is displayed on sites about cars, hotels, casinos… ? And how many times will people who click on it actually join your site? A converting banner is a banner which is placed on a site pertaining to the same market/industry. People browsing a site related to yours will be more likely to be interested in what you have to offer. However, if you wish to join general banner exchange services anyway, keep in mind that most of them offer the opportunity to choose some specific categories to display your banners. Make sure that you select dating/adult dating so that your banners are only displayed on relevant sites.

Also, you should consider registering to more than one banner exchange service. Why ? That’s obvious actually. When somebody visits your links page, the full page will load. If there’s one banner from this kind of service, you will earn about one impression (depending on the ratio of the program). If you join like ten banner exchange services and paste each code on your links page, basically, it means that each and every time your links page is loaded, you will earn about ten free impressions (one for each program). So the more banner exchange programs you join, the more free impressions you get whenever the banners are loaded.

Finally, before you join a similar program, think about checking the statistics and the ratio. The more traffic the service generates, the quicker your earned credits will be used to display your ad, and the quicker you will get traffic from this site. Concerning the ratio, try to join banner exchange programs which offer at least a 4:3 ratio (3 free impressions earned each time you send 4 impressions). Some sites offer a 2:1 ratio which is a scam, so be careful ! Here is a good dating banner exchange with a 4:5 ratio: http://www.hottyswingers.com/banner_exchange.

These basic tips should help you determine which programs are good, and which ones are not.

Submitting your dating sites to directories is a crucial point when it comes to Search Engine Optimization. It is an excellent way to receive one-way links from targeted resources and free targeted traffic.

The first thing to take into account is the nature of the directory. General directories are ok, but you will get better results if you submit your sites to dating-related directories as you will receive visitors specifically interested in dating resources, thus more likely to join your site. And obviously, submitions to non-related directories will be pointless.

The second important point is the popularity of the directory. By popularity, I don’t just mean PageRank. PageRank is useful to webmasters because the higher their pagerank, the better their results on Google. And it can be a good indication of the site’s popularity for users. But don’t solely focus on this, PageRank is not always relevant to the actual site traffic and popularity. So make sure you always check the Alexa rank of the site (Alexa.com). The lower the traffic rank, the more traffic the site receives.

You will also need to check if the directory requires a reciprocal link. If it is the case, you can add the reciprocal link to the “edit links” section of your admin area. Then the links/banners or any code you add will appear on your links page. However, remember that one-way links are always better than reciprocal links. One one-way link from a popular high-traffic site/directory will always be better than dozens of reciprocal links with small, unknown directories.

Once you have done this with a directory, do it with another one and so on… Make sure you keep a record of these directories on an xls spreadsheet for future reference so that you don’t waste your time researching again when you have to submit another similar site. This list will be YOUR selection, depending on your own needs, requirements and matching your site(s).

The easiest way to start looking for directories is to use Google. Type keywords such as “dating directory UK” or “dating directories United States” etc… and browse the sites. You will also find lists of directories all over the Internet, but some of them will be out of date, some sites will not work anymore, some of them will not match your needs etc… That is why it is always better to compile your own list of quality directories and make sure you stick to it and update it regularly with new resources.

If you have good lists of dating-related directories, feel free to post them here as a comment.

Main benefits:

- Receive free targeted visitors from directories.
- Get better rankings on Search Engines.
- Receive free targeted visitors from Search Engines.
- Get a better Google PageRank and Alexa rank.
- Improve your brand awareness etc…

Joining a Dating Affiliate Program is way up there when it comes to easy ways of making money online. Dating programs are one of the most successful affiliate programs on the internet, since the majority of people who become dating affiliates generally end up earning money. You can also sign up with an affiliate program in order to increase your income, however, remember that the competition in the arena is getting tougher by the day, and in order to make your website stand out and be special, you will have to make at least a little effort. Gone are the days when all you needed to make money as a dating affiliate was sign up with a top affiliate program. Some tips that will help you in increasing your profits as an affiliate are as follows:

• Almost all dating affiliate websites look similar and provide almost the same kind of information. In order to stand out, try to be as novel and unique with your concept as you can. Targeting a niche audience is a better idea than targeting everybody and being generic. The best way to do this is to create your own White Label Dating site with a dating service provider such as White Label Dating Solutions, the undisputed leader in this industry.

• Put up good material on your websites. Putting up rehashed and re-formatted versions of the same information that is available on every other dating affiliate program site will really not do much for your website. It would be better to write original articles, even if all you are doing is just sharing your own dating experiences.

• Make your visitors sign up for your mailing list. This will help you get a good database of your core customers, which will come in handy as and when you join up for a new affiliate program or want to promote a new website.

• In the end, the major deciding factor on which the success or failure of your endeavor rests will be your search engine rankings. Try to increase your search engine rankings by putting SEO enriched content on your website and creating as many back links to your site as possible on other related pages. You can also advertise with Google if you feel that your earnings will be able to justify the cost.