Authority Site Alternatives: Is this Viable?

[built]

Why cant I just make a 5 page website with a main affiliate page, and drive as much traffic to this page as possible.

What is wrong with this strategy?

 

[CCarter]

It would depend on where the traffic is coming from. Where do you plan on getting the traffic? I got a 6 page site that's doing fine. Driving traffic straight from paid.

 

[built]

It would depend on where the traffic is coming from. Where do you plan on getting the traffic? I got a 6 page site that's doing fine. Driving traffic straight from paid.

Well my original plan was to exploit as much free traffic as possible then try build up revenue to transition into both paid and free.

I haven’t decided which offer to promote yet, but I have a shortlist, so my traffic plan isn’t very detailed.

When I was doing research on website builders I see a lot of the paid search ads are just 5 page websites with a top 10 list. I wanted to copy this strategy, maybe flesh it out a bit more in terms of better design and then just drive traffic from blog comments, social media, forums, reddit etc.

Thinking about it now after typing that, maybe I would have to rethink the funnel

 

[secretagentdad]

Why cant I just make a 5 page website with a main affiliate page, and drive as much traffic to this page as possible.

What is wrong with this strategy?

absolutely nothing.

Well my original plan was to exploit as much free traffic as possible then try build up revenue to transition into both paid and free.

I haven’t decided which offer to promote yet, but I have a shortlist, so my traffic plan isn’t very detailed.

When I was doing research on website builders I see a lot of the paid search ads are just 5 page websites with a top 10 list. I wanted to copy this strategy, maybe flesh it out a bit more in terms of better design and then just drive traffic from blog comments, social media, forums, reddit etc.

Thinking about it now after typing that, maybe I would have to rethink the funnel

Stop. You're over thinking.
Just make a brand. Put your thought into how do I get the best possible brand identity.
How do I communicate it as quickly and simply as possible.

If you have a top 10 list on your site you're doing it wrong unless you're making a play out of providing directional guidance.

Brand identities stick way faster and harder the shorter and more distinct they are.

Slogan, Banner, Color scheme that contrasts with other players in industry.

 

[bernard]

How would you keep relevant with only 5 pages if you intend to get traffic from viral content?

 

[DanielS]

Andre Chaperon used to do something similar to this. He built out story-driven websites that were 3-4 pages long all designed to sell an affiliate product. Basically, he created story-driven pre-sale pages masked as websites.

For example: "How I Make $200 Per. Day Online Sending Emails"- this topic could be a multi-page website in itself, designed to pre-sell an email marketing software affiliate product.

Of course, you'd need traffic, but this can be from free sources (Reddit, social media) or paid ads.

 

[built]

How would you keep relevant with only 5 pages if you intend to get traffic from viral content?

I wouldn’t be using viral content as the main focus. I would be blog commenting, messaging people etc to try and get clicks

 

[secretagentdad]

How would you keep relevant with only 5 pages if you intend to get traffic from viral content?

Not all content has to be just words.
Calculators, basic db look ups, basic data manipulators or even stupid automated image generators are all a great way to turn a page into a dynamic and enthralling content engine that gets repeated and routine use from people who acquire awareness of it.

You gotta think about how to be sticky so it provides utility beyond a single read through.
Provide a reason to return and you have the basis of a good rat trap.

If you can't come up with one.
Spam the word coming soon through out your content and hype some vapor ware or something.
English is mildly hypnotic when used repetitively.

If you want to be really next level. The best hat trick is when you can make your product go viral.
The details and the pricing are differentiation points that can be totally sharable.
You can even make totally mundane stuff viral by doing a bunch of price anchoring and having limited time sales. This is can be a bit harder to do in competitive industries but with a little creativity and theming you can pull it off. Leverage Black Friday or other commercially friendly memes to find traffic.

 

[built]

absolutely nothing.

Stop. You're over thinking.
Just make a brand. Put your thought into how do I get the best possible brand identity.
How do I communicate it as quickly and simply as possible.

If you have a top 10 list on your site you're doing it wrong unless you're making a play out of providing directional guidance.

Brand identities stick way faster and harder the shorter and more distinct they are.

Slogan, Banner, Color scheme that contrasts with other players in industry.

I think I understand what you’re saying. So for example, let’s pick one of these woodworking offers:

https://www.tedswoodworking.com/new/

If I created a wood working website with brand identity and I had say 5 pages about woodworking tips that all linked to this 1 main page that focused on pushing this offer it would be alright?

Andre Chaperon used to do something similar to this. He built out story-driven websites that were 3-4 pages long all designed to sell an affiliate product. Basically, he created story-driven pre-sale pages masked as websites.

For example: "How I Make $200 Per. Day Online Sending Emails"- this topic could be a multi-page website in itself, designed to pre-sell an email marketing software affiliate product.

Of course, you'd need traffic, but this can be from free sources (Reddit, social media) or paid ads.

Interesting. I like that approach. I want something like that where I can just spend 99% of my time driving traffic to it. I don't want to focus on building a massive content site initially

 

[secretagentdad]

https://www.tedswoodworking.com/new/

If I created a wood working website with brand identity and I had say 5 pages about woodworking tips that all linked to this 1 main page that focused on pushing this offer it would be alright?

No because nothing about wood working tips will ever trigger a reason for them to come looking for your brand ever again.

A better idea would be along the lines of make a table illustrating the properties of various types of wood for common use cases.
You need something reference worthy if you want free growth.
There needs to be a valid reason for sharing the page or returning to it.

Teds tips aint gonna cut it unless you're ready to build Teds brand power so high people feel compelled to share him cuz he's just such an industry bad ass living large in their heads.

 

[DanielS]

Interesting. I like that approach. I want something like that where I can just spend 99% of my time driving traffic to it. I don't want to focus on building a massive content site initially

There’s nothing wrong with this. For a while I used social media to direct traffic to an email lead generation page, then wrote a 7-day email sequence designed to sell an affiliate product. I didn’t stick with it long enough though- but I did gain 400 relatively targeted email leads just with free social traffic.

 

[Ryuzaki]

There's an entire industry built on this model, all revolving around paid traffic with 5 - 6 page sites.

What you come to discover is that most of these 5 - 6 page sites are the exact same content over and over, and even the same designs. I was once offered a position where my entire job, 8 hours a day, would be ripping successful 5 - 6 page sites that had been split tested and optimized. Like saving the HTML from the browser and re-uploading it.

The reasons for ripping sites like this were:

1. They were already split tested and optimized
2. You know the content and design were already accepted into the affiliate networks and advertising networks
3. You were going to burn the campaign out very fast

It wasn't just "us" that would have been doing it. Everyone was ripping down and uploading the same sites AND the exact same ad creatives. Campaigns would get burnt in a matter of days, and then you'd just copy another winner. The more and faster you could do it the better.

But anyways, every single page squeezed you to the main sales page. These were and are called Flogs (Fake Blogs). You've got a homepage that lists the "newest article" and then 4 more articles. The sidebars all only link to the 5 articles, and each article funnels you to the sales page, which may even exist off-domain.

The reason for this is it's the only way to get accepted into a lot of the ad networks and affiliate networks for some of these products (beauty, diet, etc.) but it also lets you break all those networks rules on the off-domain sales page. You can do the sleaziest, high pressure sales tactics in existence. So yeah, you lose some conversion rate having to squeeze through the funnel, but you make it up on the sales page and it gives you access to tons of paid traffic.

You won't find these kind of flogs on Google because they're all set to noindex. You have to dig through the ad campaigns and spy tools to find them. It's an interesting world that moves fast and moves a lot of money fast. But you have to be able to float the money for the campaigns in the mean time.

So yeah, it's a perfectly fine idea. People are doing it all day every day.

 

[bernard]

Not all content has to be just words.
Calculators, basic db look ups, basic data manipulators or even stupid automated image generators are all a great way to turn a page into a dynamic and enthralling content engine that gets repeated and routine use from people who acquire awareness of it.

You're right. I'm investing in that right now actually.