SEO Archives

Top 10 Best Affiliate Marketing Niches in 2025

I know there are a LOT of niches to choose from, and some of them are far more “exciting” than others. However, if you want the best possible chance of succeeding in an online business (especially via affiliate marketing and/or SEO) then it is much easier to go after a proven industry.

So, what does that mean for you?

It’s simple…

The most profitable niches (at least long term) are almost always going to be those that have been popular for several years, maybe even decades, and are not likely going anywhere for a VERY long time, if ever.

They have been hugely popular for a long time because they appeal to the wants and needs of most people — generation after generation. The actual products/services are going to change but the core niche stays the same, and will probably never go away.

Often times, these industries were around long before the internet and can be found in many “offline” brick-and-mortar stores even nowadays. This means they have solid staying power.

These niches aren’t new or trendy. So the latest fad or trend doesn’t make the cut — even if it is a hot topic right now and could make some quick money. The lasting niches will always win in the long run! Therefore, these tend to be the best niches for building a website or starting an internet business.

If you want to start an online business with the highest chance of succeeding then your best bet is to enter a market that has already been proven to be profitable. That’s not too hard to understand. There’s nothing wrong with cashing in on a hot trend, but we are talking about long term profits here.

You are probably asking yourself one of the following questions (or something similar):

What are the most profitable niches for affiliate marketing?
Is this niche worth getting into for SEO?
What industries are the best to start in as an internet marketer?
Can I make money online with [insert niche here]?

This is what I often tell people when they ask me these types of questions:

As a general rule of thumb, if you are ever unsure if a niche could be profitable or not; just ask yourself…

“Does it have something to do with getting paid, laid, or living a long time?”

What I mean is this…

Typically the most profitable niches that are likely always going to be around are those dealing with wealth/money/finance (getting paid), dating/sex/relationships (getting laid), or health/fitness/wellness (living a long time).

Why?

Because these are things that virtually everyone on the planet wants!

Therefore, if it falls into one of these 3 categories, you can presume it’s more than likely a profitable niche.

That’s not foolproof advice (there are exceptions to everything) but it’s a damn good start! Obviously those aren’t the ONLY niches that will make money, but they are certainly a good starting point if you aren’t sure where to begin!

So, with that being said, what are the top niche markets in 2025?

Our niche ideas are compiled based on many years of experience and solid data showing them to be among the most popular niches to make money online. These industries are loaded with prime opportunities for creating a passive income business on the internet.

Alright, let’s get to it…

These are our choices for the top 10 most profitable affiliate marketing and SEO niches this year:

Health/Fitness/Beauty

This is a huge industry that shows no signs of ever slowing down and will probably be around forever. Furthermore, if you read above, you will notice this one is in the “big 3” categories under “living a long time” so it’s a proven profitable market. There are already thousands of money making sub-niches inside this industry and more are coming in all the time. It just keeps growing every year.

Just think about it for a second, you have:

Losing Weight
Fat Reduction
Diets (lots of these out there and new popular ones coming out every other year)
Building muscle
Supplements/Shakes/Vitamins (a lot of millionaires out there because of this sub-niche)
Healthy eating
Workout/Fitness/Lifting programs
Exercise equipment
Hair products
Makeup
Skincare
Remedies
Curing/Preventing diseases
Natural health
Cellulite reduction
Anti-Aging
IV therapy
Super Foods (Ex: I have a site about bone broth that does quite well)
Meal Replacements

…and about a MILLION other things!

The list above barely even scratches the surface of this overall niche(s). Plus, think of ALL the hundreds or even thousands of micro-niches underneath each of these. The list pretty much never ends! These tend to make great affiliate marketing niches as there are usually a ton of different products in each category that are very popular and typically provide affiliate programs so you can promote them to earn money.

There’s money to be made hand over fist here, and the opportunities are virtually endless. Another great thing about this industry is that, even though it’s super popular, there are still a lot of untapped niche markets in it due to the fact that new things are coming out all the time. Also, in many cases, you will actually be helping people so there’s an added bonus of feeling good about what you are doing.

Many of the top niches for affiliate marketing can be found in this category and a ton of micro-niches that are often great for SEO, but there’s plenty of other options, so don’t stop here if you are looking for more!

Dating/Romance

This is another one of the “big 3” (getting laid) and I doubt it’s ever going anywhere! It is highly lucrative and almost certainly always will be.

Whether someone is looking for love, struggling to keep a partner, wanting to rekindle passion, trying to get laid, needing marriage help, or one of MANY other reasons why this is such a huge topic; there are tons of ways to build a business in the dating/romance niche with all the potential products & services available.

Here is just a small sample of the topics this industry:

How to get a girlfriend/boyfriend
General dating tips
Add excitement to your sex life
Save your relationship
Online dating sites
Sugar daddies/mommas
Pick up artists
Marriage advice
Pregnancy
Intimate apparel/Adult toys

People are always looking for advice when it comes to these areas and are willing to spend money to get the help they need. This will continually be a huge market full of potential for building a profitable online business. There are a plethora of affiliate programs to promote in these niches already and plenty of room to create your own product or service as well.

Make Money/Finance

Think about this one for a moment… There’s a reason you visited this website in the first place, and are reading this post right now!

The reason being this is a MASSIVELY profitable niche that has always been popular and always will be. It also wraps up the “big 3” previously discussed with the “getting paid” industry.

Some topics here include (but are certainly not limited to):

Ways to earn money online
Make money blogging
Home business opportunities
Search engine optimization (SEO)
Social media marketing
Affiliate programs
Digital currency investing
Video marketing
MLM
Investments

Even if you are just getting started with building your online business in one of the other niches listed here, you could still help others by teaching the strategies and techniques you used to create an online business. Share your successes, failures, tips, etc…

Plus, there are a ton of courses, ebooks, coaching programs, business opportunities, and so much more than you can promote as an affiliate marketer. The options here are virtually limitless for what you can do in the money/finance niche.

Okay, you have now learned the “BIG 3” niches for getting paid, laid, and living a long time! However, those aren’t the ONLY great industries out there, so let’s continue with some more of the best niches for 2025…

Pets/Animals

People absolutely LOVE their pets! In fact, many consider them a part of the family, and won’t hesitate to spend a lot of money on them. I am personally one of those people. I love animals and would do just about anything for them. There are millions of people just like me out there.

There’s food, treats, toys, crates, boarding, grooming, bedding, training, and a whole lot more. Many people spend more on their pets than they do themselves in a given month, and some people would go hungry before letting their pet miss a meal.

If that doesn’t scream “Hot Niche” then I don’t know what does?! Plus, people will always have pets, so this is a very evergreen industry that will almost certainly never die off.

Survivalism/Prepping/Home Security

Another huge niche that has only been growing in recent years, and will likely continue to rise in modern society.

Some of the sub-niches and topics include:

Weapons/defense/security
Bug-out bags
Survival knives
Bunkers/shelters
Supplies/Gear
Self sufficiency skills
Food storage
Survival kits
Tactical tools
Bushcraft
Alarms
Security Systems
Cameras
Door Reinforcements

Plus MANY others! The ideas are virtually never-ending here.

Many preppers will spare no expense when it comes to emergency preparedness and doomsday readiness. Plus, almost everyone wants to keep their home secure even in the best of times. So there are definitely some potentially lucrative niche ideas in here and likely will be for the foreseeable future.

These also often seem to work well as profitable SEO niches because most of the research into these things and purchases are normally done online, and the overall competition levels are not super competitive yet. That also makes this one of top niches for affiliate marketers for many of the same reasons.

Sports/Hobbies

Obviously there are a nearly endless amount of sports & hobbies out there, and they come with millions of different ways to make money from them. This is more of a general niche in that it doesn’t really have a defined list of specific top-level industries to discuss.

You have to use a bit more creativity here in finding your sub-niche, but it’s really not very difficult at all once you start getting the ideas flowing. Every sport has some sort of equipment needed, and just about every hobby has some sort of product or service associated with it too. You just have to find what you enjoy and sell the products and/or service associated with said hobby or sport. It’s actually quite simple if you don’t overthink it!

Technology

New technology and subsequent products are literally coming out daily. Everyone wants the latest product or coolest new gadget on the marketing, and people will spend a LOT of money to get it!

Whether it’s the best new computer, tablet, smartphone, or the newest device on the block… people will pay for it. Everyone wants the latest and best technology. Then, you have accessories galore to go with these devices, which provides an entire world of opportunity for the savvy business people.

You can typically buy and sell these products on Amazon, eBay, Alibaba, and a whole bunch of other online marketplaces. You could also create your own video tutorials, information products, an authority site, and so on. There’s a lot of opportunity to cash in on the ever-growing tech industry.

Learn Another Language

There’s not really much of an explanation needed for this one. People all over the world are wanting to learn other languages for various reasons, so you can do quite well for yourself by giving them the resources do to so.

Whether it’s English, Spanish, French, Chinese, German, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese, Italian or any of the other hundreds of languages in the world; there are thousands of people wanting to learn them at any given time.

You don’t have to teach classes or be some master of multiple languages to make money in this niche. All you have to do is build a website or community where you can promote affiliate products that do teach people wanting to learn other languages. This can be a quite lucrative niche!

Personal Development (aka self-improvement and/or self-help)

Whatever you call it, there’s no arguing that this is a huge niche market! There are countless courses, programs, books, videos, coaches, and much more in this niche.

There are few things more satisfying than feeling accomplished & good about yourself while building your body and/or mind to achieve greater things. We all crave it. Thus making self-improvement one of the most profitable niches to get involved in.

Virtually everyone around the world wants to do something related to personal development. Whether that is building self-esteem, creating career success, building relationships, increasing confidence, achieving goals, overcoming obstacles, or about a thousand other things… it’s an almost endless niche!

This is a multi-billion dollar per year industry and is continually growing. Even a small slice of this giant industry can give you a very successful online business. And it is quite a fulfilling endeavor to help others transform their lives in a positive way!

Babies/Kids

It’s not very hard to see why this one would make the list of the most profitable niches. People spend a fortune on babies & kids for all kinds of different products. Not only their parents but also grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends, and so on. There are a lot of sub-niches here and so many opportunities to make money as an affiliate in this niche via SEO, blogging, or other forms of marketing.

Okay, that concludes our list of the top 10 best niches for 2025. This is not to say these are the only worthwhile industries to get involved in. There are plenty of hot niches out there that you can make an absolute fortune from. How you decide to build your business is entirely up to you. We have simply provided these great niche ideas to help you get started. Use them as the foundation for your business and build upon it until you have achieved all your goals!

Also, before we wrap it up, let’s make something else very clear…

There are some other industries that are super popular, and therefore tempting, but they are also VERY difficult to compete in online (if not impossible). So they are NOT recommended unless you are a battle tested veteran of the internet marketing world with a large budget and a ton of experience & connections.

Some of these include…

Payday Loans
Insurance
Real Estate (Unless it’s local)
Travel
Credit Cards

That’s not an exhaustive list but you get the idea!

These are certainly profitable niches in the grand scheme of things – that can’t be denied – but in most cases they are FAR too competitive for the average person to succeed in, at least online, so we don’t suggest trying to get into them unless you are a high level marketer with deep pockets and a badass team! Don’t be fooled by their numbers, you would be very lucky to ever make money online in any of those industries (unless you somehow find a very specific untapped sub-niche).

Stick to the main 10 niches discussed above and you will have a much higher chance of succeeding with your affiliate business! As stated before, there are obviously millions of other industries that you can build a business in and be very successful, but we feel these are the best niches in general for the average person to start an online business and be successful.

Once you have mastered a few of them, you can start branching out into others, or just dominate an entire niche subset. The opportunities are virtually endless with what you can do with these niche ideas.

SEO Basics for Business Owners: Getting Your Website Ranked in Search Engines (Why & How)

In the ever-evolving digital world, it is vital for businesses of all sizes and industries to have a strong online presence, and having a top ranked website in search engines (such as Google) can be an absolute game-changer for your business. Among other things this will help you connect with your target audience, increase brand visibility, bring in consistent traffic to your website, and ultimately drive far more sales. How you achieve this feat is through Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

In this post, we’ll give you a basic overview of SEO for business owners who are new to the concept and looking to improve their website’s Google rankings.

Table of Contents
1. What is SEO?
2. Why is SEO Important?
3. How Search Engines Work
4. On-Page SEO
5. Off-Page SEO
6. Technical SEO
7. SEO Tools and Resources
8. Common SEO Mistakes to Avoid
9. The Future of SEO
10. Conclusion

What is SEO?

Although pretty much everyone just calls it SEO and you rarely hear what that stands for, it actually means “Search Engine Optimization” — which is a multifaceted approach to improving your website’s visibility on search engines such as Google and Bing. The goal of SEO is to increase the rankings for your website in search engine results pages (SERPs) for relevant keywords; making it easy for potential customers to find your site when searching online for the products and/or services your business offers.

Why is SEO Important?

SEO is crucial to business websites for several reasons…

Increased Visibility: When your website appears on the first page of search results, more people are likely to click on it. The higher your ranking, the more visibility and credibility your business gains.

Targeted Traffic: SEO allows you to target specific keywords and phrases that potential customers use to search for products or services in your industry. This means you attract users who are already interested in what you offer.

Cost-Effective Marketing: Compared to traditional advertising, SEO is a cost-effective way to reach your target audience. It provides long-term benefits and a higher return on investment (ROI).

Competitive Advantage: Your competitors are probably already investing in SEO. If you neglect it, you risk falling behind in the online marketplace.

Improved User Experience: SEO involves optimizing your website for better user experience, leading to increased visitor satisfaction and engagement.

As well as many other reasons why it is so important. When it comes to digital marketing there are few things, if any, more vital for the online presence of a business than SEO.

How Search Engines Work

Before diving into the specifics of SEO, it’s essential to understand how search engines operate. Search engines like Google use complex algorithms to scan and index web pages. These algorithms consider various factors to determine the most relevant and authoritative content to display in response to a user’s query.

Some key ranking factors include…

Relevance: How well a page’s content matches a user’s search query.
Authority: The trustworthiness and credibility of the website.
User Experience: Factors like page load speed, mobile-friendliness, and a user-friendly design.
Backlinks: The number and quality of links pointing to a website.
Content Quality: The uniqueness, depth, and value of the content.
On-Page SEO: Optimizations directly on the web page itself.

Again, this is a basic overview, but that is pretty much how they work when it comes to ranking websites top to bottom.

On-Page SEO

On-page SEO refers to the practices you implement directly on your website and its pages to improve their search engine rankings.

Key elements of on-page SEO include…

Content Optimization: Creating high-quality, original content that provides value to your audience.

Keyword Research: Identifying and targeting the right keywords for your content.

Title Tags: Crafting compelling and keyword-rich title tags for each page.

Meta Descriptions: Writing concise and informative meta descriptions that encourage clicks.

Header Tags: Using headers (H1, H2, H3, etc.) to structure your content and make it more readable.

Internal Linking: Connecting related pages within your website for better user experience and SEO.

Image Optimization: Reducing image file sizes for faster loading times and adding descriptive alt text.

Mobile Friendly: Ensuring your website is responsive and accessible on all devices.

Freshness: Keep your content updated.

That is certainly not all of the on-site SEO factors but it is some of the more important ones to make sure you are implementing.

Off-Page SEO

Off-page SEO focuses on building your website’s reputation and authority in the online world. This is arguably the most important part of search engine optimization overall.

Key components of off-page SEO include…

Backlinks: Acquiring high-quality, relevant backlinks from authoritative websites.

Social Signals: Building a presence on social media platforms to increase your brand’s reach.

Online Reviews: Encouraging positive online reviews to enhance your reputation.

Guest Blogging: Writing guest posts on reputable websites to showcase your expertise.

Brand Mentions: Getting mentioned and linked to in relevant online conversations.

Of course, there are many more factors for off-page SEO but generally speaking these are the most important. You will need high quality backlinks if you plan to rank above your biggest competitors in even a halfway difficult niche, and a strong social presence can only help.

Technical SEO

Technical SEO involves optimizing your website’s infrastructure to improve its search engine visibility.

Some aspects of technical SEO include…

Site Speed – Ensuring your website loads quickly for a better user experience.
Mobile Optimization – Making sure your site is mobile-friendly for mobile users.
XML Sitemaps – Creating and submitting sitemaps to help search engines index your pages.
SSL Certificate – Implementing secure connections for user data protection.
URL Structure – Creating clean, descriptive URLs for improved user experience and SEO.
Schema Markup – Adding structured data to provide search engines with more information about your content.

SEO Tools and Resources

There are tons of SEO tools and resources you can utilize to help with the process. Some of the more popular ones include; Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Ahrefs, SEMrush, Moz, and Yoast.

Common SEO Mistakes to Avoid

Here are some common SEO mistakes to stay away from and solutions to keep in mind…

* Neglecting Mobile Optimization – With the increasing use of mobile devices, having a mobile-friendly website is essential.

* Keyword Stuffing – Overloading your content with keywords can lead to penalties from search engines.

* Ignoring Analytics – Failing to monitor your website’s performance and make data-driven decisions.

* Neglecting Local SEO – For businesses with physical locations, local SEO is crucial for attracting nearby customers.

* Not Updating Content – Keeping your content fresh and up-to-date is essential for SEO.

* Low-Quality Backlinks – Focus on acquiring high-quality backlinks from reputable sources.

The Future of SEO

The world of SEO is continuously evolving. Stay updated on the latest trends, newest updates, and so on. What is working today may not work tomorrow. This is not a “set and forget” industry. However, some things have always and likely will always remain the most important such as original, useful content and high quality, relevant backlinks.

Conclusion

SEO is a powerful method for improving your website’s Google ranking and attracting customers on autopilot. By understanding the basics of SEO and implementing just best practices, you can take a significant step toward growing your online presence and achieving your business goals.

As you continue your SEO journey, remember that patience and consistency are key, as SEO is a long-term investment that yields significant rewards over time. It is definitely not a “quick fix” or short term strategy.

Start by implementing the fundamentals discussed above, and don’t hesitate to seek professional assistance from a top notch SEO company to ensure your website’s success in the competitive online world.

The Art of Building Amazon Sites Post Panda

Thousands of people supplement their monthly incomes through the use of Amazon affiliate sites – or at least they used to. Recently, Google introduced a major overhaul to their search algorithms known as Panda, and a lot of Amazon affiliate sites that could be politely referred to as “thin,” “spammy,” or “junky” quickly saw their search rankings plummet down to the depths where no practical Google user would ever find them.

For the uninitiated, an Amazon affiliate site is a website or blog that directly or indirectly promotes products sold on Amazon dot com, the ubiquitous online retailer. Clicking certain links at these sites redirects you to a product page at Amazon, and when you make a purchase, Amazon pays the affiliate site owner a portion of the proceeds in exchange for the redirect. With commission rates as high as 15% and the ability to promote whatever products you’d like, including the very expensive ones, it’s easy to see how a well-implemented Amazon affiliate site could turn a tidy profit.

The trick, of course, is to build an Amazon affiliate site that passes muster in the eyes of Google Panda, and achieves the search engine results ranking it deserves. This is how you can still earn big money with Amazon.

Build Your Site Around the Niche, Not the Products

Google Panda is all about attempting to ensure that the pages ranked most highly for a given search keyword are relevant and provide the best user experience possible. As such, most of the sites that experienced severe downranking at the hands of Panda were ones that offered a list of promoted products, along with maybe a brief description of each, some keyword-rich promotional text (“This is such a wonderful product!” without any details) and maybe a few pictures. In other words, the exact same content you could find by visiting Amazon directly and simply visiting the product page. Credit to Google for sending these two-bit sites where they belong: out of the public eye.

Your job is to make your site stand out. You can accomplish this by building a site based around an entire niche, or a specific product category, instead of just the products themselves.

Let’s say you want to promote security cameras. Instead of making a thin site like the one described above that simply lists and promotes the cameras, build your site around the niche of home security, and particularly the ways that technology can be used to improve it. This is something that will provide actual value to your traffic. A few examples of content ideas that could be applied to other niches as well:

Stories of break-ins and robberies that could have been prevented with a wireless security camera.
Comparisons of the top-rated security cameras.
Software programs that integrate well with security equipment.
How to set up home security equipment.
Common misconceptions held by those purchasing home security cameras for the first time.

Once your readers see how valuable home security cameras are, they’ll be far more likely to click your affiliate links and actually make a purchase.

Know the Products You’re Promoting

Although you may be tempted to select products to promote simply based on their value or apparent immediate popularity, the post-Panda online environment dictates that it’s better to promote products that you’re actually comfortable discussing through knowledge and experience. Your readers will be able to tell whether you’re an expert regarding the products you’re discussing, and they’ll be more likely to stick around at your site if you are.

If you really want to promote a certain niche that you may not be totally familiar with, there are some good ways of conducting research:

Visit forums devoted to discussing the products and learn from experts who use them every day.
Watch Youtube video reviews of the products to see how they work in action.
Download the manuals for the products to get additional details that might not be included in their general online product descriptions.
Take advantage of return policies and trial periods. You may be able to try the products in your own home and return them for a full refund, so long as you don’t damage them. Any fees you incur in the form of return shipping will be worth the content you’re able to generate by actually using the products.

Allow for Interactive Discussion

Speaking of forums, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t set one up on your own Amazon affiliate site. Google Panda loves the idea of increased website functionality and interactivity, making a forum for your users an excellent Panda-baiting feature.

It’s important that forums are moderated and kept on topic, so don’t expect to simply create the forum, let it run itself and return to your normal daily operations. Jump in frequently to participate in discussions and answer your visitors’ questions.

Post Video Reviews of Products

Placing some multimedia content on your Amazon affiliate site can truly make it stand apart from the competition. If you have access to the products you’re promoting, record a video of yourself using them while you discuss what you like about it, how you like to use the product, your favorite features, etc. Doing so paints you as an expert with hands-on experience, and builds a higher level of trust between you and your reader.

It’s also possible to review the promoted products using video even if you don’t actually own them. Although “talking head” videos are maligned by some, the fact is that they prove that you’re a real person and not some faceless marketer hiding behind a potentially dubious site.

Think from the Consumer’s Perspective

When creating your Amazon affiliate site, it’s important to occasionally stop and think: If I were a customer researching these products, would this site provide me real, valuable assistance? If the answer is “not really, but I think I have good advertising strategies,” then your site will need a lot more work before it’ll pass the Panda test. Think about the things that you want to see when you’re researching a potential purchase for yourself, and implement them into your Amazon affiliate site.

A FREE Instant Backlink Builder – SocialMonkee Review

Since you are reading this right now, I am going to assume that you are researching SocialMonkee, and I’m sure you already know that building backlinks (inbound links) to your web pages is an essential part of search engine optimization (SEO) and internet marketing. If you didn’t know that, you do now! There are several reasons for this but two of them stand out above all…

1) Backlinks get your pages indexed. That’s important because if they aren’t indexed then nobody will find them through search. You want the search engines, such as Google, to find them as soon as possible and crawl them regularly.

2) Probably the most well-known, and certainly one of the most important reasons for getting backlinks, is that they help your web pages get higher search engine rankings for the keywords you are targeting. The whole point of SEO is to get high rankings and backlinks are a vital ingredient for doing that.

One of the biggest problems with building backlinks is that it can be a very time consuming and tedious process if you do it yourself. And if you outsource it to an SEO company, it will cost you a lot of money. So, a great option is to find as many solutions as possible that are free (or very cheap) and don’t take very much time. One such service is called SocialMonkee.

So, what is “Social Monkee” exactly? It is an instant backlink builder that allows you to get 25 unique backlinks every day for free. That comes out to a total of 175 backlinks every week or around 750 every month without paying a cent.

They do have an option to upgrade, which will allow you to build 100 backlinks up to 3 times a day! But that is completely optional. You can even get an upgraded “premium” account for free. All you have to do is refer 12 members (free or paid) to SocialMonkee and your account will automatically be upgraded. It’s a win/win situation no matter how you look at it.

Submitting a page to SocialMonkee from the member’s area is super easy and only takes a couple minutes. And there’s an even faster and easier way if you use Firefox as your browser. They created a free FF plugin that allows you to submit your page with just a few clicks of your mouse. In addition to that, if you have a premium account you will get access to link reports and RSS feeds, which are great for keeping track of your backlinks and getting them indexed faster.

You certainly aren’t going to get top rankings for competitive keywords by just using Social Monkee alone, but it is a nice addition for your SEO arsenal. Every little bit helps. When you consider the fact that it’s free and very easy to use, you really can’t go wrong. I recommend taking advantage of the SocialMonkee service right now!

7 Powerful WordPress Plugins to Turbocharge Your Blogs Performance

A key factor in both visitor satisfaction and keeping the search engines happy right now is making sure that your blog loads quickly. There should be no errors, no waiting – just click and boom the content is ready for your visitors.

If, for whatever reason, your blog is running slowly then it can affect your online business in a number of ways. Firstly people aren’t willing to wait around for pages to load anymore.

They used to say you had 30 seconds to grab a visitors attention and in the days of dial-up internet access that was true but today a guesstimate is that you have at most 10 seconds before the surfer hits the back button and goes looking somewhere else for what they want.

Secondly if your blog is loading slowly it can directly affect your search engine rankings. Slower sites don’t do as well in the search engine results pages (SERPS).

So it’s important that your WordPress blog is hosted with a reliable company that have no real latency issues but it’s equally important that you optimize your WordPress blog with plugins that help reduce the page load time as much as possible.

Before you get carried away just make sure that you test the actual speed of your blog first – you might not need to make any changes. You can run a speed test here -> http://www.iwebtool.com/speed_test

Then if you decide you want to optimize your WordPress blog speed here are 7 of the very best plugins you can use to help achieve this goal:

1. WP Smush.It – This plugin automatically reduces the size of image files on the fly so they will load more quickly. Very neat and very effective.

2. WP HTTP Compression – By outputting your pages in zip format to a compatible browser the WP HTTP Compression plugin can reduce your page size by up to 80% as well as increasing your download speeds by up to 4 times. It shouldn’t be used in conjunction with WP Super Cache however.

3. Hyper Cache – If your blog is hosted by a provider without a whole pile of cutting edge resources then this plugin is ideal for you. It’s very easy to configure and is automatically optimized to reduce disk usage for your blog.

4. WP Optimize – This is a very simple but very effect database clean up tool and allows you to run database maintenance without using PhpMyAdmin as well as clearing out your spam or comment queue with a couple of clicks.

5. WP Super Cache – This very neat plug created HTML files from your WordPress blog data and serves those instead. This reduces the overhead on the server dishing out the files because the SQL database for your WordPress install isn’t constantly involved or being queried. A very neat solution but check its compatibility with other plugins or themes you might be using.

6. WP Minify – This plugin helps you compress JavaScript and CSS files to make sure that pages load more quickly. Most theme developers don’t take the time to optimize their CSS so this plugin can really help with that problem and speed up your blog loading time as a result.

7. Hosting Monitor Plugin – This cool plugin allows you to check host up-time, hardware info, load average and the current users. Basically it allows you to keep tabs on your web host to make sure they are not the cause of your blog suffering from any speed problems. It’s one thing for a web host to claim 99.9% up-time… But it’s another thing to actually do it.

Hopefully you’ll find at least some of these plugins useful for when you’re doing your best to optimize your WordPress blog. Remember that the overall visitor experience is critical to you achieving the kind of massive and loyal online audience that you want.

Don’t let the fans down eh?

What Is Bring The Fresh?

As an aspiring internet marketing business owner, SEO specialist, affiliate marketer, or someone just looking for ways to make money online, I am sure you have heard of “Bring the Fresh” and you might be wondering what it is? In a nutshell bring the fresh (BTF) is a membership site that is fully loaded with useful information and resources that actually teach you how to make money online.

They teach an incredible system for building profitable websites, getting them ranked highly in Google and other search engines with SEO, and having them generate free passive income for you. Basically it’s a step-by-step blueprint for building a successful online business without needing a lot of money to do so.

UPDATE: Bring The Fresh is SOLD OUT for the time being and has therefore been taken off the market.

I’ve written my full Bring the Fresh Review below. So, if you want, you can skip all this intro stuff and scroll down to read my review of bring the fresh. If you want to know some of thoughts about it beforehand, I will give you a little more detail about what the BTF membership actually includes and teaches.

There’s no doubt that Bring the Fresh has caused a lot of buzz in the internet marketing world and has been recommended and promoted by many of the top marketers in this industry. The owner (Kelly Felix) has created an awesome series of videos that teach market research, product creation, copywriting, SEO, affiliate marketing, PPC, video marketing, and TONS more. He really thought of everything and included it all.

Here’s a quick rundown of just some of the stuff you will find inside BTF…

* You are shown exactly how to quickly create a website in a competitive market that the search engines will love. Yes, it is simple, and it really does work, even if you have no idea how to build a website.

* How to get numerous high authority websites to link to you. No spam or crappy links. We are talking about real authority links in a natural way.

* How to find profitable keywords fast. You will learn exactly how to go after “buying” keywords where the people searching will be ready to spend money now.

* A behind the scenes look at incredibly successful websites and online businesses. You get to watch as they are created from start to finish, and how they are made profitable, time and time again. There is nothing left out, including a sneak peek inside campaigns that brought in millions of dollars in profits. Also, an up close look at some of the biggest product launches in the history of internet marketing!

* Access to a private members only forum. They even personally answer questions there all the time, as do numerous successful members. The information in the forum alone is more than worth the cost of bringthefresh.

* Excellent support. You will never have any trouble getting a hold of them.

* …And MUCH more!

Here are the things that are NOT inside BTF…

* A useless get rich quick scheme. While it is true that some of their members have earned small fortunes in a short amount of time, and many earn hundreds of dollars per day from the information taught in BTF, most people are happy with an extra $100 a day or so; on autopilot. That’s a much more realistic goal and something that can easily be done by virtually anyone from the teachings in Bring the Fresh. Although you can make a LOT more. They don’t give you false hyped up promises of becoming a millionaire overnight.

* How to build fake blogs or other crap like that. You’ve seen the blogs that look like online newspapers or news websites. You know the ones that sell worthless products and continue to bill the customer over and over without their consent. They don’t recommend misleading people and they don’t do it themselves.

* How to trick search engines into liking your site or giving you undeserved high rankings. Tricks and schemes might work for a little while but they don’t last. If you are trying to make a quick buck through spamming or other black hat stuff, this is not the product for you.

* A customer service team located in a third world country that doesn’t even understand your questions or problems. They have excellent customer service that goes above and beyond.

* Tons of upsells. They don’t make you buy a bunch of expensive stuff in order to make their system work.

* …Or any other crap you might be expecting from an internet marketing product. This is the real deal. Honest, straightforward, and realistic.

Everyone from newbie’s to full out gurus can benefit from the information and resources that Bring the Fresh has to offer!

Obviously this isn’t some miracle product that will have you making money overnight without doing any work. There’s NO such thing! However, if you are willing to follow their advice and put in the necessary work to build a real online business, then “Bring the Fresh” truly is the system you have always dreamed of finding.

Again, I encourage you to continue reading below to find my full and very real review of bring the fresh. It will help give you some more information about what I actually found inside.

Okay let’s get to the real meat of my review…

If you regularly read this blog or any of my others, or subscribe to my newsletters, then you will know that I don’t do a lot of reviews. Yes, I’ve obviously done a few here and there, but they are certainly not a big part of my blogging efforts. Out of hundreds upon hundreds of posts across multiple sites – only a very small percentage of them are reviews. However, something called “Bring the Fresh” was recently recommended to me by a close friend of mine who also happens to be a high level internet marketer. He’s one of the few people I truly trust online and when he speaks, I listen.

Plus, I recognized the name of the owner, Kelly Felix (of “The Rich Jerk” fame) who is very well known in the internet marketing world and puts out excellent information. I’ve been following him for a long time and have a lot of respect for him. I’ve also purchased some of his other products and they have always been top-notch! So I decided I should probably at least give BringTheFresh a look and see what it’s all about.

I told Kelly Felix that I would write a review of bring the fresh if he wanted to set me up with an account. I made it very clear to him that I would give my honest opinion of it and tell the truth about what I thought – even if I thought it sucked! I do not write positive reviews just because I was given a free copy of something or because the owner is a well known internet marketer, or someone I know, or for any other reason – unless they truly deserve it. If it’s bad then I am going to call it out. Plain and simple. He still set me up with a full membership after hearing that so he must have been confident in his work. I’ll give him a plus for that right away.

Of course, I still didn’t have high expectations being the skeptic that I am. And having been an internet marketer for many years seeing all the new crap coming out all the time has made me even more cautious and pessimistic. But I tried to go in with as much of an open mind as I could.

The first thing I noticed is that their sales page isn’t full of hype and outrageous promises like you see far too often on most of the “how to make money online” types of products. It basically just gives you a rundown of who they are and what they do, an overview of what is inside and what’s not inside along with some videos, testimonials, and a bit of other information. They get another plus right off the bat for that.

But the sales page isn’t really what matters; it’s just a small part of the equation. It’s what’s inside that you pay for and ultimately the only thing that counts. So I dug in expecting to get through it all in an hour or two and be done. Ha! The joke was on me. This thing is loaded.

BTF isn’t some short ebook or report like you see so often with products in the make money online niche. Instead, this is a full blown membership site complete with videos, guides, interviews, recommended products, forums, bonuses, and so much more. I didn’t count up every minute but my rough estimate is that there has to be somewhere around 40 hours of video plus a ton of other stuff.

What is Bring the Fresh?

Some of the lessons taught and resources include; market selection, product creation, website success, link building and SEO for high rankings, marketing, conversions, templates, etc… It is absolutely packed with information! And it’s not just a bunch of fluff and filler content either. No, this is real advice that you can actually use to make money, a lot of it!

I’ve been an internet marketing business owner making a great living from my online business since 2003, so I have a ton of experience. Even still BTF taught me several things I didn’t know, gave me a few more twists on some things I did know, and refreshed me on some things I had forgotten about. I definitely didn’t think it would have much of anything new that I didn’t already know, but I was wrong. It truly is real and useful information for making money online.

Here’s a quick list of my positives about it:

It works – I know that the stuff they are teaching actually does work. That’s really all that matters and the #1 reason why I recommend it.
Several hours of video – Everything is shown to you so it is much easier to understand and implement.
Solid advice and training – Not a bunch of fluff and filler. It’s packed full of truly useful stuff.
Easy to follow – You aren’t left more confused than when you started as tends to happen with other internet marketing products.
Great value at a low price – They massively over-deliver.
Up to date – They continually update as needed.
Active forum – Lots of discussion going on in there about all sorts of different internet marketing and money making topics.
Amazing support – Questions are always answered.

And a couple very minor negative things I found:

Design – I know this doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things but it’s not a pretty site or back end by any means. I think it certainly could have been designed much better. That doesn’t take away any of the excellent content but it does make the membership seem less professional.
It could use more ebooks to follow – The videos are great and you can watch them over and over again as needed, but sometimes I like to have text to read and reference if needed. That would have been the icing on the cake. There is a very handy “guide to everything” that does pretty much sum it all up in an easy to read and follow fashion, but I still would have liked more of the sections broken down into ebooks.

One thing I want to make very clear about Bring the Fresh is that it is not a scam, or rip-off, or fraud in any sense of those words! It’s also not one of those stupid “get rich quick” schemes. I’ve seen a few bring the fresh scam reviews and I have no idea how or why they would say that because it definitely isn’t. I have many years of internet marketing experience so I have seen a lot of scams, ripoffs, schemes, misleading information, and everything else under the sun. In my opinion, this is one site that certainly doesn’t deserve the negative reviews. It is the real deal.

Once again, Bring the Fresh is NOT a scam! It is 100% legit. I give it my highest recommendation! Even after several years since I first got my membership, it is still a high quality product with very useful and usable information. They keep it up-to-date and make sure the information is always relevant. I’ve been an internet marketing specialist doing SEO and making money online since all the way back in 2003, so I have tons of experience, and I still use BTF as a guide to help me with new tips even to this day.

It’s rare for me to fully recommend a product but in this case I do. I see no reason why BTF should be avoided in any way. There are few products I’ve ever seen that I can confidently say that about. It is legitimate and if you follow the things they teach and take action on them, you will make money online. There’s not much else to say so that is the end of my honest bring the fresh review.

Hopefully this has helped you make an informed decision about BTF.

Best Link Building Practices

Ok so to continue my trend of writing about debates I have with people on the Keyword Academy forums I thought today I would write about best link building practices. There are important things to keep in mind while building links, but like most aspects of MMO ‘winning’ it is accomplished 99% through doing and 1% through thinking. So as my first point the most important thing about link building is just go out and do it instead of worrying about how to do it. A “no follow” link is better than no link at all. A link that is anchored with “click here” is worth more than no link at all. Are they the best, no, but they aren’t completely worthless either.

Ok so the ultimate thing we want to do is to try as best we can to make our links look natural to Google. That is essentially the goal of everything we do when building links. So the real question is what can I do to make my links look natural?

Vary your anchor text – Natural links occur and get anchored in a ton of different ways. Don’t just anchor your one target keyword for every link you get, anchor things that are close to it, misspellings, your URL, your site name, and even the odd “click here”
Deep linking – People who get natural links don’t just get links to their homepage, in fact a lot of the time people send their friends links to interesting articles or write about cool things they see on a site. Deep linking to your individual pages is important and a lot of the time is can be profitable too because you can use your deep pages to target more keywords.
Quality vs. Quantity – What’s the answer to this old question? Well the answer is both. If all you get are crappy links well then your site is going to take forever to rank, but you don’t need to worry about getting every link from a PR9 site. A link from a forum isn’t going to give you as much value as a link from the NY times, but 1000 might and might be easier to get.
Blogroll vs. In Content – There is always a lot of debate around blogroll and how valuable they are. A lot of people (some of whom make a lot more money than I do) say in content links are the only way to go, but I can tell you I’ve had more than my fair share of luck with blogrolls. Mix it up and get both.
Speed – When you start a new site you don’t want to blast the links out too fast. Instead start out slowly and build up momentum like an avalanche . Eventually you’ll be able to send your site as many links as you want, but the growth needs be be slow and natural.
Related Niche – Sites from a related niche are better than links from an unrelated site. Google looks not only what links are pointing to your site, but what links (internal and external) are pointing to your links.
Links from the Same Site – The more sites you build links from the better. Don’t think that two links from the same site isn’t providing you any value, but two links from two different sites are better than two links from the same site. This is not only good for authority, but it’s diversity. If one of those sites go away at least you still have one link when you could potentially not have any links left.

Anyway that’s just a basic overview of the best linking practices. I’m sure we could think up experiment after experiment to test out each best practice, but hey, it’s not worth the time when you could be spending it just building links. Now stop reading and go get yourself some links.

Link Farms

So I figured it was just about time for me to sit down and finally write another post and just when I started to think about this I happened across a debate at the Keyword Academy forums about link farms and offered my two ‘godly’ cents.

First off I’ll start with the disclaimer:

I do not personally use, nor do I advocate the use of, link farms or any other link building method that seeks to manipulate Google’s system.

And I suppose with that disclaimer I should add another:

I do know there are many people who use link farms that make a lot of money and are very successful doing it. But what works today may get you banned tomorrow. So, proceed at your own risk!

With that out of the way let’s start with defining exactly what a link farm is:

Traditionally: A network of self owned sites from which one links to another self owned site. Basically you buy a bunch of domains, post content on them, and use them to send anchored links to your money site in order to climb the SERPs.
- Self hosting domains
- http://wordpress.com
- http://www.blogger.com
Modern: A network of sites which you have paid access to from which you can post links to your sites. Basically you pay some money to someone for access to their large network of sites, you write articles (some spun, some 100% unique), and in those articles you can link to your own sites.
- Build My Rank
- LinxBoss
- Postrunner at The Keyword Academy
Broad: Any site that allows people to post content in exchange for anchored ‘do-follow’ links back to their own sites. Basically you give us something we give you something, so no matter how you slice it that does fall in a broad definition of link farming.
- http://ezinearticles.com
- http://hubpages.com
- http://wordwolf.com

So anyway now that all that preliminary junk is out of the way, the first assertion that I was arguing against was that Google could algorithmically sniff out link farms easily and either a) devalue their links or b) deindex the farms completely. I suppose this is not an unreasonable assumption, Google works with an algorithm as the base of their search and they do that pretty well. The problem for Google arises because allowing a few link farm websites ‘costs’ (in creditability, algorithmic accuracy, annoyance of people) them far less then the alternative of wiping out all link farms and causing some collateral damage as well. I agree that Google has an interest in getting rid of bad links, and getting rid of programs like BMR is one of Matt Cutts’ goals as spam king. I don’t think Google will ever be able to wipe out these types of farms completely, but if they can get rid of even some of the sites these programs use then there is some devaluation of the linking power over time so people who use these techniques need to know that over time rankings will slip if they don’t keep building links and therefore their income isn’t truly passive.

The other argument that ensued was the debate over whether or not the postrunner system constituted a ‘link farm’ of sorts. Let’s not kid ourselves about the difference people, PRN is designed to manipulate googles system therefore it’s always at risk too, which is why high standards are maintained and people need to be sure to keep the junk off their sites or some of them may be devalued or deindexed as well.

Anyway the point is that if you use link farms I wouldn’t suggest relying on them solely and you should always be trying to grow your natural link profile. It’s the only safe way. And remember the best way, and the only completely risk free way, to get any backlink is to get them naturally by providing high quality original content on your site!

–Justin (and Trent)

The Keyword Academy Review

So a lot of people out there are wondering how to make money online, and it can be tough, especially for beginners. There is a place that is beginner friendly and can really get you on the right track for success in your efforts to work from home successfully. That place is The Keyword Academy (TKA) and you can try it free for the first month. Okay, so I guess I’ve given away my opinion that it’s a good place, but why? I’ll tell you…

First off they offer a very positive attitude with real usable advice that does work. A lot of people out there promise to show you how to make you a million dollars in no time with no effort, and that is a load of crap for sure. Courtney Tuttle and Mark Butler don’t make these kind of promises, but what they do is give you a clear road map for how to make real online passive income with a bit of hard work and dedication.

This road map takes the form of the core videos that take you through the basics of making money online, from setting up a site, to how to choose a niche, how to get your site ranked for keywords, and finally how to monetize your site through affiliate income and other opportunities. Have more questions after you watch the webinars? Well that’s not an issue because there are hundreds of experts on their friendly forum who are happy to answer any questions you might have. It’s a great additional resource.

For people more advanced in the make money online world there are some great benefits of The Keyword Academy for them too. Included with your subscription is the guest posting system called Post Runner (which allows you to automatically post articles on other peoples sites to build backlinks, rankings, and traffic) and also a very useful keyword selection tool called Niche Refinery that scans for low competition keywords that will help you make money with niche sites.

On top of that you also now get “streamline” – A task management tool to help support your business processes. This is another cool (and useful) part of being a TKA member.

They are also constantly growing their knowledge base and producing webinars for their advanced members. A recent video series was about how to bump your sites from getting some traffic to gaining “massive traffic”. They continue to teach to both levels of students with regular updates.

In my opinion, the best part about the keyword academy is the PostRunner guest posting system. That alone is worth the membership cost without even taking into consideration everything else that comes with the TKA membership. It is an awesome way to get backlinks, traffic, increase search engine rankings, and ultimately make more money!

So, I guess what I am trying to say is that my review of the keyword academy is very positive. If I had to recommend just one resource for making money online there’s no doubt that TKA is it!

In summary, there really is something for everyone inside the keyword academy. As an experienced online business owner I personally find the guest posting system and the keyword selection tool to be more than worth the membership costs. And if you are a new or struggling internet marketer you will definitely find the information they teach to be a goldmine. It truly is a killer system! The private forum is also a great place to ask questions and share ideas. Heck, if you sign up I’ll see you there.

Join The Keyword Academy today! You will be VERY happy you did. I’d bet on it.

The Best Backlinks for Making Money Online with SEO

There’s no doubt that getting backlinks (also known as inbound links or inlinks) will go a long way in helping to improve the search engine rankings of your website and help you to make money online with SEO. That fact was proven long ago and continues to be true today. There’s also no doubt that having top rankings on the major search engines will give you targeted traffic and increase your business income.

Actually one of the best ways to make money online is to build websites around various keywords (niches) and get them ranked highly on search engines by filling them with tons of high quality content and getting the right kinds of backlinks.

There are a lot of ways to get backlinks. Some of these include:

– Quality Content (so people naturally link to you – BEST kind by far)
– Blogger Outreach / Guest Blogging
– Content Marketing
– Local Business Citations
– Press Releases
– Social Sites
– Video Marketing
– Infographics
– Article Submissions
– Web Directories
– Blog Directories
– Forum Signatures
– Blog Commenting
– Link Bait Posts
– RSS Directories
– Web 2.0 Properties

…And several more.

This goes on but the point is that you will never run out of places to get backlinks and you should never stop working for them. They are extremely important to your success at making money online with SEO.

Getting almost any backlink to your website is better than nothing (although there definitely are some exceptions to that rule) but certain inbound links are a lot better than others. If you can get these particular links they will help you exponentially more than virtually any other type. So, you should spend a much larger portion of your time going after these backlinks.

So, without further ado, here are some of the criteria for finding the best type of backlinks for making money online…

1) From a Related Site – Generally the rule is that the best inbound links are from websites that are related to yours. That means they are in the same or similar niche and the content is related to what you have on your website. For example: A link from an internet home business related site to your make money online site would be great.

2) From an Authority Site – A link from an authoritative, well-known, highly ranked site is very beneficial to you. These are typically called authority site links. These will give you more “link juice” and help improve your rankings more than just about any other type of link will. This is especially true if it is an authority site in your niche, or a related one.

3) Keyword Anchored – You typically want keyword anchored links whenever possible because the anchor text tells the search engines what to rank you for in their results. For that reason the anchor text should include the main keyword(s) you want your website to rank highly for on Google and other SE’s.

For example: If your website is about making money online then you might anchor your links with keywords such as; make money online, make money on the internet, earn money online, money making, how to earn money, ways to make money online, home business, work at home, and other similar phrases. Be sure to vary the anchor text because it’s not good to have them all the same. You should also have plenty of links that are not keyword anchored but that will happen naturally so you don’t really need to worry about it right now.

4) Do Follow – It should go without saying that part of the criteria for the best backlink is that it is a “dofollow” link. If the “nofollow” tag is applied to your link then you are getting very little benefit from it as far as search engine rankings are concerned. You need do follow backlinks to help you make money online with SEO. Of course, you definitely also want to have nofollow links for a more natural link profile, and you want take what you can get on authority sites. So don’t get carried away with making sure your links are all followed.

5) One Way – A one way backlink is when a site is linking to your website (for whatever reason) without you giving them a link back. These are very high quality and are typically considered to be among the best type of inlinks you can get because they are natural.

That’s basically all there is to finding the best backlinks for SEO. If you get a backlink that includes all 5 of the criteria listed above then it is about as perfect of a link as you will ever get. The more you can get like this the better, and it won’t be long before you see top search engine rankings and start earning money from your website!