This is Part 3 in a review on BANS, aka "Build a Niche Store"
See Part One | See Part Two
If you are not already familiar with BANS, it stands for Build A Niche Store and its a cool new product for developing affiliate sites that is getting rave reviews. It is super simple and incredibly fast to get a website up and running with this program. Click here for more information on BANS
Once you have your first BANS site created, its time to dig in and add your personal touch to it. In this third and final phase of the BANS Review, I'll walk through some of the customization options and share some tips to help you make the most of your new niche website...
In Part Two of this review, I walked through the setup and installation of my first niche affiliate store using BANS. In less than 30 minutes I had a brand new site up about Musical Instruments:
As I was getting familiar with the BANS features, I began to realize that this program works very much like a CMS - a Content Management System. You can add your own static pages easily, customize each of the pages the script creates for you, and basically create a fully functional affiliate site out of the tools & options in the Admin panel of your BANS setup.
In short, this system ROCKS! 😉
I'm not a big fan of automated systems or site builders with limited functionality. They usually generate websites with very little unique content and very limited features. That could even be said about BANS if you whipped up a site real quick and tried to market it "right out of the box".
That said, BANS is incredibly versatile compared to most site builders on the market, allowing you to customize the entire site - even the product pages it creates - to suit your needs. As I said, it works more like a CMS than a turnkey site builder and offers plenty of room to grow.
BANS definitely gets a thumbs-up from me for being easy to set up, easy to use, and as a super-fast way to create affiliate sites...
Developing Your BANS Site
Once you get your new niche site up and running, which should only take about 30 minutes at the most, it's time to flesh it out a bit and start customizing it. We'll take a quick look at some of the features and options that BANS offers, and the elements you should consider adding to your core site...
I started out with the basic site that you see in the screenshot above. The first thing I want to do is customize the template, and basically just make it look nicer. As you can tell, my basic colors are black, red & white. I created a quick graphic header and changed the page background to black - so now its time to make the rest of the site match that theme.
I'm not really a creative type, so I headed over to the BANS site to check out some of the styles that other users created. (You can see them by going to BANS and clicking Customer Stores). In addition to picking up some great ideas there, I checked out the Template Guide offered in the members-only area. This is an awesome detailed resource for every modification you can imagine!
Making changes is pretty much as simple as changing out the color codes in the style sheet. Even if you are not familiar with CSS and stylesheets, the Template Guide has simple instructions and screen shots for every kind of change you might want to make.
In fact, with a few simple changes to that one file, I got a whole new look:
Like I said, I'm not all that creative. But the difference between the before and after images you see here took all of about 10 minutes of tweaking. That's it!
Making Your BANS Site Unique
We now have a fully functional niche affiliate store. You could easily start promoting this site through Pay-Per-Click advertising, article marketing and other means. But in order to truly make your site unique, and ultimately rank well in the major search engines, you want to make it unique.
In addition to fleshing out your BANS site for good Search Engine Optimization, you also want to consider Visitor Optimization. This just means making it the best resource possible for your target market (your ideal visitor).
As you've probably already guessed, I know nothing at all about musical instruments. So writing up a bunch of cool unique content on the topic is not going to happen. But that's okay - there are other options 😉
I'll start by doing some keyword research to find out what my target market is looking for, in the way of information. I'll choose some keyword phrases and create new content pages around them. This is easy to do in the BANS admin panel of course - you can create as many content pages as you like, and put whatever you want on them.
Ideas for new pages on my musical instruments site might include: Instructional Guides, Learn To Play Guitar, Musical Instrument History, Antique Musical Instruments, etc - honestly I am just guessing at the moment.
Once I do the in-depth keyword research to get a feel for what my market wants, my next step will be to locate content. I'll need content for the site, for a free report I may want to offer, for articles to submit, and even for an autoresponder series.
As for the actual content, my first task will be in locating PLR (Private Label Rights) Content that I can modify and use. Second is to outsource the writing to a freelancer. I might have them create resource pages, write reviews (based on reviews shown on Amazon, for example), and do the research to write How-To articles.
Of course, if you choose a niche you are familiar with, you can do this type of work yourself.
Adding New Streams Of Revenue
The basis for the BANS site is to build a niche store that uses the eBay affiliate program. While this is a great way to monetize the site, you'll want to add additional revenue sources to your new site as well.
Ideas include:
- Google Adsense
- Books/Products from the Amazon.com affiliate program
- Affiliate Programs for Related Products
- Your own Reports/Info Products
I'll be looking heavily into PLR, and also into info products related to the musical instruments market to see what kind of JV's I might be able to strike up. At the very least, I want to put together a free report to encourage visitors to get on the mailing list for the site.
I havent set up the mailing list yet, but that's definitely on the list. You MUST have a mailing list 😉
I hope this overview helps you decide whether BANS is right for you. If you are looking for an easy way to set up your very first niche affiliate site, I would highly recommend you go with BANS. Even as a seasoned affiliate marketer, I am absolutely in love with the system and will be using it to create new niche sites... over and over and over.
This ranks right up there in my tool-set with WordPress!
Best,
P.S. If you want to see my BANS Site, to get an idea of the end result, you can check it out for yourself: www.SearchMusicalInstruments.com
About Lynn Terry
Are your eBay commissions handled by CJ.com?
Yup 😀
Lynn:
Awesome review! Will you be updating us on how well the site actually does in terms of traffic and revenue?
I've been on the fence about purchasing this product so any evidence you can provide that this tool actually "works" (i.e. produces revenue) would be helpful in making a final decision.
Travis
Yes, working with site builders / templates systems are fast and easy to handle. It just takes some creativity.
Rgds
Fione Tan
http://www.eOneNet.com
Lynn,
What if a person is NOT already an affiliate
with CJ.com and has no website to show
to CJ.com during the signup process.
Could they buy the BANS, set up a website
and then sign up and easily be approved as
an affiliate at CJ.com
Thank you,
MikeT
Good question, Mike. You can go to CJ.com right now and sign up for an account to see whether or not it gets approved - even before you order BANS. And of course BANS comes with a 90 day money-back guarantee through ClickBank so you can easily 'return it' if you are unable to use it.
Hi Travis,
Yes, I should think that would be fun to revisit this and use it as a case study for traffic generation and other tutorials!
I created a few bans sites myself. You're right, the script is awesome!
I would think getting a list together would be a formidable project if you know nothing about the subject. How will you communicate with your list members, if they know you are not up on the topic? This is definitely something that I've always heard: to have a real list, they have to know why *you* are qualified to run this site.
I'll watch to see if it makes any money.
Now that's a whole new topic in itself - which I will be addressing this week in a post titled Passion vs Profit 😉
A list is something every site should have, even your little niche affiliate sites. You dont necessarily have to write out an expert newsletter every week or month - there are other ways to set up mailing lists.
Great topics - I'll address these in detail in coming posts this week!
Hi, Lynn - great series of articles - I have been running a few BANS sites for a while - I've linked to one of them here. I agree that the script rocks - and that you can use the content management section to do lots more. Here's one of mine 🙂
http://www.diamondearringandnecklaceset.info
Best
Margaret
ps - Make mine a solitaire LOL
Great review Lynn thanks for that 🙂
Great review. My first BANS site is up and still under construction as to content. Thank you for the other ideas to optimize these sites. Being new to all of this I thank you for your insite and helpful hints - your experience is very helpful. My first site is a very competive market, but I already had the logo and name so I figured it was something to start with & learn. Check it out:
http://www.YourWeddingDayAccessories.com
It was easy and fun - I will definitely do more of these.
Sherri - http://www.WebAffliateMarketingOnline.com
Very cool - you both have some nice sites! 😉
I'll be sharing more tips in the near future, as I continue to develop my own BANS site.
Just a quick update...
As you probably know, the eBay Affiliate Program is handled by Commission Junction (CJ.com). I love to work within networks like that, as they combine commissions into one check every month - making it easy to meet minimum payouts. Plus, its just easier to get all your affiliate information organized under one network when you can.
Anyway, I did a few searches today and found a handful of music related affiliate programs that are also managed by CJ - so I already have several more programs to work with to add new products & revenue sources to my niche site!
For those of you creating your own BANS sites, be sure to search for other related programs within your CJ account for additional ways to monetize your site!
Another update for those that are following along...
BANS comes with SID Tracking so you can keep track of which pages/categories are performing best on your site.
Also, and I didnt realize this before, BANS gives you a whole zip file full of header graphics and logos to use with both of their template sizes! 😀
I don't know how everyone else says this is so easy!!! I've been trying to do my first BANS since yesterday and still not finished.
As a "newbie" I really expected it to be "simple" as your review states. I guess "simple" is still too advanced for me!!! Right now I'm finished up to the template area but find the "template guide" very hard to use and understand. Sooo many steps and requires you to go back and forth from the set up page to the guide for more things than I can understand.
Maybe I'm the exception but I feel I'm at a standstill with this program. Will check their forum page and your's to see if I can get a better understanding but that too requires time. At this rate it may be weeks before I can see a finished site - to say nothing of course about any income!!!
Hi, Martha - if you've got the site running as far as modifying the template, then you're most ways home.
Getting the look of the site right is important, but not as important as getting the content and getting it marketed.
Like Lynn, I use wordpress and bans to promote affiliate products - and one of my best performing sites is a basic wordpress template; nothing fancy at all. Yet, because of the keywords used, I am getting quite a bit of traffic and it's converting to sales.
To build good traffic to your site is what's going to take the time - and how it looks is secondary to that. Put in the products, start promoting it, back-up the database files and then work on tweaking the template so that the site's appearance starts to improve. There's still time to make a few sales before Christmas 🙂
Best
Margaret
http://macteddy.com/ - this is one of my basic wordpress sites 🙂
Hi Martha,
The BANS support forum is excellent so if you get hung up on ANYthing, just pop in there and post your question. I did that myself, and got the answer I needed right away - so that will go a long way towards helping you stay on track.
Best,
Lynn Terry
Neat blog, Margaret! Are you using the datafeeds through ShareaSale with a plugin, or just posting manually?
Hi, Lynn - depending on the time of day and inclination of ... whatever, GRIN, I sometimes use the datafeeds with the Teli Adlam script, I sometimes use Shareasale's Make a Page editor - but then, I have to manually edit it to remove all their table code and CSS styling and I sometimes add in a coupon code .
The latest wordpress is also great for adding in Goldencan feeds ..... loads of options.
I use the Make a Page feature and some of the GoldenCan stuff on BANS as well - http://pjbux.com/category/webkinz-coupons/ shows the Golden Can feed integrated into a wordpress post and this page shows a goldencan feed integrated into bans.
If you can find an RSS feed for products, they also go nicely into a Squidoo lens, although this doesn't display the pics, which is what really makes the difference. http://www.squidoo.com/coupons-and-bargains
🙂
Margaret
Hi, Lynn - I've tested the widget feature on Shareasale as well - it clips neatly into a bans store
... but I can't get wordpress to play ... yet.
I just keep telling myself that the work I do this year should really reap extra rewards next!
LOL
Thanks for the nice comment.
Margaret
That's true of course - consider it in an investment in yourself and your online business. The key is in being both consistent and persistent and continuing to move towards your goals 😉
Thanks Lynn and Margaret, I have posted my question (confusion!!) to the BANS forum and heard back pretty quickly from them so I'm sure I'll get there - eventually!!! I think you're right Margaret, I might be worry too much right now on these changes. I might just skip over this for now and see what else I can finish. I'm do sometimes get myself stuck on following "to the letter" since I always feel like I don't know what the heck I'm doing!!!!
Thanks for your responses.
Martha D
I'm glad you tapped into the BANS forum - its an awesome resource. See you there 😉
Hi, Lynn - I put up a video which describes most of the steps required to get a BANS store up and running -
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=533696901148391576
Just realised I have to go back and put in the bit about signing up as an eBay affiliate - DUH - I'd appreciate someone else's eyes giving this a review before I make the change(s).
Thanks
M
Margaret, this is an awesome video!! Thanks for making it and sharing with us. Definitely helps a lot. Do you think you could do one on the customization section?? That's where I'm still having some problems. Playing around with the colors - where they show up, when, remembering the color #'s, etc.
Thanks Margaret, really a fantastic help!
Lynn:
Any update on how this site is doing in terms of traffic/sales? I'm sitting on the edge of my seat here hoping this is going well for you;)
Travis
Hi Travis,
I'll be using this site as a case study for traffic & monetization throughout the coming year, so I'll definitely keep you updated through those posts.
I havent yet done any major updates or marketing with the site, as I am busy with year-end work... but it is already indexed and earning some revenue - will give an update with those details in the next week 😉
Wow, lots of great info on BANS here. One thing I cant figure out and maybe someone here can help me. How do you get the title page to NOT show up in the header? I am worikng on designing a new header but I dont want the page title that BANS sticks in the header to show up!
Any ideas would be great. Here is the site I am working on
http://mediazene.com/celebrity-pictures/
Thanks
Neo
Hi Neo,
You can edit the header in the admin panel - you have direct access to the css file and the templates. There is also a template guide in the Members section of BANS, and of course the Members Only Forum is a great help too.
Good job on the site!
Hey Neo,
I was having the same issue. I played around with the styles.css access through the admin section under templates.
/* Logo Site Name Start */
h1#title, h1#title a, h1#title a:hover{
font-size: 4px;
Change the font size to zero
Need honest opinion, especially from Lynn. What do you think about my first BAN site header? Does it look amateur? Should I go with an higher resolution stock photo? Any advice on improvement would be welcome.
Thanks in advance. 🙂
I do think a higher resolution image would look much nicer. 😉
Hi Lynn, pretty nice review. Started using BANS a week ago and just found out your review and it seems nice.
Now if you could come up with a few marketing tips and how to get more trafic to the websites, it would be an even greater review. That's so far my only complaint about bans, their tutorial don'T talk a lot about attracting trafic to your site and sinc eI'm new to that, I'm making tons and tons of searches on the net to have more information on that topic
Hi Yan, Thank you! You'll want to see my tips on that here: 10 Free Ways To Drive Traffic To A New Site 😉
Lynn,
Great review. I know why you are successful. I found you through research reading at 5staraffiliate forum. You were referenced on a post by Telian Adlam.
I saw BANS before and thought it looked interesting, maybe even too good to be true. The example sites looked very professional and clean.
I asked the owner of the blog about BANS and the reply I got was, "excuse me, but what is BANS?" So I knew I had to search elsewhere. I found my answers here. A very informative and comprehensive review.
Good Job!!!
Darwin
Thank you, Darwin - Glad you found it helpful!
Hi Lynn
I've been meaning to read this post since I found your site. I bought BANS about 6 months ago. I had major issues hosting with my domain registrar, GoDaddy. I love GoDaddy but BANS just doesn't interact with their control panel very well. I switched to Hostgator, as told in the members forum and all problems went away. I really have not marketed it, just too busy.
One thing with customizing is that you will still need to edit the php and css files at times. One note I'd like to reinforce to anyone somewhat uncomfortable with doing this and that is: open notepad and copy/paste/save the code (file) as a backup. Without a doubt that should be rule 1. That way if the edit doesn't work the way intended just copy/paste the original back. Saves alot of potential headaches. Came in very handy for me when I tried a couple of mods to create a user site map that just didn't want to work for me. Just put it back the way it was.
I had time over the holidays to play with mine add some customization. It was a good learning experience.
It stills all comes down to marketing in the end. That is the main reason I decided to go for mass control. It is not "Field of Dreams" just cause you built it doesn't mean anyone comes.
BANS, I like it and plan to build more. I do wish it integrated better with WordPress, though.
Al
Hi Al,
Yes GoDaddy can be difficult - you did the right thing by switching to HostGator. As for marketing, that's the challenge with any type of site or blog you create of course, not just BANS.
You can easily add a WordPress blog to your site in a new directory or on a subdomain. I assume that's not what you mean - how did you want to integrate it exactly?
My only negative regarding BANS is the look. The templates are limited to a few. Most of the stores have the same basic look. If you want to be more distinctive you really have to get in to the code. On my BANS site I played around and finally had it where I was happy with it, although not finished.
That being said it would be nice to be able to change the look on the fly, as with WordPress. Find the template you like, from 1000's, upload, select, done. Maybe not always that simple but it gets my thought across.
In all fairness, once I started playing with my site and everything started coming together, it was a nice feeling of accomplishment.
Al
I started to hear a LOT about how Build a Niche Store was working really well for some people, with stories of users making $100+ a day from a variety of Niches. So how does it work? Build a Niche Store creates a complete web site from any ebay category you want (of which there are hundreds) and builds all the links, pages, images etc without you having to do anything?
That's right 😉
@technology
That is the sole reason BANS is so popular. The hard part is driving the traffic, and making sure that traffic converts on your BANS page.
Eee PC Store
I have a question for Margaret,
I discovered this wonderful site and Lynn, a wonderful person, just today early morning.
I saw your very neat looking WordPress about pyjamas. Is it made with BANS ?
You mentioned Shareasale. What is it ?
Thanks!
one more question for Margaret,
all the stuff on macteddy, you make it ?
Is it pure WordPress ?
Hi, Zal - thanks for the nice comments.
OK, the pyjama site is a wordpress site pure and simple. I put in products from shareasale, which is an affiliate network like BANS. The same goes for the Macteddy site. The only thing I make these days is baking for my coffee shop 🙂
WordPress will run with eBay affiliate feeds; the Editor Kit can give you code to put into your blog.
There are so many ways to use these sites .... and I suspect they'll continue to grow as companies realise the value in having a whole lot of affiliates driving traffic (and sales) to their web sites.
Margaret
Thank you Margaret, and your sites look awesome!
I have another question now related to BANS, I hope Lynn will have some time to read it.
I contacted BANS to ask if it works with Mac.
I'm on Mac and using Safari only.
Adam from BANS said that Safari has some problems with HTML. He knows that from their forum. And their forum is for users only.
I don't want to install another browser, because Safari is as perfect as the browser can be.
If anybody uses Safari here with BANS, I'd appreciate to know any tips.
I posted this question on Lynn's forum, but so far no replies. Am I the only one with Mac ???!!
Hi Zal
I'm not sure that I totally understand your question. Wouldn't the browser be client side versus server side? BANS application is installed server side. The problem with the website would be browser specific related.
I would suggest viewing BANS customer stores (http://www.buildanichestore.com/customer-stores.php) in your browser. Then I would suggest entering their url at: http://browsershots.org/ , there you can select many browser viewing options and see a screenshot of the site as it appears browser specific.
If you have specific questions, let me know and I will see it I can find you answers in the BANS forum.
Al
Al offers good advice. Try that Zal and let us know 😉