Turning my Hobby Site into a Money-Maker

[Gox777]

Hi, I'm glad to have found this forum. I'm wondering if you all can share some insight.

I'm 18 and I run a website, RXGaming.net (http://www.RXGaming.net). The website started a few years back as a place to host gaming videos. The videos feature our group playing entertaining casual matches in a sort of "talk radio meets videogames" fashion.
(For all practical purposes, you could say I'm trying to market a talk radio show).
Our videos have a very loyal, but small following.

As content providers, our ideal goal is to generate income through web ads, sponsorships or endorsements. Before that can happen though, I realized we need to grow our website and get more people visiting. We recently adopted a strategey of catering to the competitive gaming audience as a way of getting out there. Tournament videos are already in demand by the community; in the past month, we've recorded 2 tournaments and our youtube subscriber count has increased by about 100.

Other plans for our website:
-user driven, searchable tournmanet index
-game reviews
-informative articles and reference lists
-ability for users to comment on articles and site updates (blog style).

Until we get our visitor numbers up, I've also thought of alternative ideas for generating income.
-Cooperating with gaming event holders to sell concessions, games and accessories at events.
-Asking for donations
-Selling RX merchandise
-Coordinating parimutuel bets at tournaments (definitely need to check up on the legalities of this one)

Please share your thoughts on my ideas.
I'd especially love to hear from anyone with experience in getting sponsorships or advertising partners.

[Mynameis...]

Well, it's really a good idea to devote your work in something you like, because if you worked hard for it, you would be working with all your "heart" and would try hard seriously. There are many people who begin their own work with something they don't like and are not even convinced of, and they turn out at the end of the day failing it and not continuing in this job.
So, hope you will get the best out of your work. Good luck.

[Norrad]

Looks like you have grand plans for the site. I would suggest you start marketing it more, to increase visitors. Remember that to make money, you are going to need to spend money.

[Twi$ted]

A great idea for you to start reeling in a bit of cash is to begin by putting ads on your site. Find people that are similar in your niche, gaming, and see if they'd want to advertise on your site. More than likely that is one of the best ways. You could also possibly become an Amazon affiliate and make a page for reviews of games you've played, then give a link to purchase the game on Amazon. Which you will then earn commission. Just an idea though

[Fergal]

Welcome to Business Advice Forum Gox777 and thanks for posting your question. Your site looks great, congratulations with that. How many unique visitors are you getting on average per month?

I do like Twi$ted's idea of getting affiliates and Amazon's Affiliate Programme (https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/) would be a great place to start. You could also have a look at http://www.cj.com/. Thinking outside the box might also help when it comes to affiliates. For example, would many of your visitors be interested in owning their own sites, if yes you might become a hosting affiliate.

Have you considered putting Google Adsense (https://www.google.com/adsense/) ads on your site?

Could you generate revenue by selling premium membership? You would need to supply something in return to encourage your free members to upgrade, perhaps access to VIP areas or give free content to premium members.

What about a PayPal donation button (https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_donate-intro-outside)? I'm not a huge fan of them myself but they do work well for certain types of sites.

Please post back to let us know your thoughts and we will give you more help and suggestions.

[aeshna]

Your site looks great and also contains some really useful content for a gamer. I think I will check it out again soon. It is good that you have chosen this niche for your website as it is your hobby also. If you are well known about something only then you can tell it to others. I think you can make more cash by placing some ads there and also advertising your website on other sites. This will generate more traffic to your site.
The other ideas you have chosen also look great.
Keep it up and all the best for all your future endeavours!

[doku]

just get the kickstart from the thing that you love most. That's an easy way to motivate yours and inspiring for a better improvement. Nice plan you got there. You may earn more by offering more features or find an x-factor that realy can drive your site very well. Keep it up!

[junglekid]

Here are some ideas for monetizing your website:

1. Google adsense ( already mentioned )
2. CPA offers - use this free service to find offers related to your niche: http://offervault.com/
3. Sell advertising space - you'll get the most out of it once your website has a lot of traffic but in the meantime you can try with adbrite, adjungle, adengage
4. Promote affiliate products - go to ClickBank, Linkshare, Commission Junction and search for products related to your niche

[Gox777]

Thank you all.
I really appreciate all the ideas and links!
I'll definitely check them out.

Working on this website is definitely something I enjoy. It wouldn't be where it is now otherwise.

[Gox777]

Btw, this is a look at the site's webalizer stats.
http://animefakedubs.net/uploader/uploads/rxgaming_stats_7-9-09.png
The yellow visits column represents unique page visits. To be honest, I'm a bit surprised it's as high as ~3000/month. I think there's plenty of improvement to be made either way though.

My next project will be to add a comment system for all the news updates to make it more blog-like. This should give people a reason to check the site more often.

[Fergal]

Personally if I owned the site I'd concentrate on building traffic at this time and only start thinking about revenue, when the site is quite a lot busier. Please don't get me wrong 3,000 visitors per month is great, and the fact that your unique visitors are increasing is excellent, well done with that. My only concern is that introducing ads now might actually slow down your site's growth, as first time visitors are sometimes put off by ads, on sites that are not that busy.

The fact that you have so many members who have contributed a decent amount of posts on the site's forum, shows that your visitors are indeed loyal. You might consider asking them to refer other people to the site, to help build traffic and membership. You could even run a small competition based on referrals.

What are your ambitions for the site? Do you want to make a living from it or are you just looking to earn some money to contribute towards hosting costs etc? If you are just looking for a small contribution towards cost, then by all means include some ads. However, if your ambition for the site is greater, you should be conscious of the fact that publishing ads at this time might inhibit your growth.

[Gox777]

Personally if I owned the site I'd concentrate on building traffic at this time and only start thinking about revenue, when the site is quite a lot busier. Please don't get me wrong 3,000 visitors per month is great, and the fact that your unique visitors are increasing is excellent, well done with that. My only concern is that introducing ads now might actually slow down your site's growth, as first time visitors are sometimes put off by ads, on sites that are not that busy.

The fact that you have so many members who have contributed a decent amount of posts on the site's forum, shows that your visitors are indeed loyal. You might consider asking them to refer other people to the site, to help build traffic and membership. You could even run a small competition based on referrals.

What are your ambitions for the site? Do you want to make a living from it or are you just looking to earn some money to contribute towards hosting costs etc? If you are just looking for a small contribution towards cost, then by all means include some ads. However, if your ambition for the site is greater, you should be conscious of the fact that publishing ads at this time might inhibit your growth.

Yes, that has been our idea as well: Focus on increasing traffic first, then worry about advertising. Realistically speaking, I don't see myself making a living off of this...not now anyway, but if I see begin to see the possibility, I would certainly welcome it. I still have plans to continue my education and further my career as a web developer/designer. Let's say I would be very happy to see an extra $100-$500 coming in RX Gaming revenue.

As far as the forums go, something I intend to do eventually is integrate them into the main site more, sharing the same database. That'll be quite a project.
Also, I'll definitely think on that contest idea.
Thanks Fergal.

[Fergal]

...As far as the forums go, something I intend to do eventually is integrate them into the main site more, sharing the same database...

You could start by integrating the design of the site into the forum. Even replacing the forum header with your site header would make the forum appear much more part of your site. Plus having the navigation links to the rest of your site, in the forum area could also help with your site traffic.