From Mastermind to Site to Relaunch (Our Affiliate Marketing Journey)

We could earn cash or merchandise from the businesses talked about on this put up.

Over a decade in the past, I reached out to somebody I had met at Affiliate Summit, asking if he can be fascinated about a Mastermind Group. He approached one other Affiliate Summit attendee that we had been each slightly acquainted with however not precisely associates with. Little did we all know the friendship that was about to be fashioned in addition to the ways in which it will change all of our companies.

The Mastermind Group

We began assembly as a Mastermind Group each Friday afternoon in 2011. At Affiliate Summit West 2012, we gave a presentation entitled Mastermind Teams Uncovered: Success in Affiliate Advertising and marketing. Watching that video again at the moment, I notice simply how fortunate I used to be to be with these two. Close to the tip of the session, somebody within the viewers requested if we had thought-about any joint ventures. We responded that simply earlier than the panel began, an OPM approached us with a shopper that he thought we might promote. These little bitty seeds become The Wine Membership Group.

Facet observe: Nearly all the things we mentioned in that video from 10 years in the past continues to be related to affiliate entrepreneurs at the moment. Besides now we use Zoom or Google Meet as a substitute of Skype. Not a lot in internet affiliate marketing stands the check of time for a decade. However in case you are fascinated about methods to begin a Mastermind Group, it’s nonetheless an important video. It’s also possible to discover the presentation itself on Slideshare. Even for those who don’t begin a full-on Mastermind Group, I might encourage you to hitch some Fb Teams or Slack channels that do one thing related the place you’ll be able to bounce issues off of different affiliate entrepreneurs that you just belief.

The Website

The positioning we ended up creating collectively was Wine Membership Critiques and Scores, later redirected to Wine Membership Group (after Google stopped preferring long-tail key phrase domains and we determined branding was extra necessary). The premise was that we might evaluation wine golf equipment however achieve this authentically. We’d take our personal photos, create our personal content material, and put up our personal movies of every membership. We began with simply the one service provider that the OPM really useful to us however over time began including others.

We dabbled in wine-related content material like wine bottle holders and recipes with wine in them. However we saved coming again to the concept we would have liked to maintain it easy and evaluation the CLUBS. We even tried a beer evaluation web site utilizing the identical premise and template, however it simply didn’t have the legs that the wine had. (that’s a play on phrases these of you who don’t drink crimson wine) As soon as we even did a Fb dwell occasion the place we every drank wine and ate Turkey Dinner Sweet Corn for hours. That’s positively an evening none of us will ever overlook.

We divided up the work primarily based on our strengths. This was a direct results of our time as a Mastermind Group as a result of we had discovered a lot about what one another might do. I concentrate on content material and social media whereas Todd and Eric do many of the technical work, together with WordPress, database, and so on. We every leap in with critiques, photographs, and movies the place it is sensible.

The positioning served us effectively for a few years. Some months we might hardly contact all of it. Different months we might be frantically updating plugins, including new golf equipment, and writing present guides. The positioning has turned a revenue each month since we created it. Generally we might see visitors spikes and work collectively to reap the benefits of them (like after we had been the primary medium to create a Lady Scout Cookies and Wine Pairing information). We knew we would have liked to provide the positioning a significant overhaul however then the pandemic hit and everybody was shopping for wine on-line and we didn’t wish to break a worthwhile web site.

The Relaunch

Now that buying habits are returning to regular, we knew that we would have liked to redo the positioning from the bottom up. As every of us is way busier now with different jobs and tasks, we ended up outsourcing a variety of the template redesign. Nonetheless, Todd and Eric did many of the work on the database, the plugins, and the redirects.

Though all the things isn’t excellent, we all know sufficient to not mess with rather more earlier than Google has an opportunity to re-index all the things earlier than Black Friday. The positioning operates higher on cellular, which is a a lot larger concern than it was after we initially constructed it. We discovered via watching our analytics over time which pages want instant consideration and which may be handled over time.

So I current to you our new web site for Wine Membership Group!

Together with that, I wish to thank the 2 finest enterprise companions a woman might ask for– Eric Nagel and Todd Farmer. They’ve actually been the wind beneath my wings in some ways for over a decade. (for you younger of us, that’s an previous sappy tune) They’ve taught me a lot about internet affiliate marketing however have additionally been essentially the most unimaginable associates.

What’s Subsequent?

Though we don’t meet as a Mastermind Group each week anymore, we now keep up a correspondence each day in a Slack Channel and meet each different week through Zoom to speak about both the positioning or no matter life has introduced us. We nonetheless do most of the issues we did when assembly weekly as a Mastermind–give one another recommendation, share one another’s content material, brainstorm collectively, and so on. I don’t know what the subsequent decade will carry for us by way of internet affiliate marketing, however I can solely hope will probably be a continued friendship!