The world of SEO and digital marketing is always changing. There are some big things happening, like getting rid of third-party cookies and Google cracking down on websites with informational content. This has left many marketers wondering how they can keep making money online in 2024 and beyond. In this article, we’ll pick up some expert opinions from Jacky Chou, the founder of Indexsy on how to make money in SEO and affiliate marketing in 2024.
Jacky is well-known for being one of the best affiliate marketers and SEO experts out there. He makes over $500,000 per month from his content sites using data-driven approaches and focusing on topics that are always in demand. He also forms effective partnerships and finds different ways to make money. Each year, his business keeps growing.
In a recent interview, he went into detail about how he achieved this success. He provides real-life examples, tactics, and predictions that other marketers can use to be successful too.
Jacky Chou
The expert: Getting to know Jacky Chou
To better understand where these insights are coming from, it's worth learning more about Jacky Chou - the expert source behind the guidance. Based in Vancouver, Canada, Jacky got his start practicing local SEO techniques like rent-and-rank over 8 years ago optimizing for competitive city-focused keywords.
Since then, he has evolved his career into running a successful SEO consultancy agency. However, Jacky's business has progressed beyond traditional project work into managing massive-scale partnership deals and networks generating over half a million dollars monthly at its peak.
Leveraging strategic alliances with already established websites facing monetization difficulties, Jacky's optimized affiliate marketing strategies have supercharged combined revenues multiplying incomes significantly. In addition to his agency operations, Jacky also owns the home goods e-commerce business Far and Away producing additional revenues through tactical content.
Extremely active on social platforms like Twitter and YouTube, Jacky transparently shares his knowledge helping others succeed similarly. Despite accomplishments, he maintains a humble attitude recommending starting small local before larger ambitions. Jacky prioritizes sustainability through value-added collaborations rather than risky short-term tactics.
Beyond revenues, Jacky also openly tracks metrics like his total network valuation and personal net worth quantifying progress. His goals involve vertical integration by potentially launching private label products within dominant categories moving beyond pure content partnerships. Jacky's focus on practical, partnership-powered strategies amid constant change positions well according to proven results.
Now lets look at what he predicts to happen in 2024:
- Changing trends demand pivots
One of Jacky's boldest predictions is that informational content sites relying heavily on display ad revenue will struggle significantly moving forward as digital trends evolve. With regulations like GDPR and the upcoming removal of third-party cookies, the ability to target ads effectively will be disrupted. This means that these sites, which depend on data to deliver ads efficiently, will see a sharp decline in their revenues.
Jacky is highly confident, with a 90% certainty level, that within the next 5 years, traffic and income from basic informational article sites will be severely impacted. This means that these sites will struggle to attract visitors and make money. Factors like the emergence of AI-powered search engines and virtual assistants that can instantly provide factual answers to queries will also contribute to a decrease in organic search volumes for these informational sites over time.
While some informational content may still hold value, businesses that are solely built around articles filled with data and display ad networks are at high risk. Those who are unwilling or unable to diversify their revenue streams and adapt their strategies will find it increasingly difficult to sustain their operations based solely on traffic as user behavior changes.
According to Jacky, the time is now for SEO experts focused on informational content to assess the risks they face and start developing alternative approaches to strengthen their businesses.
- Affiliate marketing still holds promise
Despite the challenges likely to be faced by display ads, Jacky is still very optimistic about affiliate marketing as a way to make good money in 2024 and beyond. He believes that certain niches, like health, supplements, tools, and home goods, which are focused on products people actively buy, will continue to generate affiliate sales for websites that are optimized for this purpose.
However, Jacky warns that the specific strategies needed for success in affiliate marketing will change. He cautions against relying on short-term tactics like using temporary open forums for parasite SEO, as these methods may work for a little while but will eventually be blocked as platforms adapt their policies.
Instead, Jacky recommends focusing on long-term, stable results. He suggests either building dedicated websites from scratch or forming partnerships with other businesses. When starting from scratch, it's important to focus on evergreen niches like home improvement, which have a consistent demand, rather than chasing the latest trends. It's crucial to create unique and helpful content that answers readers' questions, rather than just including links to products on Amazon. This will help build trust and engagement over time.
Jacky also emphasizes the importance of diversifying linking approaches beyond guest posts. It's necessary to treat link building as a real business and find multiple ways to distribute your content and reach your audience, rather than relying on shortcuts. With a solid foundation and patience, Jacky believes that affiliate marketing can still be a profitable and sustainable way to make money, even as the industry changes. The key is to adapt strategies to follow the best practices that have been proven effective in the industry.
More analysis on affiliate marketing and display ads in 2024
When it comes to affiliate marketing and display ads, Jacky sees some big changes coming in 2024. As said earlier, he predicts that display ad revenue will take a major hit with the removal of third-party cookies, which will disrupt targeting and measurement. As Google and others shift to contextual targeting based on on-page content rather than individual user profiles and interests, it will become much harder for publishers to effectively monetize display inventory.
However, Jacky remains very bullish on the prospects of affiliate marketing, which he sees as still having strong potential in 2024 and beyond. For those looking to get started with affiliate marketing in the new year, he recommends the following approaches:
- Avoid expired or auction domains, which Google now catches onto quickly. It's better to build sites from scratch with new domains.
- Parasite publishing (piggybacking on authority sites like Outlook.com India) can work short-term as Google plays whack-a-mole closing loopholes, but it's a game of diminishing returns.
- Focus on evergreen niches like home/garden or supplements/nutrition. These have consistent search volume and don't require constant content updates.
- Look for affiliate opportunities in trending topics. If an influencer brings attention to a supplement, get articles up about it ASAP for the surge in searches.
- Partnerships will be increasingly important, both for scaling existing affiliate sites and accessing new domains/audiences.
For link building, Jacky recommends using a variety of techniques like guest posts, niche edits, and citations rather than relying on a single strategy. The goal is to treat link building like developing a real business with an overall strategic plan. Key factors will still be relevance, authority, and variety in outreach.
Making money with partnerships
A major revenue driver Jacky has found success with is launching partnerships. This involves identifying authoritative websites struggling with monetization and offering to boost their affiliate earnings through additional content, sales outreach, and other optimizations.
One of Jacky's most lucrative partnerships generated over $300k per month through this model. Rather than taking a monthly retainer, his agency splits the incremental affiliate revenue directly. This aligns incentives to maximize profits together.
Some tips Jacky provides for those looking to get into the partnership game include:
- Start small, like partnering with a popular local restaurant's website, not a huge SaaS company initially.
- Piggyback on the authority partner's domain rather than trying to build your own site equally as large.
- In addition to articles, develop monetizable on-site elements like review directories (similar to Clutch.co).
- Consider retail "rank-and-rent" deals to feature specific affiliate products in high slots for a monthly fee.
- Aim to eventually "close the loop" and launch your own niche brand/product.
Jacky also discusses his successful partnership model with his e-commerce site Far and Away, where pumping affiliate content into related topics profits the business by $10,000 to $15,000 per month with no downsides. He believes e-commerce partnerships hold great potential.
Making money with Rank-and-Rent
While some criticize rank-and-rent strategies as illegitimate, Jacky believes there are ethical and effective ways to implement them when done properly at scale. For example, his groups replicate the Clutch.co business model with local review directories.
Rather than focusing on single domains, they target directories across multiple cities and niches. Jacky prefers this over the traditional individual domain rank-and-rent approach, finding it less volatile and has higher potential. Industries like cannabis, supplements, and blue-collar jobs actively purchase listings.
To maximize deals, Jacky emphasizes sales outreach through ad reps making the value proposition irresistible. With proven rankings already in place, services essentially sell themselves. While individual deals may be small, the aggregate profits at volume become substantial.
Jacky also notes how rank-and-rent can lead organically into related business ventures. Using industry insights and sales data, opportunities emerge for complementary product launches when demand is guaranteed. Rank-and-rent establishes a jumping point for bigger initiatives.
Local SEO business Ideas
In addition to local directories, Jacky has found success ranking highly localized services and products. Whether targeting specific dentists, realtors, or other businesses, ranking #1 and then renting the slot out through a paid listing generates ongoing client work.
However, Jacky mentions challenges with this approach as local businesses are often reluctant to pay for listings despite large profits on the line. High-risk industries like cannabis are more receptive. In general, the workload of managing multiple micro-clients gets tiresome for the money involved.
Going forward, Jacky sees partnering with local marketing agencies as a more scalable strategy than directly serving small businesses. There's an opportunity to build agency review sites that list and promote local SEO providers, similar to building nationwide versions targeted at industries. Partnering with established local players opens many doors.
Growing revenue streams in 2024
Jacky has some ambitious plans and predictions for growing his business and increasing his revenue streams in 2024 and beyond. His main goal is to focus on developing his own assets rather than relying heavily on third-party platforms for monetization.
Here are some specific strategies that Jacky intends to implement:
- Partnering with affiliate sites to gain control over entire search engine results pages (SERPs) and keywords. Once he has proven the demand, he plans to launch niche products to capitalize on the opportunity.
- Creating agency directory clones, such as "Clutch for X," that target specific local or industry service providers. These listings will be monetized, providing an additional revenue stream.
- Diversifying his revenue sources away from relying solely on Google by launching new products and pursuing ventures that guarantee traffic.
- Focusing on community engagement to attract affiliate marketers with a high potential for success. Jacky plans to engage with communities through platforms like Advise.so and YouTube, as valuable communities can generate referral business.
- Consider mergers and acquisitions to consolidate complementary affiliate sites within core niches, allowing for faster growth and dominance in those areas.
- Expanding the partnership model to potentially include equity stakes in clients' businesses, leveraging his expertise in affiliate marketing and sales.
While Jacky did not disclose his exact earnings, he mentioned some details about his revenue streams:
- At his peak, he generated over $500,000 in affiliate revenue in a single month, which he attributed to successful partnership strategies.
- His e-commerce business, Far and Away, earns an additional $10,000 to $15,000 per month in profit through affiliate marketing integrated into relevant content.
- One of his large partnerships scaled up from zero to $300,000 per month within just three months, thanks to optimized affiliate articles and sales tactics.
- Jacky tracks metrics like his network valuation and personal net worth, indicating that he has accumulated assets worth millions of dollars over the years.
- Individual rent-and-rank deals for local businesses typically generate up to $2,000 per month, but managing multiple deals requires a lot of effort.
- Major brand partnerships that secure "retail rent-and-rank" placements on ranking results pages can lead to ongoing commissions of 20% or more of sales in some cases.
Jacky is focusing on extracting more value from profitable niches and audiences by building his own assets and moving away from third-party channels and short-term tactics. By doing so, he aims to ensure resilience against changes in the business landscape.
Summary of the predictions for 2024
In summarizing his thoughts on the 2024 SEO landscape, Jacky makes some bold predictions:
- Informational content sites reliant on display ads are 90% certain to see almost all revenue disappear within 5 years as queries trend conversational.
- Niche site communities focused on topics rather than moneymaking will struggle as Google further disadvantages thin authority. Partnerships are the solution.
- Display ad revenue joining the graveyard as third-party cookies leave and contextual becomes king. Anyone bullish here needs a reality check.
- Affiliate remains strong through evergreen niches and product launches filling proven demand volumes.
- YouTube's profitability continues growing through high-intent, aligned audiences if dialed-in content focuses on that niche.
- Cloned agency directories and services have an 8-figure potential to capture local SMB spending currently lost to clueless referrers.
- Closing loops into owned products serves as a natural evolution from insights gained dominating the SERPs around relevant keywords.
- Look for M&A opportunities to accelerate scaling across wider niches with readymade proven assets.
For Jacky, the winners will be those marketers able to think one step ahead - using current skills and insights more strategically to build resilient owned-and-operated business models less reliant on external infrastructure changes outside their control. 2024 presents exciting opportunities for transformation.
