Recently, I wrote about how my Epik affiliate earnings are up (quite a bit). That post generated a lot of interest in the Epik platform and I quickly got the question: Ian, how much are you making with Epik? Can you share your earnings like you did for eBay and Commission Junction? Today, I thought I’d follow up on my previous post and answer this question with real numbers!
I’m Earning $3,544/Year On My $15,000 Investment (24% Yield)
I own 55 Epik Product Portal websites. Most of these product portals are brand new websites. They’re domains I’ve acquired within the last few years that I decided to develop on the Epik platform. Others are websites I acquired from Epik (such as Stereo Amplifiers, portrayed to the right). All of my Product Portals have custom articles (2 per site) and most have custom header blurbs too (on each sub-section of the site). I spent a ton of time and money building the best content possible because it’s all about user experience at the end of the day. I’m building quality sites that truly benefit the Internet and always recommend over-investing in great content. Between domain registration fees, development fees, acquisition fees, and article outsourcing fees, my total cost is $15,000.
Now, let’s look at the revenue side of things. Here are my earnings over the last four weeks:
- 6/29-7/4: $113.09 revenue
- 7/5-7/11: $188.63 revenue
- 7/12-7/18: $123.14 revenue
- 7/19-7/25: $118.88 revenue
- TOTAL: $543.74 revenue
Now, $543.74 divided by 28 is $19.42/day. $19.42/day times 365 is $7,088 revenue/year. However, until you’re earning more with Epik, the rev share is 50/50. (You can read more about the Epik revenue share tiers here.) So, my take on the revenue is $3,544/year. As a side note: I’m very happy with Epik’s rev share model, it’s quite generous. Moreover, Epik is a true partner and without the Epik team my sites would not be where they are. The rev share is worth every dollar!
Personally, I feel that my revenue is going to come in much higher. Why? Most product shopping happens in Q4 (holiday shopping season). My earnings should jump up during that time! However, I like to be conservative in my financial modeling so let’s just say my annual revenue is $3,544 based on the last 4 week’s data. (Also, I am not factoring in my annual domain renewal fees of approximately $500 but again that should be hugely overshadowed by my holiday season earnings.) $3,544 divided by my $15,000 cost is a sweet 24% yield!
My Epik Yield Is Unparalleled In Other Investments
I’m a huge fan of cash flow and invest in all sorts of investment vehicles that offer cash flow. I’m talking about dividend-paying stocks, websites (both build from scratch and also buy established websites), and more. Very few investments return a 24% annual yield within the first year of the venture. In the stock market, even if you buy the high yielding tobacco companies or telecom companies, we’re talking about an yield in the high 5% range.
I’m not counting capital appreciation here but I’m not counting that for my Epik Product Portals either. Come to think of it, the capital appreciation with Epik Product Portals is much higher than stocks. Why? Sites like Flippa are heating up and it’s a hot market for income-producing websites right now. Just check out my last post about Zac Johnson’s eBook.
My end conclusion: Epik Product Portals are one of the best investments around. The websites are truly useful and are making the Internet a better place. I’m finding that by partnering with Epik, I’m earning extremely high yields with scale. My future includes many more Product Portals as I plan to expand my portfolio to well over 100 Product Portals over time.
Get Started For Just $224.10 With My Epik Coupon Code
Want to give it a test? Your first Product Portal will only cost you $224.10. The regular price is $249, but you get 10% off with the exclusive PPC Ian coupon (PPCIAN10). Click here to get started with Epik! Anyone else out there developing sites on Epik? I’d love to hear your experience. Want to learn even more? Below, I link to some of my other posts about Epik:
- My Personal Epik Product Portal Websites – Learn all about my personal websites on Epik.
- Epik Product Portal Domain Development Tips – Epik website development tips that work wonders, especially on Epik’s new Product Portal 3.0 platform.
- Epik Product Portal Tips and Special PPC Ian Discount – Even more Epik development tips and also my exclusive coupon code (PPCIAN10). If you enter this code upon checkout, you will receive 10% off your entire order.
- My Affiliate Earnings Are Up With Epik 3.0 – Learn about my recent success on Epik since the launch of their brand new Product Portal 3.0 platform.
Image in this post © PPCIan.com
Posted in: Domains | Tags: epik, epik product portal | Comments: 10 comments so far, join the discussion!
10 Comments
Hi Ian,
At this rate, assuming it doesn’t die down a bit from the increase of competition, it takes 4 years to get your investment back. Why go through all the trouble when you can continue to do ppc and see results in much less time, even though sometimes you are at a loss?
Hi Jeffrey,
Thanks so much for the comment and question! I’m glad you asked this because the question brings up some really interesting topics…
It is very hard to compare PPC to Epik. PPC Is a high risk media channel that involves full time work. I like to equate it to the NYSE trading floor, except it’s 24/7. It’s (very) active income, not passive income. If you do not actively manage PPC, the downside is tremendous. Epik, on the other hand, is true passive income. You build the SEO website and continue to refine over time, but it mostly does its own thing (and grows organically over time). My Epik sites make money while I sleep. There’s low risk because there’s no day-to-day media spend, and you have built a website/asset you can easily sell. With PPC, there is absolutely nothing you can sell (unless there’s an underlying SEO website that does a ton of SEO traffic). Investors 5 years ago would buy PPC income streams, but not anymore (they are only interested in SEO properties such as Epik properties). As someone who’s been involved in a multitude to big acquisition deals, I’m definitely able to comment on this market perception.
Other passive investments that are good comps to Epik include buying existing SEO-optimized websites that throw off income, investing in real estate for cash flow (Robert Kiyosaki style), investing in dividend-paying stocks, or placing your money in a CD (or something a bit more favorable like Lending Club). When it comes to any of these alternatives, you’re going to be hard pressed to find a comparable passive cash flow return to 24%. In a CD, for example, we’re talking about a 1% or less interest rate (versus the 24% I’m seeing on Epik). In the stock market, I’m happy all day long to buy stocks yielding 5-6%. At that rate, it would take me around 20 years to make my investment back in cash flow alone (not factoring in dividend reinvestment or dividend hikes, but also I’m not factoring that into my Epik model either).
Moreover, my model is very conservative for several reasons:
1. Most of my sites have been on Epik less than one year. Most are sites that didn’t even exist before, and I purchased the domains within the last year or so. As I’ve seen with the other sites in my portfolio, age matters. My sites built in 2007 comprise 80%+ of my overall website income. Over time, my Epik sites will end up making even more money, but I’m being conservative in my model and just saying that we’ll stay at 24%.
2. Holiday shopping could account for half or more of my annual earnings. If I factor that in, my return would be even higher.
3. I completely disregard capital appreciation. CDs don’t appreciate at all. Stocks appreciate some, but not much. However, if I wanted to, I could sell my Epik sties for a strong multiple and make a great return that way. Developing income streams in a scalable fashion commands a high valuation on the equity side of things. That said, I’m a cash flow investor so I’m not really looking to sell (and that’s why I ignored that in my model).
If you go out an look for a passive income investment that yields more than 24% cash dividend return within a year of the venture (with scale and minimal time investment in setting it up), I’d be quite impressed. Are you currently invested in any such vehicles? Sure, there are some and I have experienced that first hand buying websites. However, in the scheme of things and when we’re talking about scaling, I really feel you’re going to be hard pressed to find a better return. Thanks again!
All the best,
Ian
Hi Ian,
I have some portals developed at Epik and I’m quite pleased with their performance so far as well. I do have a question, that I wanted to ask you a while ago, but didn’t have a chance to: in your opinion, would it be worth it to run a PPC campaign for the portals overall? Would you or did you do it for one of your portals?
Thank you.
RK,
Right now, I’m on the basic Product Portal platform. CPCs within paid search have been rising steadily over the years due to large, corporate brands entering the market. As such, I do not believe it would be hugely profitable to run paid search to basic Product Portal sites. That said, I do plan on exploring Epik’s eCommerce platform (soon). Once I’m developing drop ship eCommerce sites, I guarantee you 100% I’m going to test paid search (and will report my results here). The margins are going to be high enough with an eCommerce site to support paid search campaigns. Hope this helps!
Thanks so much for the comment! While my name is PPC Ian, I’m not currently sending PPC traffic to my Epik Product Portals.
All the best,
Ian
PS – While I currently don’t own any lead gen portals with Epik, that’s another type of site that could work well with paid search (especially if I were to leverage adCenter since it’s a bit cheaper than AdWords in certain verticals).
Have you noticed any spikes or declines in traffic over time? Is it duplicatable?
Hi John,
Recently, with the launch of Epik Product Portal 3.0, I have seen a steady increase in the traffic and performance of my Epik websites. I have found the best strategy with Epik is a portfolio approach. It’s hard to predict in advance which sites will work the best, but with my portfolio of 55 Product Portals I have seen a relatively even and consistent spread of traffic and profit by website. Of course, some are huge winners, and others not as much, but overall I’m seeing a lot of consistency.
Awesome question!
All the best,
Ian
There is no doubt that this one is quite interesting and awesome business model. 24% earning … simply awesome.
Social Bookmarking Service,
Thanks for the comment. Epik is really great and I highly recommend giving it a try. Don’t forget to use my special PPC Ian coupon code for instant savings.
All the best,
Ian
This is a great business opportunity. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for the comment, Greg. You are quite welcome. If you have any questions about Epik at all, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
Best,
Ian