Before I walk away from my niche...

So I'm 99% done going through all the materials in the classroom section and ready to rock n roll, but I have the small dilemma of the RV website my wife and I run. She built it up from nothing and it's paying our bills, but I wanna move on and start putting Ronin deals together... but I know she's going to be pretty hurt so I'd really LOVE to figure out a way to apply some Ronin mojo to the site and keep us both happy.

I've already spoken about it a little in one of the other posts, and concluded that offering our lead magnet to other RV blogs could bring in some traffic and build our email list... however, we have nothing for sale and 90% of our revenue comes from display ads on the site.

So my point... I'm keen to know if anyone has any ideas on how to apply some Ronin tactics to our RV blog.

I don't like to just throw a request out and then sit back and expect everyone to solve all my problems, so I'll start with the ideas I already have rolling around in my head...

As mentioned, we could offer our lead magnet to other RV blogs to use as their own lead magnet but keep the opt-in & download page on our site so we have control, allowing us to add affiliate links into the lead magnet and landing page. This would build our list and generate more ad revenue. The lead magnet itself is a spreadsheet with a whole bunch of data about each make and model of RV in the US (the benefit is that it saves hundreds of hours of manual research) so there's plenty of space in there to throw in a little T1 or something.

2. The problem with the idea above is we have no product to sell and have been wracking our brains for product ideas for ages now... but as a Ronin... I don't wanna create a product... so I need to find affiliate products... however, we have attempted this for a while now too and there's really not much out there, and what IS out there is very low ticket.

3. I totally could just create an info product myself, as I am a good writer (when I need to be) but it's not something I enjoy doing... at all... and any info you need on RVs and RV life is freely available all over the internet so I could never charge the kind of money that would make it worthwhile.

4. I have started sending our email subscribers to a FB group with the intention of creating some "group buying power" so we can approach dealers, suppliers, etc. and negotiate some exclusive deals. So far 70 people in the group so haven't even begun approaching dealers/suppliers yet. The group is made up of mostly retirees who are not looking to spend much money... so I dono if it's even a worthwhile exercise... but I feel like the idea has some potential somewhere, somehow.

5. Another thought I'm having is... RV dealerships... they sell big ticket items to the tune of $250,000 a pop sometimes... and I feel like there's some kind of opportunity just sitting there waiting for a lone samurai with no master to come in and create some kind of deal or opportunity or whatever.... I don't have the Beamer training so I'm not sure exactly what that entails but I understand it's to do with the back end... and I'm thinking... is there some way of inserting an asset into the back end (geez that sounds crude) of some of these huge 100,000 - 200,000 dollar deals... surely there must be something I can do there. I'm thinking maybe I could find some deals on some popular campgrounds and offer them as an unannounced bonus after they purchase their RV. But I dono... it kinda sounds a bit weak when I think about how much they just dropped on their new motorhome.

6. Another thought in regards to dealers... lead gen?? There's gotta be a way I can figure out how to Ronin up a deal with another RV blog/website/supplier who can send some targetted traffic that I can onsell to a dealer?

7. Or find a high converting RV lead gen funnel and license it out to the dealer/s? Have to figure out where to even start with that.

8. Some numbers I should mention... we're currently getting around 80,000 unique visitors a month, and are capturing about 30 email optins a week (120 per month). Just about to crack 1000 active subs. We make about $3,000 to $3,500 in ad revenue/m plus about $600/m in Amazon aff. links.

Anyway, so that's what I've got so far... not much... just some threads to pull on for now. Anyone else got any ideas?

I'm about ready to just walk away from the niche and leave my wife to run it on her own and just MAKE some deals happen that will eclipse the income from the blog and allow her to walk away too and come over to the dark side of deal making, the Ronin way.

Cheers

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