Tuesday, June 30, 2009
How Well Do You Plan Out Your Niche Sites?
Admit it. We all have done it. You get an idea for a niche, do a little keyword and domain name hunting and an hour later you have an attempt of a niche site live on the web. How is that working for you? Niche site building is a process as you will see in the new eBook Kelvin and Adam are releasing. If you were to start a brick and mortar business, would you have it up and running in an hour, even a day or week for that matter? Great niche sites take planning, from layout, to content, to keyword focus, to link building and traffic generation. Actually building the site and getting it live on the web is an easy process and will go even smoother with a well laid out plan of exactly what you are wanting to do. If a blog is not attached, you should have at least 80% of your content written and ready to go live before even building the site. You should also map out exactly what the site structure should be before even installing the platform. Sketch out everything on a piece of paper or Word file before you even start. Know exactly how the final site will look upon completion. Sure this takes a ton of work before hand, but trust me that the finished product will look and perform better if you plan it out. Each site is a business all to itself and every successful business has a business plan before they are open for business.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Email From Kelvin And Adam - New Guide Coming Very Soon
In case you did not get the update from BANS creators, Kelvin and Adam, I am posting it below. I will have a copy in my hands soon and can not wait to see it. It should be well worth the money. Below is the email sent out.
Thanks for all the feedback we've received - both positive and negative.
Before we link you off to the full guide summary we promised we want to take the time to clarify a couple of things raised in both emails and on the forum.
1. What Is This New Guide And Where's It Come From?
We've been building niche websites monetized through affiliate links and contextual programs like AdSense since 2004.
It's how we got started online, it's how we managed to switch from going to work to working from home, it's how we learnt the majority of the practical internet knowledge we have, it's what gave rise to the concept of BANS, it's what enabled us through finance and understanding to move into more complex internet projects.
They were our way in to the internet and they have played a part ever since - for a long long time they were our "bread and butter".
Our new product isn't a guide about BANS - it's a guide about affiliate marketing through content driven websites.
That's the opportunity.
For as long as consumers research and buy products online and for as long as the companies that sell (or facilitate the selling of these products) have affiliate programs that enable you to make money by promoting these products there will be space for committed affiliate marketers to make a lot of money by building sites which connect the two together.
All BANS is is a relatively simplistic content management system for developing such sites with a focus towards the eBay affiliate programs.
Until we built BANS we use to hard code all our content websites in Dreamweaver.
Despite the fact that it's been said numerous times by people who have actually seen this model through - ie have been successful with it - the amount of times we've seen people give up or point the finger when they haven't taken the time to break down what it is that they are actually doing has been unbelievable.
If you don't truly know the model (the requirements of the model) how can you successfully develop sites to profit from it?
This has always been a shortfall for BANS.
It's always been just a tool - some of you have loved it, some of you have outgrown it and some of you have abandoned it.
With no direction the idea of the "quickest path to success" is the one that many followed which meant the rapid development of poorly chosen, poorly planned, poorly built, poorly marketed and poorly managed sites.
The result of that process is inevitable - regardless of platform.
If you can't see that you're wasting your time.
Another group of people went into over-development - design rather than research and content creation became the focus.
Both have got it wrong.
The GameImprovementIrons.com site has sat on the front of BANS for over a year.
It cost us $500 to put together (we outsourced the content) and it has been consistently making between $200 (out of season) and $400 (in season) per month for the past couple of years.
It's not one that we've paid any attention to - it's not had any new content added to it in over a year and a half - it's not had any active marketing - it's not even structured perfectly (we don't recommend this level of neglect) - but it's sat there in prime position on Google and the other major engines for the last couple of years for many of its target keywords connecting golfers interested in Game Improvement Irons to different sets of clubs listed for sale on eBay.
All this while thousands of affiliate marketers both inside and outside of BANS have become hysterical about the future of niche site building.
There's also no reason it won't continue to do that for the forseeable future - who's competing with us???
The search engines fill their indexes with relevant data - our site is the only site dedicated to Game Improvement Irons on the internet and with the exception of a high level and comprehensive series of guides on improvement irons on an industry leading Golf website our own site is the most complete representation of that market segment online.
With little competition and with a site structure and written content (that has been thought out and not copied) which mirrors the collective demand it ranks - it's as simple as that.
If we wanted to sell that site we'd expect to receive around 24x the monthly income on a website aftermarket like Sitepoint so we're talking around $7,000.
A $500 investment and we've got well over $10,000 back - there aren't many ways of doing that in this world on or offline.
"Relevancy" is the only word that matters when it comes to niche affiliate websites at every part of the process - from researching, planning and building all the way through to marketing and management.
We've seen sites built to target golf putters (ie with a domain name targeting golf putters) full of reviews of golf balls.
What's happening here?
If you're targeting putters build a site about putters, if you're targeting golf balls build a site about golf balls.
If you've got it in you to build a site covering all golf equipment then sure cover everything but before you start down that road you've got to be honest about the requirements to pull a site off that covers a market segment of that size.
The higher up a market segment you go the fiercer the competition - move up the ladder too high and you've moved out of niche affiliate websites and into resource websites which is a completely different game and which requires much more advanced sites and features - forums, reader reviews etc etc for success.
It's "niches" for a reason.
A small site called something like golfputterguide.com which is full of golf ball reviews is a "conflict" and your rankings suffer as a consequence.
Have a look at your own sites.
Do they properly "mirror" the demand they have been built to serve (not just in page structure but in the "answers" these pages provide) or are they a mix-mash resulting from poor planning?
We've looked at thousands of BANS built sites over the past couple of years. 99.9 times out of 100 any "problems" lie with the site and any problems with the site are a consequence of the perspective of the person that developed it.
Like it or not - that's the reality.
In October 2008 (post the mid summer eBay and Google drama) we put around $15,000 into content for the development of a new network of golf equipment related sites.
Built with BANS V3.0 according to the basic principles outlined above they're all indexed, all gaining rankings, all getting relevant people and all converting a percentage of these relevant people into eBay affiliate commissions.
There's no rocket science here, no mystery - just basic method and procedures which result in the relatively quick development of a new site which "matches" a particular demand and which then generates money connecting that demand to the supply.
Build them with BANS, build them with Wordpress, build them with Joomla, hard code them - if you want to make a go of this just make sure you build them and that you build them "right".
And so that's what this new guide is - our answer to the question:
"How Do I Build Niche Affiliate Websites Successfully"
What About The Future Development Of BANS?
We appreciate that this will be a dissapointment for many of you but for now we've taken BANS as a tool as far as we want to take it.
We're not software developers - never have been never will be - we took BANS from the 1 page setup file it was when it launched back in 2006 to the CMS it became in V3.0 through the use of a PHP book bought from a local bookstore - this was a huge task and an intensely pressurized extended period of time - all done for free for existing BANS users.
We remain happy with both the progress we have made with BANS as a product and the level of site you can build with BANS V3.0 in the context of the opportunity that exists and if you want to develop more advanced sites then there are options open to you that will enable you to do that (the reason a Wordpress section was added to the forum).
We have had 2 enquires over the past few months from development teams wanting to take over the project and further evolve it - something that we do appreciate there is room to do and something that we would like to see happen.
This is something we'll be considering over the next couple of months as we see the release of this new product through and evaluate our own future online.
BANS as a project, however, is neither dead nor vulnerable to dissapearing.
With all that said (and we appreciate it's a mouthful) - here's the link to what was the initial purpose of this email - the "Full Guide Summary":
To download please right click your mouse over the link and choose 'Save Target As...'
http://www.thenumber1waytomakemoneyonline.com/full-guide-summary.pdf
The new product will be released from the following website:
http://www.thenumber1waytomakemoneyonline.com
And within the next few days we'll be in touch with final details of the actual release day.
For those of you interested in seeing "this" how we see it - we truly hope it serves you well.
There's an awful lot of room online to make money from affiliate marketing via content driven websites.
We believe that it's simply not being looked at properly.
Thanks for taking the time to read this through and we'll be in touch again shortly.
Best,
Kelvin and Adam
Thanks for all the feedback we've received - both positive and negative.
Before we link you off to the full guide summary we promised we want to take the time to clarify a couple of things raised in both emails and on the forum.
1. What Is This New Guide And Where's It Come From?
We've been building niche websites monetized through affiliate links and contextual programs like AdSense since 2004.
It's how we got started online, it's how we managed to switch from going to work to working from home, it's how we learnt the majority of the practical internet knowledge we have, it's what gave rise to the concept of BANS, it's what enabled us through finance and understanding to move into more complex internet projects.
They were our way in to the internet and they have played a part ever since - for a long long time they were our "bread and butter".
Our new product isn't a guide about BANS - it's a guide about affiliate marketing through content driven websites.
That's the opportunity.
For as long as consumers research and buy products online and for as long as the companies that sell (or facilitate the selling of these products) have affiliate programs that enable you to make money by promoting these products there will be space for committed affiliate marketers to make a lot of money by building sites which connect the two together.
All BANS is is a relatively simplistic content management system for developing such sites with a focus towards the eBay affiliate programs.
Until we built BANS we use to hard code all our content websites in Dreamweaver.
Despite the fact that it's been said numerous times by people who have actually seen this model through - ie have been successful with it - the amount of times we've seen people give up or point the finger when they haven't taken the time to break down what it is that they are actually doing has been unbelievable.
If you don't truly know the model (the requirements of the model) how can you successfully develop sites to profit from it?
This has always been a shortfall for BANS.
It's always been just a tool - some of you have loved it, some of you have outgrown it and some of you have abandoned it.
With no direction the idea of the "quickest path to success" is the one that many followed which meant the rapid development of poorly chosen, poorly planned, poorly built, poorly marketed and poorly managed sites.
The result of that process is inevitable - regardless of platform.
If you can't see that you're wasting your time.
Another group of people went into over-development - design rather than research and content creation became the focus.
Both have got it wrong.
The GameImprovementIrons.com site has sat on the front of BANS for over a year.
It cost us $500 to put together (we outsourced the content) and it has been consistently making between $200 (out of season) and $400 (in season) per month for the past couple of years.
It's not one that we've paid any attention to - it's not had any new content added to it in over a year and a half - it's not had any active marketing - it's not even structured perfectly (we don't recommend this level of neglect) - but it's sat there in prime position on Google and the other major engines for the last couple of years for many of its target keywords connecting golfers interested in Game Improvement Irons to different sets of clubs listed for sale on eBay.
All this while thousands of affiliate marketers both inside and outside of BANS have become hysterical about the future of niche site building.
There's also no reason it won't continue to do that for the forseeable future - who's competing with us???
The search engines fill their indexes with relevant data - our site is the only site dedicated to Game Improvement Irons on the internet and with the exception of a high level and comprehensive series of guides on improvement irons on an industry leading Golf website our own site is the most complete representation of that market segment online.
With little competition and with a site structure and written content (that has been thought out and not copied) which mirrors the collective demand it ranks - it's as simple as that.
If we wanted to sell that site we'd expect to receive around 24x the monthly income on a website aftermarket like Sitepoint so we're talking around $7,000.
A $500 investment and we've got well over $10,000 back - there aren't many ways of doing that in this world on or offline.
"Relevancy" is the only word that matters when it comes to niche affiliate websites at every part of the process - from researching, planning and building all the way through to marketing and management.
We've seen sites built to target golf putters (ie with a domain name targeting golf putters) full of reviews of golf balls.
What's happening here?
If you're targeting putters build a site about putters, if you're targeting golf balls build a site about golf balls.
If you've got it in you to build a site covering all golf equipment then sure cover everything but before you start down that road you've got to be honest about the requirements to pull a site off that covers a market segment of that size.
The higher up a market segment you go the fiercer the competition - move up the ladder too high and you've moved out of niche affiliate websites and into resource websites which is a completely different game and which requires much more advanced sites and features - forums, reader reviews etc etc for success.
It's "niches" for a reason.
A small site called something like golfputterguide.com which is full of golf ball reviews is a "conflict" and your rankings suffer as a consequence.
Have a look at your own sites.
Do they properly "mirror" the demand they have been built to serve (not just in page structure but in the "answers" these pages provide) or are they a mix-mash resulting from poor planning?
We've looked at thousands of BANS built sites over the past couple of years. 99.9 times out of 100 any "problems" lie with the site and any problems with the site are a consequence of the perspective of the person that developed it.
Like it or not - that's the reality.
In October 2008 (post the mid summer eBay and Google drama) we put around $15,000 into content for the development of a new network of golf equipment related sites.
Built with BANS V3.0 according to the basic principles outlined above they're all indexed, all gaining rankings, all getting relevant people and all converting a percentage of these relevant people into eBay affiliate commissions.
There's no rocket science here, no mystery - just basic method and procedures which result in the relatively quick development of a new site which "matches" a particular demand and which then generates money connecting that demand to the supply.
Build them with BANS, build them with Wordpress, build them with Joomla, hard code them - if you want to make a go of this just make sure you build them and that you build them "right".
And so that's what this new guide is - our answer to the question:
"How Do I Build Niche Affiliate Websites Successfully"
What About The Future Development Of BANS?
We appreciate that this will be a dissapointment for many of you but for now we've taken BANS as a tool as far as we want to take it.
We're not software developers - never have been never will be - we took BANS from the 1 page setup file it was when it launched back in 2006 to the CMS it became in V3.0 through the use of a PHP book bought from a local bookstore - this was a huge task and an intensely pressurized extended period of time - all done for free for existing BANS users.
We remain happy with both the progress we have made with BANS as a product and the level of site you can build with BANS V3.0 in the context of the opportunity that exists and if you want to develop more advanced sites then there are options open to you that will enable you to do that (the reason a Wordpress section was added to the forum).
We have had 2 enquires over the past few months from development teams wanting to take over the project and further evolve it - something that we do appreciate there is room to do and something that we would like to see happen.
This is something we'll be considering over the next couple of months as we see the release of this new product through and evaluate our own future online.
BANS as a project, however, is neither dead nor vulnerable to dissapearing.
With all that said (and we appreciate it's a mouthful) - here's the link to what was the initial purpose of this email - the "Full Guide Summary":
To download please right click your mouse over the link and choose 'Save Target As...'
http://www.thenumber1waytomakemoneyonline.com/full-guide-summary.pdf
The new product will be released from the following website:
http://www.thenumber1waytomakemoneyonline.com
And within the next few days we'll be in touch with final details of the actual release day.
For those of you interested in seeing "this" how we see it - we truly hope it serves you well.
There's an awful lot of room online to make money from affiliate marketing via content driven websites.
We believe that it's simply not being looked at properly.
Thanks for taking the time to read this through and we'll be in touch again shortly.
Best,
Kelvin and Adam
The Rewrite Dilemma
I received an email from a reader that was inquiring about a new service that rewrites articles for customers and wanted my thoughts on the service. While I do not use the service the reader was questioning about, I have heard of several that do this.
My thoughts on rewriting others content is this: We all tend to use other articles as basis of information in writing our own works of original content. If you are rewriting the content, but are merely copying the whole articles thought process and overall body, you should probably link to the original article as a source of inspiration or reference. If you are TOTALLY rewriting it, to add something new in ways of views or additional information, then you can claim it as your own. While in the Google guidelines it says there really is no penalty for duplicate content, you should reference in good faith if you syndicate an article or merely rewrite. Some articles can indeed be rewritten for the better, I know a ton of mine could really be improved. My thinking is though, if you are going to go that far as to spend money on a rewrite, why not pay for a totally original piece of work? Sure it will cost you a little bit more, but if done by the right service, it will lend more credibility to your site in general. The site in question from the reader, I will indeed try, just to see how close it comes to the original article from a plagiarism aspect and to see if it is actually rewritten better on a quality standpoint. I will report back in a future post.
My thoughts on rewriting others content is this: We all tend to use other articles as basis of information in writing our own works of original content. If you are rewriting the content, but are merely copying the whole articles thought process and overall body, you should probably link to the original article as a source of inspiration or reference. If you are TOTALLY rewriting it, to add something new in ways of views or additional information, then you can claim it as your own. While in the Google guidelines it says there really is no penalty for duplicate content, you should reference in good faith if you syndicate an article or merely rewrite. Some articles can indeed be rewritten for the better, I know a ton of mine could really be improved. My thinking is though, if you are going to go that far as to spend money on a rewrite, why not pay for a totally original piece of work? Sure it will cost you a little bit more, but if done by the right service, it will lend more credibility to your site in general. The site in question from the reader, I will indeed try, just to see how close it comes to the original article from a plagiarism aspect and to see if it is actually rewritten better on a quality standpoint. I will report back in a future post.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Blog Commenting With Your Twitter URL
We all have done it, we comment on blogs related to our niche and slap our target keyword as the username and our niche URL in the URL spot. Usually it is attached to a 5 word comment, if that. I have found it more useful these days if commenting on a blog post in a related niche to leave my Twitter page username and Twitter profile URL instead along with a meaningful comment. Everyone should have a Twitter page related to whatever niche they are in and hopefully updating with niche related comments or blog post/content pages from your site. When leaving your Twitter username and URL, it is a little less threatening and spammy in nature. Sure you are not getting whatever search engine love there is to get, but aren't we really look for surfers related to our niches? Sometimes we pay too much mind to the search engines and not enough to the goal of getting targeted surfers. Think about this the next time you leave a blog comment.
Have you tried commenting with your Twitter URL?
Have you tried commenting with your Twitter URL?
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Saturday Around The Web June 27th
Sorry for the late post as I was at the neighbors helping them with their new iPod touch and got hung up a while.
The first interesting thing I came across is Tweetboard. I have yet to set it up myself, but plan on doing so this week. I see it as an alternative to burdensome message boards and quite an engaging tool to have for your niche.
Chris Crompton from Search Engine Land has a take on AdWords Conversion Tracking: How To Optimize Your Account 10x Quicker. Definitely a good read.
Aaron Wall has a post on how to spot keyword trends that is very informative.
Speaking of keywords, I found a cool keyword tool driven by the Google AdWords API. Fun to play with.
Here is a post on 7 secret ways to use Twitter search.
The first interesting thing I came across is Tweetboard. I have yet to set it up myself, but plan on doing so this week. I see it as an alternative to burdensome message boards and quite an engaging tool to have for your niche.
Chris Crompton from Search Engine Land has a take on AdWords Conversion Tracking: How To Optimize Your Account 10x Quicker. Definitely a good read.
Aaron Wall has a post on how to spot keyword trends that is very informative.
Speaking of keywords, I found a cool keyword tool driven by the Google AdWords API. Fun to play with.
Here is a post on 7 secret ways to use Twitter search.
Friday, June 26, 2009
A Twitter Guide By Mashable
I was going to save this for my around the web post I do on Saturday, but felt this particular site needed it's own post. If you did not know it now, Twitter is very powerful. I have found it almost as useful as Google itself. I heard about the deaths of Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett and Ed McMahon on Twitter first this week. Not only from a news standpoint, I also find it semi useful as a search engine itself. Learning to use Twitter to your advantage takes time. I have mentioned the book by Joel Comm before that I still recommend, but now Mashable has released a Twitter Guide as well. You should spend a couple of hours going through this as you will truly learn a ton. You will learn also how to leverage Twitter in your favor as far as niches go. Bookmark it for sure.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
The Best Way To Read An Ebook
If you are like me, you have purchased or freely downloaded your share of eBooks. Each one is like getting a present on Christmas morning. Unfortunately, most eBooks are hard to read or not well put together. It is very easy to get distracted, especially if there are numerous links included. You can get off on a tangent in no time. Blog post or web pages less than 1000 words are easier to read online.
I have found that if I print the eBooks out with my printer and read the content anywhere in the house other than the computer rooms. I always have a highlighter with me to highlight the important points and links I will want to visit later. I always try to read the entire eBook all the way through first before venturing on to any links. Some how reading it on paper holds my attention longer and I absorb the info much better and faster. If you find yourself never finishing an eBook, you should really give this a try. Send my apologies to the tree huggers for the extra paper usage.
I have found that if I print the eBooks out with my printer and read the content anywhere in the house other than the computer rooms. I always have a highlighter with me to highlight the important points and links I will want to visit later. I always try to read the entire eBook all the way through first before venturing on to any links. Some how reading it on paper holds my attention longer and I absorb the info much better and faster. If you find yourself never finishing an eBook, you should really give this a try. Send my apologies to the tree huggers for the extra paper usage.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
SEO Is Not Dead, Just Do Not Over Do It
There has been a ton of talk lately that SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is dead or on it's way out. Like I mentioned yesterday, you do not have to be an SEO guru to rank for a good niche site. However, if you are getting better at SEO, just do not over do it. Do not stuff keywords, make sure the meta tags reflect the page content and do not use any hidden text or other spammy SEO tactics. Make sure if your site where to ever get a hand review by Google, that it would pass the mustard test. If you think it is OVER SEO'ed, then odds are so will Google. There is nothing wrong with better optimizing your site for the search engines, but it should not be the main focus of your sites anyway. As I always preach, use common sense.
Below is the latest Matt Cutts video addressing the concern of over optimization:
Below is the latest Matt Cutts video addressing the concern of over optimization:
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
My 600th Post
The saying time flies while your having fun surely applies to me. This post marks my 600th post on this blog. It seems like yesterday that I set it in January of 2008. After looking back through some past post this morning, I am proud to boast what a huge collection of know how out there for the web. It truly is a rewarding experience both from an accomplishment and financial level. This blog as gone well beyond what I dreamed it would become. There is a ton of great information in here. Some of course may be a bit out dated, but for the most part everything is still relevant. I thought I would take a the opportunity to list a few things that have changed as far as niche site building over the last 18 months.
1. It is no longer niche store building, it is niche site building. You should be building a niche site, not a store. The eBay adds you list are just that, ads. It is not a store inventory. Like it or not, you are advertising these products. A page with nothing but eBay ads is worthless and offers no value. Build a niche and THEN ad the ads.
2. The BANS platform still works. A ton of bloggers have turned their noses up at the BANS platform over the last 18 months. They claim it will get you in trouble with the search engines and many other non sense claims. Yes there are other alternatives, many which I also use like PHPBay and Wordpress, but BANS still is the purest and easiest platform for any newbie getting into niche site building. Build a site the right way with BANS and you can still compete with any other platform in the niche of choice.
3. Your earnings in any niche will be reflective of how much authority and credibility you have of the said niche. The days of just niche hunting and keyword sniping along with throwing up thin niche sites are gone. 18 months ago, you could make money this way, today you will spend a ton of money to drive qualified traffic to a site that has no authoritative value.
4. A ton of information in the famous 2002 post on Webmaster World by Brett Tabke, still holds true today. You will notice one repetitive factor and that is new content. If you can not write or purchase original content, you need to get out of the business as it is not for you. Everyone has something to say, so just say it. You will get better as you go.
5. Social networks and niche networking are a must. Twitter, Facebook, Myspace and Digg can all deliver fantastic quality traffic if used correctly. Do not spam or use it for search engine gain, use it to get in touch with other people that like your niche.
6. Common sense prevails over all. You do not need to be an SEO wizard to make money in niche site building. Use common sense when building pages. Everything you need to know is supplied by Google in the starter guide. Everything from site layout, SEO, content and link building can be gotten by on by using a common sense approach. You will learn more as you go, but when in doubt, let it be your guide.
7. You do not need 100 sites to make great money in this business. 5-10 highly authoritative niche sites will not only keep you busy, but will provide a hefty income for you. The sky is the limit, but you must become the niche. Focusing on things you know about is a ton more enjoyable than building sites you have no interest in. You can truly own a niche in one year.
8. Adding additional revenue streams is a must. Do not limit yourself to just EPN. Use Amazon, Linkshare, Commission Junction and Pepperjam to help enhance your sites. There is an affiliate program out there for nearly everything.
9. Every backlink is usually worth something. Do not get caught up with nofollow or dofollow. A link to your site is another doorway in. You can not control being linked to from bad neighborhoods, but you can control linking back to bad neighborhoods. Link directories, blog commenting, article directories and many other forms of backlinks all hold some value, especially if it results in a targeted surfer coming to your site.
10. Be careful what you read. For ever good source of information about making money online, there are 1000 bad sources that just want to sell you something. The list grows daily. There is a solid wealth of information available both free and paid, but if it promises guaranteed results or a cut the corners type philosophy, you should run the other way. The deeper you get in the business of building great niche sites, you will find there are no magic secrets, just different practices and hard work. Be wary of the latest tricks and easy way outs. Only buy from reputable sources or make sure you budget for bad investments.
All in all, niche site building should be fun and rewarding. I enjoy putting this information out daily for you and I hope you enjoy it just the same. Here is to 600 more blog post to get you earning more money.
Thanks for reading!
1. It is no longer niche store building, it is niche site building. You should be building a niche site, not a store. The eBay adds you list are just that, ads. It is not a store inventory. Like it or not, you are advertising these products. A page with nothing but eBay ads is worthless and offers no value. Build a niche and THEN ad the ads.
2. The BANS platform still works. A ton of bloggers have turned their noses up at the BANS platform over the last 18 months. They claim it will get you in trouble with the search engines and many other non sense claims. Yes there are other alternatives, many which I also use like PHPBay and Wordpress, but BANS still is the purest and easiest platform for any newbie getting into niche site building. Build a site the right way with BANS and you can still compete with any other platform in the niche of choice.
3. Your earnings in any niche will be reflective of how much authority and credibility you have of the said niche. The days of just niche hunting and keyword sniping along with throwing up thin niche sites are gone. 18 months ago, you could make money this way, today you will spend a ton of money to drive qualified traffic to a site that has no authoritative value.
4. A ton of information in the famous 2002 post on Webmaster World by Brett Tabke, still holds true today. You will notice one repetitive factor and that is new content. If you can not write or purchase original content, you need to get out of the business as it is not for you. Everyone has something to say, so just say it. You will get better as you go.
5. Social networks and niche networking are a must. Twitter, Facebook, Myspace and Digg can all deliver fantastic quality traffic if used correctly. Do not spam or use it for search engine gain, use it to get in touch with other people that like your niche.
6. Common sense prevails over all. You do not need to be an SEO wizard to make money in niche site building. Use common sense when building pages. Everything you need to know is supplied by Google in the starter guide. Everything from site layout, SEO, content and link building can be gotten by on by using a common sense approach. You will learn more as you go, but when in doubt, let it be your guide.
7. You do not need 100 sites to make great money in this business. 5-10 highly authoritative niche sites will not only keep you busy, but will provide a hefty income for you. The sky is the limit, but you must become the niche. Focusing on things you know about is a ton more enjoyable than building sites you have no interest in. You can truly own a niche in one year.
8. Adding additional revenue streams is a must. Do not limit yourself to just EPN. Use Amazon, Linkshare, Commission Junction and Pepperjam to help enhance your sites. There is an affiliate program out there for nearly everything.
9. Every backlink is usually worth something. Do not get caught up with nofollow or dofollow. A link to your site is another doorway in. You can not control being linked to from bad neighborhoods, but you can control linking back to bad neighborhoods. Link directories, blog commenting, article directories and many other forms of backlinks all hold some value, especially if it results in a targeted surfer coming to your site.
10. Be careful what you read. For ever good source of information about making money online, there are 1000 bad sources that just want to sell you something. The list grows daily. There is a solid wealth of information available both free and paid, but if it promises guaranteed results or a cut the corners type philosophy, you should run the other way. The deeper you get in the business of building great niche sites, you will find there are no magic secrets, just different practices and hard work. Be wary of the latest tricks and easy way outs. Only buy from reputable sources or make sure you budget for bad investments.
All in all, niche site building should be fun and rewarding. I enjoy putting this information out daily for you and I hope you enjoy it just the same. Here is to 600 more blog post to get you earning more money.
Thanks for reading!
Monday, June 22, 2009
Apicture Aparagragh And Adsense
Like my play on the Awords? LOL! Can you really make money with just Apicture, Aparagragh and Adsense? Of course you can. Without pointing out any of my own sites, I will point you to one by Michelle MacPhearson called Cool Tattoos. Now this is a Wordpress setup using the Photo Dropper plugin. Not too fancy of a site, but I guarantee you it does well in Adsense earnings. Of course she has built a ton of backlinks using her 30 minute backlinks program, but a site like this is easy to do and keep updated daily. Just Google "Cool Tattoos". You can easily do this with a free Blogger blog as well, minus the plugin of course and about 10 minutes a day worth of work.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Getting Niche Related Traffic From Twitter
Using Twitter to drive quality traffic to your niche site is pretty painless and easy to do. While it will not drive a ton of traffic at first, it may down the road the more followers you get.
The first thing you will want to do is to get a Twitter account centered somewhat around your niche name. If comic books is your niche, you may choose a name like comicbookguy or comiccollector. Just make sure it is somewhat related to the niche you are driving traffic to.
Secondly, make sure to add the link to your site in the bio section of your account settings on Twitter.
Third, design an attractive Twitter background and add as much info about your niche and website on the background. Make sure to put your website address in big bold letters on the background as well. If you are graphically challenged, you can user a great program like Customize Twitter to design a very professional background.
Next you will want to hunt down 5 or 6 great blogs or news sources related to your niche. Make sure these sites update regularly and have a RSS feed.
Add these RSS feeds to post automatically to your Twitter account using Twitter Feed. Here is a great tutorial on how to use Twitter Feed. If you have a blog as well, make sure to add your feed as well.
Make sure to check your followers daily and follow back any users that follow you. Over time, you will pick up quite a few followers related to your niche. You will also be driving some traffic to other sites in your niche, but you can use this to your advantage and contact the other sites and try to work out a link trade between you and the other sites.
After you build up some followers, you can also mix in some affiliate link offers into your Tweets two or three times a day.
This is a painless, yet effective way to build up quality surfers without spending a ton of time other than the initial setup. Give it a try, you might be surprised how good it works.
The first thing you will want to do is to get a Twitter account centered somewhat around your niche name. If comic books is your niche, you may choose a name like comicbookguy or comiccollector. Just make sure it is somewhat related to the niche you are driving traffic to.
Secondly, make sure to add the link to your site in the bio section of your account settings on Twitter.
Third, design an attractive Twitter background and add as much info about your niche and website on the background. Make sure to put your website address in big bold letters on the background as well. If you are graphically challenged, you can user a great program like Customize Twitter to design a very professional background.
Next you will want to hunt down 5 or 6 great blogs or news sources related to your niche. Make sure these sites update regularly and have a RSS feed.
Add these RSS feeds to post automatically to your Twitter account using Twitter Feed. Here is a great tutorial on how to use Twitter Feed. If you have a blog as well, make sure to add your feed as well.
Make sure to check your followers daily and follow back any users that follow you. Over time, you will pick up quite a few followers related to your niche. You will also be driving some traffic to other sites in your niche, but you can use this to your advantage and contact the other sites and try to work out a link trade between you and the other sites.
After you build up some followers, you can also mix in some affiliate link offers into your Tweets two or three times a day.
This is a painless, yet effective way to build up quality surfers without spending a ton of time other than the initial setup. Give it a try, you might be surprised how good it works.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Saturday Around The Web June 20th
OK, Happy Saturday to everyone. I hope your week was as good as mine was. A ton to get to on this Saturday, so here we go:
Google recently launched the discovering the web page that has a ton of useful features.
Twittip is a great blog for getting what else? Tips about using Twitter.
Speaking of Twitter, is there really such thing as a Twitter slap?
An interesting post on how the page rank sculpting uproar may affect blog comments that are no followed. Javascript and iframes may be on the way back to help with this.
Speaking of the nofollow leak, SEOmoz did a Whiteboard Friday video on How Do We Plug the Nofollow Leak?
Matt Cutts discuss the differences between paid link directories like Yahoo and BOTW and regular paid links.
Darren Rowse discusses how simple changes he made with Adsense doubled his revenue. If you have not seen his new ebook yet, it is a must buy.
In case you missed my post early in the week, Google gives notifications with reconsideration requests.
Search Engine Land has a good read on the Impact Of The Internet On Human Behavior.
Google recently launched the discovering the web page that has a ton of useful features.
Twittip is a great blog for getting what else? Tips about using Twitter.
Speaking of Twitter, is there really such thing as a Twitter slap?
An interesting post on how the page rank sculpting uproar may affect blog comments that are no followed. Javascript and iframes may be on the way back to help with this.
Speaking of the nofollow leak, SEOmoz did a Whiteboard Friday video on How Do We Plug the Nofollow Leak?
Matt Cutts discuss the differences between paid link directories like Yahoo and BOTW and regular paid links.
Darren Rowse discusses how simple changes he made with Adsense doubled his revenue. If you have not seen his new ebook yet, it is a must buy.
In case you missed my post early in the week, Google gives notifications with reconsideration requests.
Search Engine Land has a good read on the Impact Of The Internet On Human Behavior.
Friday, June 19, 2009
Wordpress Grammer Spelling Style Missed Words Plugin
Sorry for the late post as I got caught up with some family stuff. Tonight's post will be short and sweet. I came across a great Wordpress plugin that checks spelling, misused words, style and grammar. If you suffer from all of these things as I do, you will find this plugin a godsend.
ETA: ... and right on cue I misspelled the word grammar in the post title. See, I really need this.
ETA: ... and right on cue I misspelled the word grammar in the post title. See, I really need this.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Google Now Sending Reconsideration Request Messages
Google Employee, Sagar Kamdar, recently posted a reply in the Google Webmaster Help forum that they are now sending confirmation messages after a reconsideration request was processed for a site review. Although it seems they do not tell you if the site in question was accepted back into the index, at least they tell you if it was reviewed or not. Before you do resubmit, I highly suggest you take a hard look at your site from a Google point of view. this is hard to do sometimes as every one of us thinks that are sites are Google worthy. If it is a very thin site, or the content is not original, odds are you will not be let back in. This is a step in the right direction for Google, though. at least they are making an effort to keep webmasters in the know.
The reconsideration request submission form is here. The site must be included in your Webmaster tools section for it show in the drop down section of the form. If you have some success stories using it, make sure to post a reply to this post.
The reconsideration request submission form is here. The site must be included in your Webmaster tools section for it show in the drop down section of the form. If you have some success stories using it, make sure to post a reply to this post.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Linkshare Wordpress Plugin
There is a new Linkshare Merchandiser Wordpress plugin available now so you can list products from Linkshare merchandisers you have a relationship with. Linkshare is free to sign up with and I have used them for years. They pay on time and have a huge selection of products and companies to promote. This plugin would make a great addition to the PHPBay and PHPZon Wordpress plugins.
Certain Linkshare publishers may have hundreds of advertiser relationships to keep up with which can make it very difficult to keep track of vital pieces of Advertiser information like commission terms, contact information, and Premium Partner status.
On Friday, Linkshare released a report called the Consolidated Advertiser Report in the Publisher Dashboard to help with this. This report has information on all of your Advertisers in one place.
Certain Linkshare publishers may have hundreds of advertiser relationships to keep up with which can make it very difficult to keep track of vital pieces of Advertiser information like commission terms, contact information, and Premium Partner status.
On Friday, Linkshare released a report called the Consolidated Advertiser Report in the Publisher Dashboard to help with this. This report has information on all of your Advertisers in one place.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Have You Ever Heard Of The Top 10 List By David Letterman?
If you live in the United States and have had a television at one point in your life, you probably have heard of the Top 10 List By David Letterman. It has been an ongoing segment on the Letterman show for ages. Why do they continue to do it? Because it is successful. Many folks will tune in just to watch that one segment.
Top ten list can easily be translated over to any niche as well and makes for a great social bookmark. It is a quick read for surfers and really draws attention. You never know what regular visitor you may pick up when posting a top ten list to your niche site. You can probably do a weekly top 10 to train visitors to come to your site once a week.
The "I did not know that!" factor works the best when using these. Make them witty yet informitate and be sure they are researched and factual. List items that a regular niche user may not know about before they came to your site.
Top ten list can easily be translated over to any niche as well and makes for a great social bookmark. It is a quick read for surfers and really draws attention. You never know what regular visitor you may pick up when posting a top ten list to your niche site. You can probably do a weekly top 10 to train visitors to come to your site once a week.
The "I did not know that!" factor works the best when using these. Make them witty yet informitate and be sure they are researched and factual. List items that a regular niche user may not know about before they came to your site.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Needing Hubpages Content, Just Look Around Your House
If you are just getting started with Hubpages and unsure where to start with as far as content goes, just look around your house. Any products you purchased lately that you could write a positive review on? Just narrow down a long tail keyword phrase via any of the keyword tools you may have and target the article around it. Throw in some links to the manufacturers product page and mix in some eBay and Amazon ads and you are good to go. You probably have a house full of content just waiting to be written about.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Stop Trying To Be Ebay & Amazon, Because Your Not
I was asked via email to take a look at a site done with Wordpress, PHPBay and PHPZon this morning. The site was very attractive and was laid out very nicely. The main problem was that it was fluffed with regurgitated content and still very thin content wise. What original content WAS there, was not enough to offset everything else. The site was merely a mirror of eBay and Amazon.
Let us suppose the site does make a sale or two, is there a reason for the surfer to ever return? In this case probably not. The art of building great niche sites has evolved. Every where you look now, Wordpress sites integrated with the two Wade plugins or some form of the plugins exist. You MUST stand out from the crowd, not only to rank, but to engage the surfer. You are not eBay or Amazon, so stop trying to be.
Let us suppose the site does make a sale or two, is there a reason for the surfer to ever return? In this case probably not. The art of building great niche sites has evolved. Every where you look now, Wordpress sites integrated with the two Wade plugins or some form of the plugins exist. You MUST stand out from the crowd, not only to rank, but to engage the surfer. You are not eBay or Amazon, so stop trying to be.
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Saturday Around The Web June 13th
We will start with an interesting question that surfaced on the BANS forum about capitalization and search in Google. I will not point to thread as there is a ton of bickering going on in it and it has moved far off of subject. However, I came across an article from Search Engine Land by Barry Schwartz on Google search results based on the case sensitivity. The article is now nearly a year old, but you should be able to draw your own conclusions on this.
If you are a Facebook user, hopefully you nailed down your username for your friendly URL last night. I personally stayed up late to make sure I got the ones I needed for my accounts. Here is the URL once logged into Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/username/.
Came across a great article on an innovation lesson from childhood about multi tasking. It is short and to the point.
Twitter has begun to launch it's verified accounts process. It is only for high profile people to start with, but is the beginning stage hopefully to reduce some fraud and spam in the near future as Twitter is becoming a mine field of spam as of late.
Speaking of micro blogging, Google is in the process of launching a microblogging search engine, soon. Personally I would like to see them better filter their own blog search engine better to weed out spam, before tackling this.
Finally thanks for all of the feedback on the blog redesign. I had a few emailed questions about where to find good Blogger templates for Blogspot blogs. Blogger posted about this themselves recently. They have some great resources for Blogger themes listed.
If you are a coder and want to find and fix my missing div tags, I will pay the first person who comes up with the fix 20 bucks via PayPal. I just do not have the time to crawl through it myself as I have many more important task that need attention. You can see the problem first hand on individual post pages that have short post. The two sidebars do not stay floated on the right, but instead drop down under the post body itself. Use my contact page to let me know if you have a fix.
If you are a Facebook user, hopefully you nailed down your username for your friendly URL last night. I personally stayed up late to make sure I got the ones I needed for my accounts. Here is the URL once logged into Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/username/.
Came across a great article on an innovation lesson from childhood about multi tasking. It is short and to the point.
Twitter has begun to launch it's verified accounts process. It is only for high profile people to start with, but is the beginning stage hopefully to reduce some fraud and spam in the near future as Twitter is becoming a mine field of spam as of late.
Speaking of micro blogging, Google is in the process of launching a microblogging search engine, soon. Personally I would like to see them better filter their own blog search engine better to weed out spam, before tackling this.
Finally thanks for all of the feedback on the blog redesign. I had a few emailed questions about where to find good Blogger templates for Blogspot blogs. Blogger posted about this themselves recently. They have some great resources for Blogger themes listed.
If you are a coder and want to find and fix my missing div tags, I will pay the first person who comes up with the fix 20 bucks via PayPal. I just do not have the time to crawl through it myself as I have many more important task that need attention. You can see the problem first hand on individual post pages that have short post. The two sidebars do not stay floated on the right, but instead drop down under the post body itself. Use my contact page to let me know if you have a fix.
Friday, June 12, 2009
If Building Niche Sites Was Your Job, Would You Be Fired?
Pretty profound question, but one you should ask yourself on a daily basis. Like it or not, this is work, hard work. If you do not work at it and treat it like you own it, you will not be rewarded. The best thing about niche site building is the fact that you can can give yourself a raise every day. You have complete control of your actions. You set your own schedule and answer to yourself. If you treat it like a hobby or a sideline business, you will be paid accordingly. It is very very easy to catch paralysis by analysis in this business and your production will grind to a standstill. Do not be that person. As you go into this weekend, make the decision to treat your sites like a business, a fortune 500 company that you run, where millions of people are affected with every move you make and every task you undertake. To succeed in niche site building, you need to be striving to be the authority on your niche. SEO, link building and promotion can all be learned over time. Your authority will speak louder than you can even imagine. Tons of people make a ton of money on the web and get tons of natural traffic because they have great sites, not because they are the master at SEO or link building.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Is 64 Cents A Day Too Much To Build A Better Niche Blog?
I just purchased the new ebook from Darren Rowse called 31 Days to Build a Better Blog. You should recognize his name as the author of ProBlogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income
. The new ebook takes you through 31 days of task to help revitalize your niche blog. He uses a well laid out format for newbies to veterans alike. The investment is a minimal 64 cents per day when you break it down.Who is this Workbook for?
This ebook is for bloggers at different stages of their blogging including:
- those who have just started a blog but who don’t know what to do next
- those who have had a blog for a while but it’s stalled in its growth
- bloggers with bloggers block and lacking inspiration
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
A Little More On HubPages
I received a few emails on my Hubpages post I made a few days ago and wanted to clarify a few things for those who are thinking of using it. First, yes it is free to use. Just make sure you follow the rules. Second question I received was asking if you can really make money with Hubpages? I certainly do and only been at it for a month or so, since re-acquainting myself with it. The key is writing good pages targeted around a keyword phrase and exploit it. These pages rank real well because of their authority, so within minutes of publishing a page, you could be on page 1 of Google. The key is the keyword phrase targeting. Another question I got was for me to explain the scoring of the Hubpages and the author rating. If you just do a little digging, it is not hard to find the answers to these questions.
I am not going to dwell much more on them, but if it interest you, you should read everything starting here and you will get a much clearer picture of what they are and how to create great hubs. If you rush right in and start without reading, you will likely get frustrated and quite. As my dad always said, read the dam directions, son.
I am not going to dwell much more on them, but if it interest you, you should read everything starting here and you will get a much clearer picture of what they are and how to create great hubs. If you rush right in and start without reading, you will likely get frustrated and quite. As my dad always said, read the dam directions, son.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Another Facelift For Build A Niche Store Blog
Well, it has been almost a full year since I gave my blog a well needed re-design. I was going to wait until post #600, but some images went AWOL so I decided now was as good of time as any.
I would like to take the time to thank eBlog Templates for the PassionDuo Red Blogger Template. It served me very well for the year. Now I moved on to the Revolution Two Church theme by Brian Gardner. It was converted for the Blogger platform by Bloganol dot com. There are quite a few tweeks I still need to accomplish to fit my SEO and look needs, but I think this one will serve me well for a while. after a few modifications, I will see how it performs and will likely keep it for at least a year.
Let me know what you think of the new design thus far.
I would like to take the time to thank eBlog Templates for the PassionDuo Red Blogger Template. It served me very well for the year. Now I moved on to the Revolution Two Church theme by Brian Gardner. It was converted for the Blogger platform by Bloganol dot com. There are quite a few tweeks I still need to accomplish to fit my SEO and look needs, but I think this one will serve me well for a while. after a few modifications, I will see how it performs and will likely keep it for at least a year.
Let me know what you think of the new design thus far.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Don't Forget About Hubpages
Hubpages can be very aggravating for a new user. What aggravates them most about it is their failure to understand how to properly use it. If you rush right in thinking you can backlink directly to your niche sites, you are not understanding the process. Your first few hubs, should be those with no links out. Consider them one page websites that are focused around a keyword phrase. You can monetize it with Adsense, EPN and Amazon, but you should practice a few hub pages to understand how to use it properly and better both your hubber score and your hub page score. Once you get the hang of it, it is useful for both earning income directly from the hub page and getting link juice passed to your niche sites. When you do start mixing in links to your own sites, make sure you are linking out to some sites you do not own as well. Read through all of the tutorials, you will get a better understanding on how hubpages are designed to work. I personally try to add 2 hubpages a week myself. The more you do, the better you will learn to target the keyword phrases and earn money within the hubpages system. Do not be afraid to build backlinks to these pages either, as they rank very well in Google with a few well crafted backlinks. Understand HOW to use it and you will make money using it.
Sunday, June 7, 2009
Sunday Around The Web June 7th
I thought today was Saturday, but instead it is Sunday. I lost a day somewhere. Anyways, here is what should of been in the Saturday post of around the web.
First up is a blind search engine taste taste of sorts. with the recent buzz about Bing, you can use this tool to vote which search engine gives the best results for a search query. you should use a search query unrelated to any of your niches as you likely have memorized what the results look like. Try it a couple of times on your next few random searches and see what your preferences are.
Came across Tiny Chat this week as well. It is a cool video cam chat room with a ton of free features. They do have a paid feature should you find it useful.
Danny Sullivan penned a great article on Twitters real time spam problem. It will likely get worse until it gets better. Word is that authorized accounts will be tested soon.
Matt Cutts released a few more videos this week. Coming soon pages and if they hurt you, Impact of server location on rankings and Getting Google to deeper pages of your website. All videos are short and get right to the point.
Website Magazine has a post about Targeting Social Networks for Sales with some demographics attached in it. well worth a read.
First up is a blind search engine taste taste of sorts. with the recent buzz about Bing, you can use this tool to vote which search engine gives the best results for a search query. you should use a search query unrelated to any of your niches as you likely have memorized what the results look like. Try it a couple of times on your next few random searches and see what your preferences are.
Came across Tiny Chat this week as well. It is a cool video cam chat room with a ton of free features. They do have a paid feature should you find it useful.
Danny Sullivan penned a great article on Twitters real time spam problem. It will likely get worse until it gets better. Word is that authorized accounts will be tested soon.
Matt Cutts released a few more videos this week. Coming soon pages and if they hurt you, Impact of server location on rankings and Getting Google to deeper pages of your website. All videos are short and get right to the point.
Website Magazine has a post about Targeting Social Networks for Sales with some demographics attached in it. well worth a read.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Well I Married My Dream Girl, I Married My Dream Girl
Admittedly I do not watch much television, but when I do, it is usually sports. I have watched almost every Penguins game during the NHL playoffs and that damn FreeCreditReport.com commercial always is shown. So much so, that I walk around the house singing it, to annoy my wife. God forbid I should every need their services, but if I did, I would likely at least look at their site. Their marketing is classic, ram the brand down your throat with a series of catchy jingles. You should always be working towards branding yourself whenever possible. with all of free social networking and video sites out there, a real creative mind could achieve a high quality branding through a real low budget ad campaign.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Linkshare Free SEO Web Seminar Next Thursday
On Thursday, June 11th, Linkshare
will be offering a free seminar on SEO best practices. The seminar will be given by Victoria Edwards, SEO Internet Marketing Specialist at LinkShare. She will be sharing her SEO best practices, including ideas that may help you increase your search traffic. The seminar will start at 1:00 PM, EST and you will need to register beforehand. If you are newer to the business, I highly suggest you tune in to it.
Linkshare is a great affiliate company to market for and have been a very reliable earner for me over the years. You should sign up and look around at all of the products they offer to promote.
Click here to become a LinkShare Affiliate!
Linkshare is a great affiliate company to market for and have been a very reliable earner for me over the years. You should sign up and look around at all of the products they offer to promote.
Click here to become a LinkShare Affiliate!
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Why It Makes More Cents To List Fewer Product Listings
How many products should one show on a niche site page? This is always an ongoing question for niche site users. Lets look at it from a Page Rank distribution focus or as I like to call it: Link Juice. Now Page Rank is a highly debatable topic, but the greener the bar, the better a webmaster feels. The front page of your niche site USUALLY will have the most Page rank and that page rank is distributed through other links on the page. There could be links to other sites or internal pages of your site. At one time Page Rank was distributed evenly through all dofollow links on your site, but as Matt Cutts revealed at SMX, this is not the case anymore. Let's say you have 20 nofollow eBay listings on a page and 5 dofollow links to internal pages on your site on that same page. That is 25 links in total. The old page rank distribution method use to divide up the Page rank and pass it on equally to the 5 dofollow links, but that is not the case now according to Cutts. Now the links, dofollow or not get only an equal portion of the Page Rank distribution. So instead of 20% link juice like before, the dofollow links now get only 4% link juice passed on to each dofollow link.
Is this a big deal? In the grand scheme of things, I wouldn't rush out and change all of your sites structure and number products listed, but you should be aware going forward in the overall site structure. We want as much link juice and Page Rank passing down to internal pages as we can get. This also would mean you want to think long and hard about showing product listings on the front page of your site if indeed it is the page with the most Page Rank.
Let's look at it from a surfer standpoint as well. If they are looking for a particular product, they are PROBABLY on your page ready to buy. Listing 5 or 6 highly targeted items to match their needs is just as good in my opinion as listing 20. They want it, you have it. I hearken back to the example BANS golf store. it looks clean and shows the surfer exactly what they are looking for.
Let me close this post by saying once again that this is not a HUGE factor, but every little bit will help, especially when you are dealing with Google.
Is this a big deal? In the grand scheme of things, I wouldn't rush out and change all of your sites structure and number products listed, but you should be aware going forward in the overall site structure. We want as much link juice and Page Rank passing down to internal pages as we can get. This also would mean you want to think long and hard about showing product listings on the front page of your site if indeed it is the page with the most Page Rank.
Let's look at it from a surfer standpoint as well. If they are looking for a particular product, they are PROBABLY on your page ready to buy. Listing 5 or 6 highly targeted items to match their needs is just as good in my opinion as listing 20. They want it, you have it. I hearken back to the example BANS golf store. it looks clean and shows the surfer exactly what they are looking for.
Let me close this post by saying once again that this is not a HUGE factor, but every little bit will help, especially when you are dealing with Google.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Matt Cutts On Google Deindexed Sites
Deindexed sites are common in the affiliate marketing world. This is not just for BANS sites as the common factors are usually site thinness or other major no nos that Google dislikes. While there is really no SURE FIRE way of getting it back in the index other than correcting the obvious mistakes and resubmitting to Google, it may be in your best interest to take your lumps and move on. You could 301 redirect the deindexed domain to a new one, but as Matt Cutts is quoted here:
Cutts is basically telling you to move on. Is this what everyone wants to hear? No! Are there situations where you can get a de-indexed site, re-indexed? Sure, I have done it myself, but it is hit and miss and no guarantees as far as a time factor.
So what do you do with all of that content you added after de-indexing? Personally, I would try and get all of the content to evaporate from the major search engines you are listed in for duplicate content sake. You can try to block all bots in the robots.txt and see how long it takes. Slowly add in your content to the new site and build backlinks slowly as well. Most importantly, learn from your past mistakes and do not let it happen again.
Can you get hurt by 301′ing a penalized Web site to a new Web site?
Typically not because it could be a case where someone’s trying to Googlebowl you. However, if it’s a site that’s penalized and that Google doesn’t trust, then you may not be getting that much juice transferring over anyway. Sometimes its better to just start truly fresh.
Cutts is basically telling you to move on. Is this what everyone wants to hear? No! Are there situations where you can get a de-indexed site, re-indexed? Sure, I have done it myself, but it is hit and miss and no guarantees as far as a time factor.
So what do you do with all of that content you added after de-indexing? Personally, I would try and get all of the content to evaporate from the major search engines you are listed in for duplicate content sake. You can try to block all bots in the robots.txt and see how long it takes. Slowly add in your content to the new site and build backlinks slowly as well. Most importantly, learn from your past mistakes and do not let it happen again.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Do Link Shorteners Pass Page Rank And Link Juice?
Tiny urls and link shortners are here to stay. It makes posting urls easy via Twitter and several other platforms. While not all link shortener services are created equal, MOST will pass page rank or link juice if they are using a 301 redirect. Matt Cutts from Google, just did a video on this you can see below. He also references a post by Danny Sullivan from Search Engine Land, who did expansive research on the link shortner services. The one he recommends as the best link shortner is http://bit.ly/
Monday, June 1, 2009
What If You Were Only Allowed One Web Site?
The title of this post should say it all. What if you were only allowed one web site? How would it affect the time and energy you put into it? Would you add content everyday? Would it be the authority site in it's niche? Would you make sure it succeeded and was promoted on every available turn? Would you write articles everyday to attract traffic from article directories? Would you social bookmark everything you could from your site? Would surfers think that your site was the go to place for information in that niche?
I think you see where I am going here. Tons of you are treating your best site like it was one of thousands that you own. One site can make a ton of money if you become the authority on whatever the niche is. You should treat your favorite site like it is the only one you are allowed to have. If you do this, I am sure you will see your income rise as the bi-product of your hard work.
I think you see where I am going here. Tons of you are treating your best site like it was one of thousands that you own. One site can make a ton of money if you become the authority on whatever the niche is. You should treat your favorite site like it is the only one you are allowed to have. If you do this, I am sure you will see your income rise as the bi-product of your hard work.
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