Turning Pages Off In Build A Niche Stores

If you are in the admin section and click on store or content pages, you have seen the ability to turn pages off or on. By default they are all on, but you might wonder what instances you would want them off. Perhaps you do not want a page to show up in the navigation tree for one. Lots of BANS stores prefer to list their Sitemap and Privacy Policy Pages in the footer. You can achieve this by turning off those pages and manually adding them into the footer section of the template as these pages are not so important to the surfer. The only bad thing about turning off pages is that they will not show in your xml sitemap and will not be picked up by the search engines unless you have a link on your site pointing to that page or a link from another site pointing to that page.

Another instance where you might use this is if you have a thank you page that only gets seen after a contact form is filled out and the submit button is pushed. Once again this page would never be seen by the search engines or even need to be seen. You also might create your own 404 error page that need not be indexed as well.

Make sure when creating any content or store page, you decide right then if you are going to want the SERPS to see it, because if it is left on it will be in the sitemap and COULD be indexed at any time.

HTML For The Newbies

This is another post geared at the newbies of Build A Niche Store or newbies to webmastering as a whole. There are tons and tons of WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) html editors out there. Even Build A Niche Store comes with one as well. Although these editors are easy to point and click and have easy menu items, you are going to have to learn basic HTML at some point. There are two great sites for learning HTML. One is Html Goodies and the other is Web Monkey. There will be times where knowing code will help you in so many ways. Just because these editors make it easier on you, does not mean you should not know how to adjust what is under the hood. HTML is very simple to learn and there are tons of printable reference sheets on the web as well. Mix this learning into your routine and learn it. Once you have gotten HTML down, you need to move on to learning CSS with stands for cascading style sheets. Knowing CSS will help in editing your own templates and code for your BANS stores as well.

BANS Questions Of The Week

Happy 4th of July!!!! I am proud to be an American.

As promised on Fridays I am going to start answering questions I get via email as a blog post. I get quite a few that are quick answers and a few that are long drawn out. Here are a few that are great from this week.

Is BANS dying?

No! BANS is not dying. It seems like we go through this stage about 4 times a year. Google does not hate BANS and EPN is alive and well. Build great content driven stores worth linking to and you will be just fine. I do suggest you start modifying the looks of your BANS stores going forward. Start thinking unique, template wise. BANS is here to stay and Adam and Kelvin are always on the move with upgrades and improvements.

What is the single most important thing I should be doing after installing my store?

I would say make sure you have changed everything that is default about it. Including meta tags on every page. Getting it search engine optimized is an art and is very important and should not be left to default settings. It is a boring task for sure, but take the time and do it right.

How much do you make online with your stores and what do you do for a living?

Well that is pretty blunt and to the point. I will tell you this. I left a job as an Executive Director of a small Chamber of Commerce because of what I make online with my sites. So I guess you can say my job is now BANS full time. I also own 3 rental houses and two other high traffic non BANS sites. I am 40 and a work at home husband and dog owner. If you have any doubts about BANS making money, you need to get it out of your head. Once my light came on, my earnings went through the roof in a matter of 3 months.

What is your favorite free tool you use?

Not many good ones are free anymore, but one I use on every site I build is not a secret to my blog readers. It is the free SEO tester. It is not the end all do all tool for SEO, but really is a great tool for both newbies and veterans. I use it now more as a game to see if I can get a 40 on my first pass through it with a page.

I am new to niche store building, what target number for keyword searches should I be focusing on.

If you are using a tool like SEO book keyword suggester, I would say anything 30-50 in looking at the Google number. I know that sounds low, but if you target and capture a high Google ranking for even a term that gets searched for 30 times a day, the sales are usually there. I dominate quite a few terms with those types of numbers and they produce nicely. Just depends on the niche, but those numbers are obtainable by newbies to get there feet wet with.

What is your second favorite search engine after Google?

Well, I only use Google primarily myself unless I am backlink checking with Yahoo, but I find myself liking LIVE right now at the moment, because they are so manipulative right now and the traffic usually converts good. A good search engine optimized site with only free link directory and article backlinks can dominate LIVE in a matter of two weeks or less. I am sure they will change there algorithm soon, but right now I can get instant traffic from them on new stores until my proper place with Google is obtained.

Keep your questions coming and I will address more in the coming Fridays. Have a great holiday weekend. Send all questions to address listed below.

Phooey On The Summer Slow Down

It is that time of year again when the chicken littles of the niche store building process come out and spread the notion of Summer slow down. Let me first say that if you were tied to just one niche or one brick and mortar store, your niche could be affected. When you throw BANS into the mix, there is no reason to moan. You are not limited to anything except your own imagination. The truth is people continue to buy and sell things on eBay everyday. If they are buying, then you need to find what they are buying and put that item in front of them. You have an endless inventory of products right at your fingertips and a proven platform named eBay handling everything. My numbers in June broke all my previous monthly records and I only added one new store during that month as I was busy going back to neglected stores that needed attention. If you are blaming a season on not making any money, then you need a check up from the neck up. People still buy during the Summer and some niches even get better than normal, it is up to you to find those niches and get them in front of people. A very under utilized tool is the Terapeak service. this is one of the best paid services a Build A Niche Store user can have. Now go find those hot niches before Fall comes as I hear a Fall slow down is also on the way followed by a Winter slow down.

Searching For Backlinks From Related Sites

Some easy searches in search engines can sometimes uncover possible related sites that may accept link exchanges or even better free link submissions. If you are going to do any link exchanges, make sure the site is in the same ballpark as yours. You can play around with the search terms below in both Google and Yahoo and probably find a good handful of backlinks worth pursuing. The less links on the page the better as more link juice will flow to your site. this is not some hidden secret, but one technique that needs to be touched on every now and again. Feel free to experiment with the phrases as well. I have uncovered a few great backlinks using this method for myself. Below are the search terms.

1. intitle:add+url "keyword phrase"
2. intitle:submit+site "keyword phrase"
3. intitle:submit+url "keyword phrase"
4. intitle:add+site "keyword phrase"
5. intitle:add+your+site "keyword phrase"
6. intitle:directory "keyword phrase"
7. intitle:list "keyword phrase"
8. intitle:sites "keyword phrase"

Pepperjam Giving New Affiliates 10 Bucks

If you have yet to join up with Pepperjam, now is this time. They are giving $10.00 to each new publisher for signing up. I have been using Pepperjam for a while and have been really happy with the support and the attention to detail. They continuously are adding more and more advertisers as well. Pepperjam Network is Now Offering a $10 Affiliate Sign On Bonus. Join Today.

Making Use Of The Info Domains

I have read where quite a bit of Build A Niche Store builders have suffered getting info domains deindexed for the time being. Some have made it through and most have not. Luckily I did not get caught up in this on BANS stores, but do own a couple of info domains myself. It could be a Google glitch or it could be a filter on Google as well. Personally I feel Google will let these creep back into the index over time. Perhaps a solid backlink or two will get them back in. Here is my suggestion for those uneasy with it.

If the domain name is niche specific in nature, I suggest putting a niche specific directory up on the domain name. You really have nothing to lose. There are great free scripts out there, more notably PHP Link Directory. If you can set up a Build A Niche Store, this script is a breeze. I am sure you are saying not another stupid directory, but I will tell you that there is a shortage of good niche specific directories out there. I would populate the directory with 12 to 20 good categories and fill in some links in each category. Throw up some Google ads and a few niche specific ad banners from Pepperjam or Commission Junction and let it fly. I would also set it to demand reciprocal links for submissions as well and set the feature link price at about $3.00 each. Demanding reciprocal links from like sites should not be a problem, because even I have no problem linking to a site on a link trade that is in the same close realm as I am. The best part about being the niche directory owner is you can also link to your own BANS store. Perhaps you have moved the initial build to a top level domain already. If you haven't, this might not be a bad idea. Lets face it, you already bought the domain, so why not take an afternoon at put it to work for you. Google likes niche specific directories a ton more than the standard all encompassed crap that is out there. Make sure the submissions you receive pass the mustard and are relevant to the directory. Do not take just any submission. You can also submit your directory to some of the directory list out there. There are a ton of list that will list you, just do a search for them. Also if you have a US Free Ads account, make an add asking for link submissions. Tons of affiliate marketers browse those as well. Turn those lemon info domains into juicy lemonade.