SiteSell Blog

What's Your "Bigger" Online Business Concept?

Ken's Blog

A post in the SBI! forums got me thinking... if I were looking to buy a Theme-Based Content Site to drive traffic to a larger undertaking that I was working upon, I'd be searching for SBI! businesses. (Of course, my search would take time because so few SBIers want to sell their traffic-generating sites.)

What do I mean by a larger undertaking? Check out Richard Bergman's case study...

Where Are You on the AdSense Pendulum?

AdSense & Contextual Advertising

It's all too easy to be seduced by Google into plastering AdSense ads all over your website ("adsense adnauseum"). Sure, it may (or may not) make you a few more bucks...

But, in the long run, your site's credibility and appearance counts, too.

In the "old days," website owners worried about placing AdSense ads, period. It made the site look "commercial." So if they did place ads, they'd make them almost invisible (ex., small and at the bottom of the page or tucked away in the right column).

Why Tweaking Pages Can Hurt Your Online Business Success

How to Build an E-Business

Tweaking is a low-yield exercise that can damage your online business success.

Avoid falling into the trap of adjusting and tweaking your web pages to improve Search Engine (SE) rankings. Tweaking refers to the process of repeated re-working of keyword density and the placement of keywords in the various parts of a Web page to rank more highly at the engines.

It’s not worth your time to try and manipulate the SEs. This exercise is an attempt to "fake reality," and it’s getting more and more complicated for Search Engine Optimizers (SEOers). It’s simply not possible to stay ahead of the smartest minds at the big Search Engines.

How to Make Your Goals Accountable

E-business Tips

It's not enough to just think about e-business goals. Setting it all down in writing casts your goals in concrete. That gives you something to look back at every 1-3 months, assess how you are doing, and adjust accordingly.

Setting it all down here makes it public, which introduces some element of accountability.

Keeping your goals in your head achieves neither. The memory of your goals will float away.

Most people, of course, never establish goals for the year ahead.

Both of these latter two approaches to goals result in unprioritized work. Not a good way to build long-term online business success.

Do you have a clear idea about what you want to accomplish online? Write down your thoughts and make yourself accountable for your e-business goals and actions.

Tweeting For Free Targeted Web Traffic

Traffic Generation

What role does tweeting play in driving free targeted web traffic to your Web site? Google shows tweets in the SE results, according to this blog post.

Being found for a tweet at Google is kind of like being found for a blog post, except the effect is even more short-lived. The odds are that if you do manage to get a tweet into the Top 10 for a search result, it's not likely to be long-lived and it's more likely to be a long tail search.

So we're not talking about a huge difference to your free targeted web traffic. But there are a few things you might as well do to get it right. And getting it right can also contribute to a more important aspect of traffic generation... your site reputation. A link to your site from the "home page" of your Twitter account is worth something if you Twitter.

Does eBay Own Your Online Auctions? Start Turning the Tables!

Monetization

Net auction selling (and eBay, specifically) is attractive for several reasons...

• easy to do
• no financial risk
• only an auction listing is required
• lots of targeted traffic actively searching for your type of product or service
• fun and excitement
• etc.

These positive attributes paint a rosy picture, and for the most part, this "picture" is valid. That's why entrepreneurs continue to join and stay with eBay. The payback potential is high and there is a strong sense of community among auction sellers. On a daily basis, you get to meet and/or do business with people who share similar interests to yours.

The Finder's Fee Model Generates Leads

Monetization

The finder's fee model is as classic as business itself... get paid for referrers or a finder's fee by finding customers (or "leads"). In other words, you become the key intermediary between surfers looking for information/solutions and business owners (especially those ones offline) who provide the products or services these surfers are seeking.

It's a worthwhile monetization option for your SBI! site because...

How To Use Twitter For Your Online Business Success, Part 3

Social Media

Now that you know how to build a following in your niche at Twitter, let's look at how you can take the concept of "Niche-Twittering" one step further, with Content 2.0.

Content 2.0 (C2) is SBI!'s Web 2.0 proprietary platform, which enables your site's visitors to add full content web pages with text, images, video, etc. to your site. These pages deliver long-tail search traffic, build community and spread virally.

How do you combine Twitter and Content 2.0? Easy... say, you have a Web site about Anguilla, and someone makes a tweet about a nice Anguilla hotel (which your RSS feed informs you about). Direct them to your Content 2.0 invitation on your site and ask them to share their hotel recommendation on your site!

Or be proactive and ask someone influential in your niche a question, "Have you ever gone out to Sombrero Island? I'm looking for a contact who'll take us there." Or ask it of all who are following you. That starts a conversation about your niche, and builds relationships.

How To Use Twitter For Your Online Business Success, Part 2

Social Media

The key is to find time-effective ways to use Twitter for your online business success. Remember, we only have so many hours in a day. Prioritizing that time is critical. And it's easy to lose lots of time at Twitter, 140 characters at a time.

 

The basic concept for niche-twittering starts as follows...

How To Use Twitter For Your Online Business Success, Part 1

Social Media

Whether you like it or not, social media plays an ever increasing role in achieving online business success. Depending on how you use Twitter, it can be a huge time waster, or make a valuable addition for your niche business.

What Is Twitter?

The best way to picture the "twitter-sphere" is a bunch of people conversing around a water cooler, except in this case, you can only communicate in text and you have a limit of 140 characters!

You can find those "conversations" through Twitter's search tool and other tools (more about those later). Search on your Site Concept Keyword and related keywords (ex., if your Site Concept is RVing, you'd also search for "motorhomes" and "RVs") and then scroll through the results until you find a comment that grabs your attention.

Next step? Follow the most niche-relevant "twitterers." Introduce yourself and share your own thoughts. Follow what's happening in your niche through RSS feeds. Anytime there's something new about your niche, you'll know.