If you have a unique niche, and there is a target audience for it: 100K + Searches monthly- Hypothetically " You have a nice domain thats keyword rich " it will take very little SEO and marketing to bring in traffic.. How would you approach businesses to advertise on the directory? Would you start it out free? If so, at what point would you begin charging? What would you base this decision on? Traffic, High SERPS, ? Would you start it out cheap? If so, how much? Would you let it sit for 2 months to see what kind of traffic you are getting before you do anything? Would you flat out charge what you want to charge but possibly risk losing business because you wont be able to bring everyone a customer? If you are going to reply, please give some insight - not just - "Id Start it for cheap." If your going to vote, Thanks .
Are you pretty sure that the potential customers within the niche are directory aware and the sort to need what you offer?
Hi Pipes, I would say yes with confidence. But, if I cant show traffic -- Then no they wouldnt need me.
If you can't build the content yourself (listings) to start the directory then you should start with a free option and may be have an option for featured listings.
I can build the comment - But, its a service providing website - I dont need them to build much - I have multiple domains that are search specific and will not need much for SEO. This is more of a surfer search for provider website directory.
In start keep listing free and enter some reputed web sites yourself in each category to build trust of your directory with varied description and titles
I suggest that you focus on building up content and good listings for your directory, thats what I did for my business directory and it is now ranking quite well in SERPs.
Hey there, I am also starting a new business directory. What I am doing is having a reasonably priced premium business type that offers a bit more and also a standard type. The standard type I allow people to upgrade for free if they provide a quality backlink to the website. If you have a quality websites, a lot of sites do not mind linking to it. If you think it is going to be easy to get top rankings, you might want to think twice. It does take quite a lot of link building and other factors to get high rankings - that is if the niche is worth anything to people there will be other competitor websites out there like yours. If you have any traffic ideas, feel free to PM me and we can share thoughts on how to build up our directories. I am building up a Green Niche for businesses, organizations, events, people, products, jobs, etc. Some of my competitors are PR6+ so its going to take some work Sincerely, Travis Walters
This is more of a service providing website where we match consumers looking for services with service providers. The people that are advertising really do not need to give me content. The site domain name itself and my own methods of link building and SEO will do fine for ranking. Content is not an issue. The issue is - I need to figure out when and what to charge up front.