DP SEO Contest?

Wouldn't that carry some weight over?

 

I don't think subdomains are fair really - as anyone can come in with a subdomain on a strong site already, link from the host site and get a massive boost. If you link from domain.com to sub.domain.com the new one is going to rank very well.

Good suggestion, but I wouldn't make it too hard. It would be pretty embarrasing to hold an SEO competition and none of the contestants to finish in the top 5 of the serps!

The problem I was thinking about after we spoke earlier, is if you offer completely free hosting or domains, many people would register and do absolutely nothing with them, which would be a complete waste to the sponsor. A whole load more will register purely for the free domain. Maybe offer them at a discount, but not free.

I'd guess as many contestants as they could get, the more there was the more interesting it would get. I'm sure someone could sponsor at least a small prize(s).

I would think you can't have rules at all, outwith domain registration. If you say no link buying, and I give myself links from the company I work for, is that link buying? If you say no black hat, and someone comment spams blogs is that black hat? I spend ages every day sorting crap out of my comments, so I would say it was. Many people's sole seo efforts consist of trying to get through my filters, they'd say it wasn't. Or you say no forum spam comments, then I go register a fake account on a forum and spam some links - but not to my own site, to whoever is currently ranking first. Complete nightmare to manage and police!

 

I will sponsor

1 Years reseller hosting to the winner

For contestants:

$3 hosts the 3 months of the contest
$7.99 registers a domain

 

yes i love seo quiz, i got good knowledge

 

That sounds quite interesting. Is it for a new domain? A new page on a current domain? Is it for white hat only? greyhat or blackhat? Blackhatting would be easy, but would not last long in the serps (especially Google). So how do you keep everyone honest?

 

"free hosting/domains"

Pixeladd is getting us all this good stuff for free so that the contestants don't have to put anything on hte line.

 

I am interested - also i can supply hosting if needed

 

If people would prefer like using only one host - subdomain entry so it would be really truly fair.

 

The domain must be brand new.

 

yeh think the domain is going to have to be brand new really.

i did toy with the idea of having 1 domain and everyone gets a subdomain but i think that could be open to abuse.

or everyone has a blogspot domain if people dont want to buy a new one.

has a few offers of free hosting for the contest which is great, keep the ideas coming guys, still not had enough real interest as yet, hopefully over the weekend this thread will stay "live" and more people might come in

 

If you can get deals for like 1 dollar .com domains + free hosting. That would be cool.

If the contestants place a link or a banner ad or both on the sites for some sponsors.

That way maybe you can get those deals. What we need is more contestants. Maybe making a sign in Box for the people interested in joining to apply.

If you have numbers to present to possible sponsors that would help the deal.

 

I must admit this is a good idea but it requires many people to compete in the same market, which makes the idea not very good. Because why someone would go for something they don't want to do... motivated to win a SEO contest only? This would create a bunch of websites made only for the contest, without having proper content related to any industry.

But, please note I'm not negative. The idea is good but I would suggest you to change it a little bit.

 

That's why in SEO contests people don't aim for market related terms (keywords).

 

a $6 domain?? blimey, things must be tight

 

I would suggest setting a start date for the competition, and only allowing domain names registered AFTER that date to be able to compete, that way there is no competitive advantage to people having "older" domains.

 

ok guys lots of good stuff in the thread, keep the ideas and suggestions coming and il try and get it all in order

ive had a chat with a few possible sponsors who would be happy to offer some prizes for the winners in return for some ads on the sites etc...
im thinking the winners will get alot of work anyway here on DP as its the perfect project to show people your SEO skills.

il get some sort of signup form done today so people can get updates etc..
Hoping to get this started next week, im open to suggestions as to how long you would like it to last?

 

Keep up the good work Pixeladd.

I think 3 months is what it takes for google to trust minimally on a freshly created domain, so that would be a nice time frame for the competition.

Are any of you guys advertizing this outside of DP already?
Because there are quite a few people out there that would happily embrace this competition.

About the Domain names, yeah 6 bucks it's quite a lot for some people, and I guess we could get way cheaper prices on it from one sponsor. Specially if we're talking about instead of 30 having 80 contestants, just for a small decrease on the domain price.

 

yeh im going to post it up on my blog and also contact some other blog owners to try and get some more entries.

yeh the domain thing i guess needs to be looked at, thats the problem with DP, $6 is alot to people here but if your into seo and want to progress then it should be looked as an investment.
again if anyone has any suggestions into how that can be done then let me know

IF any of you guys have some spare sig space maybe you could get a link into this thread

if you are interested PM me here with your email addy, il leave that open for a few days and see how many replies i get. then i can email everyone with updates etc..

 

Is there anyone on DP that owns a Domain Registrar that would like some Advertizing or backlinks in exchange for a discount on domain names?

 

I think 3 months is fine - I have a 3 month old domain hitting 1st page for terms with 4-5 million results, so it seems fine to me. And you don't want to be taking up everyone's time concentrating on the contest for a year or something.

I think that there will need to be some big prizes if you are going to get people to participate - I mean, who's going to spend 10's of hours promoting a site for no revenue and just to win a few months free hosting, when most people here have hosting anyway.

I think that to make it fair, everyone should be made to use their own domain (or) everyone has to use a free hosting domain (blogger or wordpress). (Simply for customization and control advantages, stat tracking etc).

I am interested, but there needs to be some sort of incentive there that would make me want to give up my time