So, I live in an area with a population of about 150,000. It's a fairly big town with your usual assortment of small businesses but also big stores like Wal-Mart, Home Depot and such. Googling the name of this town produces absolute garbage. There is a city council site and a newspaper site (to read the paper online). There is no true site related to this town and what's here. Would it be profitable for me to create a site that would probably be ranked #1 on Google with little effort. I could have pages for restaurants, hotels, parks & rec, and various stores. I was thinking I could basically just sell ads on the various pages. Say a small business or locally owned hotel wants to be on the first page for a specific section, I'd charge them around $75 per week. If they wanted on the home page, it would probably be more like $300 per week. Adwords tells me this town gets 1M searches monthly. Is this something that could work? It would take a couple of months of hard work to get a basic site up and running. Thoughts? Maybe add some product links related to some of this stuff like Best Buy? Maybe break down and have people do reviews of businesses?
This is a fabulous idea and I say go for it. A few things, though: 1. Do you want the website to look as if it's a blog? Or a website made out of...let's say...Joomla or Drupal? 2. Do you think you have enough technical skills to handle the graphics and webmaster stuff? (a business owner may ask you to create a banner for his/her establishment) 2. Do you have a local business permit to start the business? I don't know about the laws in your area but there may be people who would "question" the legality of your business since you're asking for fees and all. Also, we cannot discount the possibility that someone else out there might "question" your business or website especially if it's already garnering a ton of traffic and advertisers. So just be ready for those criticisms.
1. I have Dreamweaver and have a few websites I've been tinkering with. I'm fairly good at putting graphics and text where they should be and making a smooth site. 2. I'd probably have to outsource the banners or step up my knowledge with photoshop. I can create basic stuff with it so it may not be too hard to have a company logo with some text. 3. That's a good question. I don't know the rules about charging for ad space. I'll definitely look into that! The news here is dull so if I launch a 100 page site about local businesses and activities in the area, I'd be bombarded with reporters/radio stations and probably lawyers... Should I check with an attorney before even starting this up? Maybe they'll give me a free consultation in exchange for a banner on the "Attorneys" page lol.
Take a look here www.citrus411.com i think this is what you are thinking of. Just make a better website then theirs.
Yeah I was thinking something along those lines but ack. That site is painful to look at haha! The only competition I'd have is the local newspaper/magazine so to counter that, I thought about having user reviews for various local businesses that showed off their service, hospitality, etc..
Well i know that the site does run a local radio commercial so you should look into the cost of that. Remember you are offering advertising and in turn you will have to advertise yourself otherwise you are of no value to your advertisers. Also i think your pricing is a little high. I would go more on the low side in the beginning. Try and get 1-2 advertisers into each of your categories then raise price a little but because lets say you have 2 advertisers for a local diner. Now a 3 comes to you and wants in well you now hold a little power over them as far as bargaining. Just a thought Good Luck with it
Good for you. That's a great, helpful skill. Just make sure that you have a way to automate or at least make some sections easy to update. I can imagine the many advertisers that will want to have a piece of the action once word about your site spreads out. Oh yeah, I just remembered...do you plan to get local news from your local paper or do you have other means to get news/features/interviews? Because your local paper might have reprint/republishing restrictions. I suggest that you look into that as well. Actually, I run a community website myself. Just like you, I also saw the importance of having a website that can really bring the residents (and advertisers, of course) together. As expected, it drew in a huge amount of traffic during the first few months. Then it slowed down for about two months because some people (well, a local media outlet, actually) thought that I didn't have a business permit and that I was "abusing" the system. That I was circumventing the law blah blah. I think they were just too scared that another member of the fourth state came into the picture. Anyways it all worked out in the end since I had a permit in the first place. Plus I got an endorsement from the local council stating that my website was legit and its main objective was to help shape our community's image online.