Thinking about giving up on building websites...

Discussion in 'General Marketing' started by dspohn23, Feb 9, 2008.

  1. #1
    My sites:

    http://www.findsomearticles.com/ (2 months old) (40+ visitors a day)
    http://www.findsomerecipes.com/ (2 months old) (2+ visitors a day)
    http://www.us-city-home.com/ (1 months old) (3+ visitors a day)

    These sites generate nearly no traffic and no money for me.

    I have be consistently commenting on dofollow blogs with links to these sites. I have tried my best to SEO these sites. I have submitted these sites to directories, using a variety of anchor texts. I have also submitted many of the pages from findsomearticles.com to Digg, Stumble, Mixx.com, etc.

    However, I can help but feel down, that these sites are going no where. I haven't seen an increase in traffic at all, even after all the hard work I put in everyday. .75 cents in revenue a day will not cut it for me, for much longer. I just can't justify all this time I put in, for so little money.

    Does anyone have any suggestions for me on these sites? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
     
    dspohn23, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  2. white.wizard

    white.wizard Peon

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    #2
    Hi dspohn23, I checked a little bit your 3 sites. For example your article site has a lot of content as far as I saw.

    Now a good question: it is a fresh content ? Or republished content ?
    I suppose these are articles from free ezines and directories. So you have a lot of quantity but no quality. This is one aspect.

    Another problem I noticed is that you meta tags "keywords" and "description" are the same for all your articles. These is bad because you should have keywords and description related to the article.

    Maybe you invest time and effort to run these websites but it's essential to do the this right.

    As an example I have lunched an website in January. It has only 8 articles but I get 20 visitors a day without making any effort. You can take a look at website here: http://www.professional-articles.com


    How much time did you invest in these sites ?
    And what are you expectations ?

    I hope you will find useful my tips. After you answer to my question I can give other tips.
     
    white.wizard, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  3. Notting

    Notting Notable Member

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    #3
    Here's a reality check for you. Your sites are the same as 1000000000000000000000000000000000 sites on the net (if not worse).


    You need to:

    a) come up with an idea for a site that no-one else has created yet
    b) make your site better than all the other sites on the same subject.

    You need to do a brainstorming session and come up with some new ideas mate!

    Good luck
    Notting
     
    Notting, Feb 9, 2008 IP
    gemini181 likes this.
  4. gemini181

    gemini181 Well-Known Member

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    #4
    "Most people give up just when they're about to achieve success. They quit on the one yard line. They give up at the last minute of the game one foot from a winning touchdown." -Ross Perot

    Your not that close yet :p, but it's still a good idea to never give up. :)
    Remember: E-commerce is booming.

    [​IMG]
     
    gemini181, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  5. white.wizard

    white.wizard Peon

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    #5
    I'm not agree with you Notting when you say that it has to be a new idea.
    A new idea will be ideal of course but existing business on the market are also good.

    From my point of view as long you are dedicated and give to your user something useful it's ok. I don't say it's enough. dspohn23 should write down some goals for the sites. Then he should create a plan and stay with it.

    Also a good book about how to build a web business will help.
     
    white.wizard, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  6. mightyb

    mightyb Banned

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    #6
    First of all 2 months is nothing in terms of SEO. It can take up to a year to get some decent SEO results. Secondly it looks like you were wasting your time on things that no longer work as well as they used to a few years ago. For example directory submissions IMHO is 95% waste of your time. You need to start reading on some up to date SEO. Find different ways of acquiring backlinks. You need quality backlinks from related sites. For example find 10 or so PR5+ related blogs with "top commentators" plugin. With a few comments a day you will end up with quality, homepage links.

    The problem with DP is that its 90% "newbs". You hardly ever see any decent tips. Find some blogs run by people who know what they are doing. Learn from their techniques and ideas.

    Fresh ideas here: http://www.bluehatseo.com A whole bunch of good blogs listed in this post: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/best-seo-blog-of-2005-best-search-blog-awards/2696/
     
    mightyb, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  7. Genuine Marketer

    Genuine Marketer Well-Known Member

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    #7
    I agree with notting and it just looks way too bland. Add a bit of originality to it or get someone to build a layout for you. Also the content is most likely everywhere else.
     
    Genuine Marketer, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  8. regencytimberbuildings

    regencytimberbuildings Active Member

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    #8
    2 months isn't long enough. I find that new sites normally take between 1-6 months to gain decent serps.
    Also I think there is some tough competition in your niche.
     
    regencytimberbuildings, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  9. ladyfiesta

    ladyfiesta Well-Known Member

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    #9
    You have to love what you're doing instead of making your number 1 reason as making money. Plus, your sites are still young, they need more time to grow.. those websites that make a lot of money usually are more than a year old..
     
    ladyfiesta, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  10. Perry Rose

    Perry Rose Peon

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    #10
    Stop doing methods that don't work, give aways, sign ups, seo, signatures, exchanging links...

    Start advertising, and, getting word of mouth going!

    Until you do, you wont see the kind of success you want.

    That's the bottom line.
     
    Perry Rose, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  11. corb

    corb Peon

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    #11
    A small issue I noticed is that they look like template sites. So even if the content is awesome, people will see it and skip it because it looks like "just another ad serving website"
    Try adding some images that look like the content

    Best of luck buddy!
     
    corb, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  12. dspohn23

    dspohn23 Peon

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    #12
    I'd like to thank everyone for your comments and advice. I really do think that I need to give it some more time.
    I obviously need to improve the look and content quality of these sites. I figured that if I saw some promise in them, that it would be easier for me to be excited about working on them.

    Once I got around to looking at the web stats for today, I noticed there was a huge increase in traffic today. There were over 800 uniques today to go to findsomearticles.com. I was extremely surprised at this, because that was probably the total of uniques of the past 3 weeks put together. So I guess that I should not give up yet, and that there still is something to look forward to.

    Thanks everyone for you advice and encouragement!
     
    dspohn23, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  13. ruby

    ruby Well-Known Member

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    #13
    Ill say one thing.... UNIQUE VALUE PROPOSITION.

    Or put another way.... MARKET DIFFERENTIATION.
     
    ruby, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  14. dspohn23

    dspohn23 Peon

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    #14
    I'm not try to make a million dollars with these sites. I have a few other sites that I am also working on.

    My real goal is eventually to make a steady $50 US a day combined from all of my sites. I'm not looking for a total income, just a nice supplement.

    Do you guys think that it is possible for me to achieve this within a year, if I spread it across 10+ websites? Or should I really be focusing on less sites and better content?
     
    dspohn23, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  15. immortality

    immortality Peon

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    #15
    Everything youre doing is not the way to go about getting traffic. It will get you ranking decently in search engines LATER ON. Put more time into getting actual traffic instead of going for SEO.
     
    immortality, Feb 9, 2008 IP
  16. twodogs

    twodogs Banned

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    #16
    i just started a blog to make extra and i dont expect to see results for at least 6 months

    if you want quick traffic join Entrecard.com

    ( i actually have to redo our plan thanks to Entrecard because we are now seeing results
    we didnt actually expect till the 2nd month )

    you will find some great sites you would never have seen due to ranking
    or serps

    it also has been great for our networking and have met some fine people in only 3 weeks

    PS: sorry this is not spam for Entrecard
     
    twodogs, Feb 9, 2008 IP