It seems it is important to build authority website if one want to succeed in this game. What do you think what is important nowadays to become authority? How it could be achieved?
You have to make something people will like, instead of just stumble over p; People link to stuff they like. Booyah!
Even if you have quality and unique content, without proper links or AdWords you won't be seen. Come on guys... phree_radical, there is something about "people link to stuff they like", but they have to see the stuff to link to them, aren't they?
Getting many links and linking to high ranked sites in your industry will do the job sooner or later Didier
Yes, unique content and also sticky content will do it. Also a big site with many pages and good quality backlinks on popular sites will help alot.
Don't get confused between trust and authority. You have have an authority site that isn't trusted and a trusted site that isn't an authority. Authority site - The definitive source of information on a given subject Trusted site - Typically old with lots of links from other trusted site, i.e. Wikipedia, DMOZ, Yahoo, BBC, CNN etc
I think authority comes when other people start referring their friends to your site. A while ago I ran WinsockVB.com (a programming community resource for Visual Basic programming), and it became a bit of an authority because it was constantly referred to in forums whenever a Winsock related question was posted. With authority comes things like higih PR backlinks, high traffic etc.
You are missing the point. Quality unique content IS the starting point. Without quality, you won't get links from other sites. Without unique content, you won't get respect from the search engines. Buying ads and links won't turn you into an authority. It is your content that will do it for you. And years of hard work...
To be an authority, you have to be good and have quality content. That's sort of a given in the word 'authority'. Of course this can be achieved, but it won't be overnight. This sort of thing takes time and energy. The one thing that has not been mentioned in this thread is that it takes a community to consider someone an authority. So after you start your site, become active in communities related to your subject - and be real good and helpful and be right (often).
An autority site is THE site in the category. Example: Ask any one in the forex market which one is the best site to learn forex, and they will tell you: Babypips.com. If not, you will tell them, and they will thank you for that. Everybody who surfed a little bit on the net searching about forex love this site. It's the same for any subject.
Unique is something we can always go for but I think the more SPECIFIC you are on a topic the better off you are. Detail comes along with being unique I guess. My site deals with fishing and I pound on topics specific to my local area. This can be tough to do but if you know a lot about the information in the site you are trying to build then you are winning 3/4 of the battle. Next is to link to sites that are in your genaral niche but not in direct compitition. Now focus not so much on google ads but on local ads. In my case, boating stores, outdoors stores, etc. This is where my income comes from. $2200 an month. I do have google ads on my site but it's so minimal. Another thing that I may recomend is to place spelling mistakes in your meta key words. I bet 10-20% of my search hits are done on spelling errors! The main thing for me is this started out as a hobby and now it's a part time income. There are other things you can do to focus on store fronts that want internet advertising. This has worked very well for me. If you want more info please PM me or anyone else that matters. Roger