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Money Making Websites, How to Start a Website
In this article we will be covering topics such as how to start a website if you don’t already have one, how to find your target audience, how to convert traffic on your website, which networks to choose and how to get your visitors to come back again and again and again.
Contents:
- How to Start a Website?
- First steps: How to Generate Revenue
- Common Marketing Mistakes to Avoid
- What’s in a Domain Name?
- How to Get Traffic for Free?
- How to Get Repeat Business?
- Money Making Websites, How to Start a Website Conclusion
How to Start a Website?
If, in the first instance, you’re asking, ‘how to start a website’, then you need to read my article, Where to Register Domain Names. This article will advise you how to select the best domain name and how to register it with a good domain name registrar.
You then need to read my article, Web Hosting Providers, How to Choose the Best One if you’ve decided to have a different domain name registrar and hosting provider.
- As a newbie, I would recommend registering your domain name and hosting you website with the same company, JustHost would be my recommendation.
First Steps: How to Generate Revenue
So, presuming you have a good domain name which reflects your niche, hosted with a good hosting provider, we come to the task of how to generate revenue from you website.
- Ask yourself this, where am I going and how do I intend getting their?
The first decision required, is to decide which niche markets to operate in. You need to find the niche markets that have not been fully developed so allowing room to grow. Once the best niche markets have been selected, check the market trends for those market segments. Google Trends is an excellent way to track the current market trends and follow the life cycle of market products.
What is a Niche Market?
A niche market is the subset of the market on which a specific product or service is focusing. For example, car seat covers would be a niche in the automobile market.
- Niche marketing is a small market segment of a much larger entity.
Mainstream niche products aimed at a wide demographic audience tend to be low priced. Narrower demographics tend to lead to elevated prices with better margins.
Choose Which Products You Promote with Care
When deciding upon your niche markets choose a market place which pays good commissions. You’ll generally find the work involved in earning a commission of 5% is just the same as that for earning 50%, so choose which products you promote with care.
Research, Research. Research – Unsavoury Products
When choosing which products to promote, do your research. Discover what other affiliates are doing. Take note of the products being promoted by other affiliates. Check the products you are considering promoting carefully, there are probably several unsavoury products you would not like to be associated with.
After you have decided upon your niche market and the products you would like to promote within your selected niche markets you need to plan your marketing and promotion methods. Product review sites work well as do articles for sites such as EzineArticles.
Common Marketing Mistakes to Avoid
Too Much Too Soon
One of the biggest mistakes we all make is trying to do too much too soon. Ideas tend to arrive all at once and all demand attention. Too many ideas can have you constantly flitting from one idea to the next without really getting anything done.
- Lots of half finished projects are no good to anyone.
- Consider your ideas. Make some notes. Take a step back. Prioritise.
Having a defined goal will make you a lot more money than jumping between ideas. Given all the electronic gadgets we have these days I still find a notepad, a pencil and a To-Do list works wonders.
- Carry a small notepad and pencil wherever you go. Ideas come at the strangest times.
Pick a Goal, Don’t Get Side-tracked.
Each of your websites should have a definite theme within which you should work. Try to narrow the theme as much as possible. Why should you do this? Well, it’s very easy to have your website moving in a direction that was not intended and in so doing loose your intended audience.
Keep to the Point
When building a website to generate revenue you need to gain the trust of your potential customer as quickly as possible. They are viewing your page for a reason. Don’t give them a reason to leave. Tell them what they need to know and get them to your conversion pages, the pages that convince them to buy, as quickly as possible.
- The above having been said, don’t start with the hard sell, nobody likes a pushy salesman (or woman). It’s not so much pushing them towards a sale as coaxing them with patience and a careful balancing act.
Analysis, ClickTale and Google Analytics
Not allowing time to analyse your website and the traffic generated will loose you sales. You need to know which pages generate the most traffic and the most profit. Tools like ClickTale and Google Analytics are excellent SEO tools for this task. Another advantage of both these tools is their integration with WordPress, both ClickTale and Google Analytics have plugins available.
How often should you check your statistics? For low volume sites once a month may be sufficient but I would recommend getting into the habit of checking your websites statistics at least once a week. Just set one hour aside one day a week, grab a cup of tea and a biscuit and ponder.
What’s in a Domain Name?
If you are going to make money at affiliate marketing you must have your own domain name and website.
How Should You Pick a Domain Name?
Try to get a domain name that does one of two things, either describes the product (fine-jewellery) or describes the brand (KingSolutions). When describing the product try to obtain a name that contains a couple of targeted keywords if possible. Above all make the domain name memorable.
How Should You Pick a Domain Name Extension?
Which domain name extension should be chosen really depends upon your defined audience and which countries you are targeting. If you are only targeting a specific country such as the UK then a .co.uk extension makes sense as this will help you to rank in the country specific search engines. If you are targeting a worldwide audience then .com still predominates.
- My preferred solution is to register both the country and .com extension where possible.
How to Get Traffic for Free?
First a little clarification. When I say FREE I mean no money outlay and not no work. Getting traffic to your website for FREE will cost you time and effort.
So, what’s the easiest and best (in my opinion) way of getting traffic? My recommended methods are:
- Produce excellent content for your own website.
- Ping the top search engines and directories.
- Write content for article sites, i.e.: EzineArticles.
- Try Free Press Release sites.
- Post on Forums.
- Place relevant comments on Blogs.
- Video submissions.
How to Get Repeat Business?
How do you get repeat business, easy, offer something of value! If your customers feel they got a good deal and can trust you, why wouldn’t they return to your website?
A typical affiliate method of contacting (potential) customers is with the use of an email list. You can build an email list by offering something of value FREE of charge. All the customer has to do is register their email address.
So, to get repeat business:
- Build trust with your customers.
- Be an authority.
- Offer good value.
- Offer a good service.
If you can do the above, not only will your customers return but they will tell their friends and then you have chain reaction. Personal recommendations are the thing of dreams, nurture them.
Money Making Websites, How to Start a Website Conclusion
My main advice is, find the money to get your own website built. You’ll need a web hosting provider (as little as £35 per annum), a domain name (FREE with the right web hosting provider) and a content management system (CMS) such as WordPress (FREE). Write your content and start working your way through the above.
You can research your domain name choices at any of the registrars listed in my article, ‘Where to Register Domain Names“. Most of these registrars provide domain name registration, domain name hosting, free domain name search facilities and some even give you a FREE domain name if you accept their domain name hosting package.
Well, I hope you found something useful and enjoyed this article, Money Making Websites, How to Start a Website. Don’t forget to let me have your thoughts in the comment box below. See you soon.
