Points of focus when planning out a website.
Posted on Jan 16, 2009 by
Paul WhiteOne thing I have observe recently has been how the most successful
websites got their start. How they grew, and how they maintained
growth. It wasn't from black hat
SEO campaigns, and it wasn't from
some huge media push. It was a result of quality content and a slow
expansion over time.
Years ago I met with a
business owner that was going to build a yahoo style website. They wanted to have everything on there, classifieds, online dating, autos for sale, news, homes for sale, ext... Of course their goals was to get rich from all the advertising. But to have advertisers you need traffic. To get traffic you either need lots of word of mouth, or you need to be ranked high on google.
My recommendation to build a website is to take it slow. Make your focus on building quality content, that is focused to one particular niche. Make this niche your website's foundation. Then over time expand your niche to other niches that are closely related. This kind of planning will yield the greatest results from search engines.
How do search engines measure my page's content and figure out where I should be ranked?
Google's equation for determining a website's page rank is a secret. But it is a reflection of over 200 variables. Just about everything that could possible impact your ranking does. Here are a few of the things that will determine your ranking
External links from other sites.
Internal links from within your site.
External links to other sites.
keywords,
Title Tags.
Keyword density on page content.
Order of words in title and on page.
Age of page
Age of links
What text is linked.
URL of page
URL of graphics and files
Use of H tags
size of photos on page
number of photos on page
alt attribute on photos
These are just a few of the variables Google uses.
Real world example:
So you want to start your own site, first lets pick a niche.
Lets say you build your own solar panel to power a fountain in your yard, and you want to tell the world about it. So you build a website
dedicated to this project of yours. Over time you start to get people emailing you with questions. So you add a Questions and Answers section to your website for the most asked questions. Then over time you get alot of people asking about the different types of solar panels, and which to use. So you create a list of solar panels organized by manufacturer on your website, and include your recommendations on each of them. People start to email you their recommendations. So you add a comments form to the site so people can leave comments on the various solar panels you have listed. Eventually you also have to add a list of inverters and other related hardware. Then you post some tutorials for those who want to build their own system. Other people contact you asking if you will build it for them. Instead you put together a list of solar installers for people to contact. Over time you start to get contacted by other installers you don't have listed. They offer to pay you to list them on your site. Now you have advertisers. Eventually you change the format of your site to be a paid only site for advertisers.
Now this may seem like a very small niche but its easy to see how starting small can easily lead to a bigger site. The point I am trying to make is to stay close to your niche. Don't expand your site off to areas that aren't related to your niche. A website is like a tree, your niche is the trunk of the tree. If you want to add something to the site it will need to branch off from the trunk. If what you want to add is not related to the niche, then its better to start a new site just for it. Similar to the way forum moderators don't like discussions to stray away from the topic at hand. Its important to keep your site and its content relavent to your niche. Else you aren't maximizing your image to search engines.
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