I run about 50 profitable websites, AMA.

[BANG]

I've been building niche websites for a few years and I have put together a portfolio of about 50 that are profitable. By profitable, I mean they have earned enough to pay off their development costs, hosting, domain name and any other expenses.

Ask me anything!

 

[MetaData]

How do you keep track of everything?

 

[BANG]

How do you keep track of everything?

I wish I could tell you that I use an intricate system of levers and pulleys and everything goes as smooth as silk, but the truth is I just kind of wing it. LastPass is a LIFE SAVER (There are other password-vaults out there worth checking out, too.)

I use a few different tools to track my rankings but aside from a few exceptions I generally go after smaller and less competitive niches, so as long as the traffic keeps flowing I don't worry too much about tracking every little thing. I dig a lot deeper for the tougher niches that I'm in because I've got to use any advantage that I can.

If you're curious about tracking in regards to anything in particular, let me know. In general, it's one of the areas where I can really stand to improve. Tracking, and automation... Now that I've got the system down, my focus is to lighten the workload while being able to get more done.

 

[Williamder]

I'm just trying to get started building niche websites.

This is pretty vague but... if you could go back in time to when you were just getting started what would you tell yourself? Is this even "real"? I mean is it too late to get into building niche sites as a viable business model?

 

[BANG]

I'm just trying to get started building niche websites.

This is pretty vague but... if you could go back in time to when you were just getting started what would you tell yourself? Is this even "real"? I mean is it too late to get into building niche sites as a viable business model?

If I could go back to when I was just getting started I would want to tell myself not to worry because the grinding pays off, but that's kind of cheating because a big part of what makes an entrepreneur is taking that leap of faith.

Nothing is guaranteed or owed to anybody, Williamder. (LOL.. William = Bill... Billder... Builder. I just got it. Clever.) You might be the hardest working guy in the world, but that doesn't mean anybody is going to visit your site, you know? Results are all that matter. The harder you work, the more experience you'll get, the better you'll start to be able to really hone in on what works again and again.

Just don't let fear paralize you, just go for it. Go all out, all in, whatever you want to call it. I've met too many people who never end up making it because they're afraid to take that leap of faith, they spend their time think if what if's and being cautions (Which is not a terrible idea, depending on your circumstances.. but ultimately you've still got to take that leap.)

Things went good for me when I got rid of my safety net, but obviously there are a lot of people who get rid of their safety nets and end up flat on the floor so ...

 

[MetaData]

It would be tactless of me to ask you how much your sites make you, but could you give me a rough idea how much they're earning and what type of sites they are? Do you have a particular pattern or style for most of them or are you all over the map?

 

[TrinitySAHM]

Whats the best approach for a mom? This is a weird question. I have a lot of time at home when I can work on the computer but I have never made a website before. Its weird for someone who has never made a website before to start up a business making websites so I'm having reservations.

 

[Dawnna]

What are the best niches right now?

 

[BANG]

It would be tactless of me to ask you how much your sites make you, but could you give me a rough idea how much they're earning and what type of sites they are? Do you have a particular pattern or style for most of them or are you all over the map?

Content sites with a lot of articles, my main type of content is the written word but I dabble in videos and infographics sometimes. I'm going to be going a lot harder with videos, I have a new project coming up where every article will also have a video to go along with it. I'm thinking it will help get pages on the map sooner (The backlink from the video), and having the video embedded into the article will help get views and hopefully rank it better in Youtube. So I'll be using Youtube to help rank my pages in Google, and my visitors from Google who play the video will be helping to rank it higher in Youtube. Here's to hoping the sum of all parts makes a great whole or whatever.

Whats the best approach for a mom? This is a weird question. I have a lot of time at home when I can work on the computer but I have never made a website before. Its weird for someone who has never made a website before to start up a business making websites so I'm having reservations.

The best way to get started may be to join where you can sell writing services. It will help introduce you to new niches, and if you save a copy of your articles and google some phrases from them a week or two after submitting them to your customers, you'll be able to see what people are doing with them. That might be the easiest way to go starting from scratch. Also while you're doing that, start a blog. Don't even worry about doing things right or wrong yet, there are 10,001 variables to tweak and each one has a whole set of pros and cons, so just ignore all that stuff for now and DO IT. Just start blogging, caution to the wind. Don't expect to bank off this first site, it's a learning experience. The sooner you just start doing any type of blogging, the closer you'll be to what you're trying to do.

What are the best niches right now?

That's the million dollar question my friend

 

[Ryuzaki]

Before my questions, there's a couple of small comments I'd make. Writing content as a way to start is very smart. It'll get some cashflow going, teach you how to grind hard, because it's very tedious, and expose you to niches, so you can get an overview of the landscape. You can also search specific phrases you drop in there and see their sites and learn from that, as you've said. You can get a grip on what's a good enough design, how to structure sites, etc. Also, to the person asking about mom blogging... just get in "the loop" and you'll never starve for traffic. But then the game is how do you climb that social ladder... it's SEO... Social Engineering Optimization. Shouldn't be hard if you're passionate about your topic.

Q1)
You've stated that these 50 sites are paying for their own expenses, but is the surplus revenue enough for you to live on and attack this full time?

Q2)
Regardless of yes or no above, do you plan to pivot away from the volatility of small sites and move into authority sites? You probably have several in your batch that could be redirected and grown into larger and more stable earners. What's your take on this?

 

[Daquan]

Do you find the 80/20 Pareto principle to be true with your sites? do 20% of them bring in 80% of the money?

And if that's the case, what should you do with the other 80%? turn them into a blog network? Flip them? Let them die?

 

[Mandalay]

Hi BANG. Like I said in my intro thread here (woohoo I made a hyperlink!!!) I'm brand new at this but I just put up my first site. I bought a Wordpress theme from Themeforest. I choose a niche that interests me. My husband is supporting me while I work on my first website. Is it realistic that I could start making money in a month or two? I don't want my husband to have to support me 100% while I do this because he works hard and if this doesn't work out I might have to go back into nursing or home care.
What is a good time frame for someone starting from scratch to being able to support themselves? I won't need 50 websites before I can pay the bills will I?

Thanks ....... I'm feeling kind of nervous after writing this....

 

[BANG]

Q1)
You've stated that these 50 sites are paying for their own expenses, but is the surplus revenue enough for you to live on and attack this full time?

Q2)
Regardless of yes or no above, do you plan to pivot away from the volatility of small sites and move into authority sites? You probably have several in your batch that could be redirected and grown into larger and more stable earners. What's your take on this?

I'll answer both of those at once. I'm not working on these sites fulltime because I'm taking a bit of "down time".. a few months to figure out what I want to do next. So, I have enough money stashed away that I'm able to take a few months off and not sweat it, but I'm not ready to retire off of these sites or anything but I'm just tying to figure out what my next move will be. I'm not 100% sure I want to take any of my current sites too much bigger, just because I'm really craving some new type of adventure.

We can get more technical with these questions if anyone wants to know anything more specific!

 

[BANG]

Do you find the 80/20 Pareto principle to be true with your sites? do 20% of them bring in 80% of the money?

And if that's the case, what should you do with the other 80%? turn them into a blog network? Flip them? Let them die?

I haven't really looked into that, I mean... sure, my top 20% of sites are performing a lot better than the sites that aren't in the top performers... I'm honestly not super familiar with Pareto, so pardon me for not being able to give you much more. I haven't flipped any of the worse performing sites, if anything I would probably sell the most valuable ones to help fund "round two".
I'm fairly aware of which sites link to which, I guess if you really wanted to take a fine tooth comb they're all just 2-3 moves away from one another so it's safe to say they're already more or less "networked" together.
If a site hasn't earned it's worth after a year of being properly developed, I will most likely cut it loose unless it still has decent stats but just isn't able to rank, in which case I leverage it for links to my other properties and just keep my fingers crossed lol.
Quite a long-term business plan.. keeping your fingers crossed, hey? That's what's been stressing me out the most as I take this time off to reflect and plan my next move... I want something SUBSTANTIAL, but I also want to perfect my current method. I'm not worried, I've got a lot more downtime to figure it all out.

Hi BANG. Like I said in my intro thread here (woohoo I made a hyperlink!!!) I'm brand new at this but I just put up my first site. I bought a Wordpress theme from Themeforest. I choose a niche that interests me. My husband is supporting me while I work on my first website. Is it realistic that I could start making money in a month or two? I don't want my husband to have to support me 100% while I do this because he works hard and if this doesn't work out I might have to go back into nursing or home care.
What is a good time frame for someone starting from scratch to being able to support themselves? I won't need 50 websites before I can pay the bills will I?

Thanks ....... I'm feeling kind of nervous after writing this....

Hehe congrats on the hyperlink!

A month or two from scratch... No, that's not realistic to start earning any kind of decent coin. You MIGHT crack your first sale / ad click / newsletter signup (Depending on how your site is monetized) within that time, but frankly I wouldn't be stressing out if it took more than a few months for a site to get any significant traffic or *events* (Event = sale, ad click, etc.)
Nah, you won't need 50 websites... A lot of people do it with just one or two. Different strokes. It sounds like you're putting a lot of pressure on yourself, if you don't mind me being a bit presumptions, maybe you're a bit anxious about all of this too. Again if I'm being blunt, I wouldn't even fret if your first site doesn't earn you anything. Use it as a learning process. If you have to get a job to take some of the stress away in the meantime, it's not the end of the world either... Some people need that safety net to really focus and invest themselves in a project, whereas other people prefer to 'burn the boat'... It all comes down to knowing yourself and what works best for you.

 

[Daquan]

Is it realistic that I could start making money in a month or two?

There's a ramp up time regardless these days. There's been a sandbox in place for a long time meant to frustrate SEO's, which basically is Google saying "we aren't going to let you rank for 3 months regardless what you do." Now, there are ways around this, such as not coming across as an SEO and having dumb link velocity, or at least not validating it with some social signals amongst other things.

Forget all of that though. If you are already riding the line that tight, you should get a job in the meantime and build this up on the side. It's going to likely be a year before you're earning good, and it may not match your day job. It might be a year before you realized you flopped on your first effort too. Don't ride the line that close. There's no sense. And a day job can provide you with money to pay for content and things like that that will accelerate you on the path to success.

 

[Devil Anse]

Maybe what you can do is move yourself on to *Phase 2* and get some virtual assistants pounding out these sites with some guide you make. That way this can scale and you can get back to having fun new adventures. I agree about getting bored with the same old projects, even if they are doing good.

 

[TeddyP]

I see you said that they are all networked together in some fashion. Does this mean you are building a ton of sites in similar niches? Or are you dominating one larger niche? Or are they unrelated or what?

I'm scared to link some of my unrelated sites together, but I have made posts about topics where I could kind of meld two niches together to sneak a link in more relevantly.

Can you tell me how you are doing this and staying safe? It be great to let all of my sites harness each other's power.

 

[Samwise89]

I'm making about $3 a day now My problem has been that I just don't know how to get backlinks fast enough and not be a spammer. I've got about 10 sites now *done* but only one is ranking and making money, and I know it's because of links. How do you manage to rank that many sites? I've been making social bookmarks and blog comments. I email and ask for guest posts but people hardly ever reply and those that do say no. It might be because of my sites not looking that great either. I'm not sure what to do.

 

[MartyFlyStax]

Is there anything you wish you did differently when getting these sites started? Any time-savers you didn't realize until site #35 or something like that?

 

[BANG]

Maybe what you can do is move yourself on to *Phase 2* and get some virtual assistants pounding out these sites with some guide you make. That way this can scale and you can get back to having fun new adventures. I agree about getting bored with the same old projects, even if they are doing good.

That's a good suggestion, it's hard for me to give up control... If a VA could do it properly, wouldn't they be doing it for themselves? Well, I guess the key is to break it up into tasks for each one to manage, and hope that it all falls into place. Hmm, that's definitely something I need to explore more. I definitely don't want it to look like I'm trying to paint myself as some guru who knows everything by starting this AMA, I just thought it would be fun and hell, I'm learning a few things and getting some great suggestions too.

I see you said that they are all networked together in some fashion. Does this mean you are building a ton of sites in similar niches? Or are you dominating one larger niche? Or are they unrelated or what?

I'm scared to link some of my unrelated sites together, but I have made posts about topics where I could kind of meld two niches together to sneak a link in more relevantly.

Can you tell me how you are doing this and staying safe? It be great to let all of my sites harness each other's power.

They're not all necessarily all networked together, just where it makes sense. There are a few different niches, but they're all in the same ballpark for the most part... I'm not doing anything too special, just not over-doing it, or linking too much, and I have a lot of other backlinks to quality sites. I don't really like the word "authority", it gets tossed around way too often.

I'm making about $3 a day now My problem has been that I just don't know how to get backlinks fast enough and not be a spammer. I've got about 10 sites now *done* but only one is ranking and making money, and I know it's because of links. How do you manage to rank that many sites? I've been making social bookmarks and blog comments. I email and ask for guest posts but people hardly ever reply and those that do say no. It might be because of my sites not looking that great either. I'm not sure what to do.

Hey 3 bucks a day is a good start. If only one site is ranking and making money, then you don't have 10 sites done my friend. Pick one and build some links to it this week, don't worry about building them "fast enough", take your time. With 10 sites that you're trying to rank, do one at a time, grab a few links, and just keep cycling through them each week or each few days, or even each few links you build. You have the luxury of having enough on your plate to keep yourself very busy, constantly making progress, and not having to worry about building too many links to one site as much. Use that as an advantage instead of looking at it like a disadvantage.

Is there anything you wish you did differently when getting these sites started? Any time-savers you didn't realize until site #35 or something like that?

Sometimes I wish I had everything setup in some type of wordpress management dashboard, but I also don't know if I trust that... feels like putting all my eggs in one basket, and it must create some kind of footprint too. Other than that, I wish I signed up for a lifetime Backup Buddy membership on day 1 instead of paying $150 a year and having to go back to set it up on each site. Live and learn!

 

[BIGdCPA]

QUESTION: What makes you qualified to be giving out advice?

 

[Vernon2014]

QUESTION: What makes you qualified to be giving out advice?

Maybe the fact that he took the time to open the thread and he's just sharing his experiences? Where's your thread, Beebs? Jeez.. lol.

 

[Bubbles]

loling at "big d", check yourself.

OP - do you need any help running your sites? I'm very new to affiliate marketing but I want to sharpen my skills. I'm willing to work for low pay or even as a volunteer if it means I get a chance to see behind the scenes for how all of this works. I said in my intro that I'm an affiliate and I'm always looking for great offers... today, it sounds like I'm the one making a great offer... so what do you say?

 

[Napolean]

You ever get in shit from a google update?

 

[BANG]

QUESTION: What makes you qualified to be giving out advice?

Nothing, man.. just the fact that I'm here doing it and being honest and open about everything instead of hissing at anyone who asks me a question (re: your intro thread.)

loling at "big d", check yourself.

OP - do you need any help running your sites? I'm very new to affiliate marketing but I want to sharpen my skills. I'm willing to work for low pay or even as a volunteer if it means I get a chance to see behind the scenes for how all of this works. I said in my intro that I'm an affiliate and I'm always looking for great offers... today, it sounds like I'm the one making a great offer... so what do you say?

Haha... hmm, maybe.. Send me a PM with a little bit more info on your background and experience and what you bring to the table and we'll see if we can work something out. Always happy to have an opportunity to help out a Builder.

You ever get in shit from a google update?

I don't worry too much about those... I've had things move around, sure, but then you make the necessary adjustments and carry on your way.