No matter what area of internet business you get into, it is always a gamble. I’ve probably started a dozen websites since I got into internet marketing in 2004. Out of the dozen websites only one has been really sucessful bringing in $xx,xxx a year. Webpuffs.com has yet to reach it’s potential, right now we are just making pocket change. Most of the other websites I started, I either bailed out of too early or it was just a tough market to stay in. The good thing about the websites that have failed is that I’ve learned stuff from each of the sites. The bad thing is I lost money on most of them. I haven’t lost much because I don’t usually don’t invest tons of money into a new project until it starts paying for itself. You can read more on my business philosophy here: http://www.webpuffs.com/category/my-business-philosophy/

I think some newbies get this idea that they are going to get rich quick. No matter what you do in life it takes work to make money, there is no way around it. Secondly, even after you work hard on an internet business doesn’t mean you will be a success.  What set my site that makes $xx,xxx a year with my sites that made a very low $xxx or a very low $xx a year?  Here are a few things that I believe help make my one site a success.

Niche - One of the biggest factors of a successful site is having a niche business, selling a product or service that not everyone and their brother is selling.  One of my business ventures was a web template site.  There are over 81 million results in Google for web templates.  I sold 2 web templates during the life of my site, but I ended up selling the whole site for $200 when it was all said and done, I probably made a small profit on it.  I wouldn’t of called it a success.

I know people who are trying to sell items that there are billions of on the internet.  It’s like trying to sell plain yellow #2 pencils.  You are trying to sell them for a $1 while anyone can pick them up for $0.10 at their local store.

I talked to a friend of mine the other night he came across a product that hardly no one is selling.  He just started a week ago and has already had days where he sold 10 items in one day.  The point I’m making is try to sell something no one else is.

Learn How to Market - When I first got into the the internet business world I started to visit search engine optimization forums.  I read a ton.  For my most successful site, I’m #2 in Google, Yahoo, and MSN for my major keyword.

Look Good -  People tend not to buy from sites that look ugly.  I compare this to a well lit gas station and a dark gloomy gas station, which gas station would you feel comfortable getting gas at?

That’s about all I have to say about that at this time.

Jon

Link Building is off page SEO. Link building is probably the most important part of SEO. The internet is called the world wide web because it is based on websites that are connected together by links. In a search engine’s eyes a link pointing to your site from another site is a vote for your site. One way links are better than reciprocal links, or “link trades”. One way links are better because there is a chance that the person who is linking to you is linking to you because they think you are an important resource to their readers.

There are many ways to build links, but here are some common ways that people build links.

Submitting Your Site to Directories - There are services out there who will submit your site to hundreds of directories for a small price. I usually go this route because it saves a lot of time.

Buying Links - Buying links can get expensive, I don’t buy too many links. You have to be real careful what sites you buy links from.

Blogging - I believe gaining links by blogging is one of the best ways to build links. It is more natural as far as search engines are concerned. Any future sites that I start will have a blog attached to it. I believe it is better to have external sites blog about you, but an internal blog is still beneficial.

Link Trading - Very common link building technique. One thing nice about this technique is that it is free.

Here’s a previous post that I made that you might find helpful:

http://www.webpuffs.com/2006/03/31/search-engine-optimization-seo/

Have you ever had such good service at a restaurant that you told everyone and their brother about this certain restaurant?  Well, I have stumbled across a hosting company that I believe should be rewarded a best in customer service award.  My hosting provider rocks!  I’ve emailed them asking them questions about certain issues many times.  These certain issues are usually things they aren’t suppose to offer support for.  They solve my problems with in 24 hours 99% of the time.  They’ve gone out of their way to help me many times.  Recently, I was having problems with my .htaccess on Wordpress conflicting with my osCommerce admin.  They fixed my problem in less than 24 hours.
I’ve had hosting providors before that had monkeys working for them.  It’s like they hired bums off of the street who never even touched a computer before.  I usually knew more than them about my hosting account.

My current hosting provider is just plain awesome.  I just wanted to give them some props.  Who is my hosting provider?  Bluecityhosts

I made that last post 3:30 in the morning so it wasn’t very clear. This is pretty much how it’s going down. Jeff and I are splitting the revenue 50/50 on this site. By the end of the month, maybe we can each buy a Happy Meal. Jeff created a script so that we can split the Adsense clicks 50/50. Jeff is the man when it comes to coding. Like I stated in the last article, we will be tag team posting. I have a feeling I will be in the ring more than him.

During my sabbatical (On my last post I said I handed this blog over to my brother-in-law a month ago. It was actually two months ago.), I haven’t been doing much web stuff. I’ve been playing around a little with os Commerce. I figured a few cool things out that I will share with you at a later date. My one website that brings in most of the dough is still doing great. I believe we have reached my first goal of replacing my wife’s income. I spoke of this goal in this article. We may have even passed it. I will know for sure at the end of the year when we add all of our profits together.

I’m still doing children’s ministry. I’m having a blast and running hard. Lately, I’ve been diving into more adult related ministry stuff. I’ve been soaking up marriage books and reading stuff on different doctrines and end time prophecy. I’ve also been sharpening my children’s ministry skills, I’ve been learning how to do more magic tricks. I’m a regular Houdini. Life is good. Until next time…

Jon

Hi, my name is Jeff Schollaart.  This blog is now changing to a question/answer format.  I have the first question.  Jon Lewis handed this site, and all I want to do is convert the adsense ID over to mine.  I cannot find it anywhere!  I found an ID in a php file, so I changed it, but it made no change on the website.  So Jon, if you read this, please answer my question.   This will also give other users who plan on starting up a blog with adsense an idea of the best way to inject adsense into their word press.  I have never used word press before, and I’m sure I am just overlooking the setting, but help would be appreciated. 

 I am opening this blog up for questions now, and I will try to answer them.  Questions allowed… PHP, MySQL, Linux, Web Design, Google Checkout, Networking, Security, and personal questions which aren’t so personal.

I really want to hand my blog over to the new owner with ease. I want my readers to feel like I never left. From ministry experience I believe when there is a transition of leadership, it is always better for the new leader to always come from the inside and not the outside. When I took my current job, I came from out of state. There was a team of 20-30 volunteers. The former leader moved out of state and never raised up a leader under them. If the former leader would have raised up a leader under them, the new leader would have known the way things were before. The new leader would have even known the volunteers well. The new leader would already be adapted to the areas culture. But it didn’t go down like that. Me, the new leader, comes in doesn’t know a single one of the volunteers. I had no clue what the culture was like since I was from a different region. I also had no clue what the volunteers were used to doing in the past. I was literally handed the keys and told to get ‘er done. I had to work hard to gain the trust of each of my volunteers. I also had to learn what my volunteers did in the past to understand how they thought. I also had to learn what the culture was like. It would have been a lot easier for me if I was brought on under the last leader.

I would like to give the new owner of Webpuffs.com a little bit better of an intro than I was given as I started my new job a little over two years ago. The new owner of Webpuffs.com is Jeff Schollaart, my brother-in-law.

Here’s a little bit of Jeff’s background so you can get an idea of who he is and what direction this blog will probably go in. Jeff, in my opinion is a programming guru. He does a lot of hand coding. Most of the time he rattles stuff off to me and I’m thinking, “What in the world are you talking about?”. I wish I had half of Jeff’s knowledge. Jeff has built quite a few database driven websites. He is currently being contracted by two different places to devise elaborate data-driven sites that cater to their specific needs. Although he has taken college courses on computer programming and more, most of his skill is self-taught stemming from his love of the field. My intro doesn’t give it justice, but you will soon experience his wealth of knowledge first hand.

This is how the blog transfer will happen. Right now I’m working on transferring my domain over to Jeff, and then we will go from there. I will be communicating with Jeff throughout the transition as well as commenting here and there on the blog.

Thanks,

Jon