Everybody already knows that "content is king" and probably have heard this saying many times over from lots of popular websites and people too... But what does it really mean? Ok, It goes a little something like this.. Original and relevant content is what is always in demand online... Right? Therefore, whatever "it is" popular at any given time.. Be it videos, images, articles, guides, reviews, etc... If you have it on your web site and it's one of the better ones out there, especially if it's available for free or the best deal VS. other competitors = makes you king. You are the king of that something. Yay!
It's kind of like a popularity contest though.. The popular sites and bigger and well established players, have a big advantage and head start! It's much easier for them to do well with a lot less effort.... While for the newer sites and smaller players, eh. You get what I am saying. But as long as you are supplying whatever everybody wants and needs you will be able establish yourself as the king of that stuff. If you can produce quality content time and time over and over again, you can engage an audience and continue to acquire an even bigger audience in that niche and grow your website / business. A very targeted group of visitors.. A true loyal following. Just like an actual king had back in the day... You get what I am saying?
Simple right? Well, content is great and all that but let me tell you... The chase for content is endless. Let me repeat that one more time. THE CHASE FOR CONTENT IS ENDLESS! There is so much content that can be produced for whatever that it is not even funny. You can spend millions of dollars per day, yes per day! Re-producing content or thinking that you are doing something original but are you really??!... Most of the content already exists in various forms on the internet on just about every topic. Just producing content for the hell of it is really silly. You have to produce content with a purpose. What is the purpose? Well, it varies, case-by-case as every site is different. What is the best content?? Well, it depends who you ask :) There is a lot of variables that come into play when you are building a site and need to fill it with relevant content in order to make the search engines + visitors happy.
A few years ago I had recruited over a dozen "writers" to work for my web development company here in my NY office. Some of them were seniors attending high school, some freshmen in college. I asked a few of my good friends who were also my former teachers / professors to send over their best students who excelled in professional writing, journalism style, who may be interested in picking up a few hours here and there doing reviews / guides of various topics such as Music, Games and Travel. The tasks were pretty simple and straightforward and we paid really well and awarded bonuses too. Everybody worked hard and busted their ass, as was expected of course :)
I had a really great thing going here for about 1 year and we had tons of content produced, probably something like 100,000 unique pieces for at least 7,000 mainstream web sites which were money making machines all thanks to Google AdSense. We produced the content, put it up on the websites, did the search engine optimization and bammm.. Within a few weeks, the traffic that the sites generated would pay for their upfront / production costs and from there on everything was pure profit. It wasn't easy or too much fun micro-managing all of this operations and making sure everybody was doing their job and so on and so on... But a learning experience and one that I will never forget. It had it's crappy days, but overall, was a beautiful thing. Team effort.
We focused on a few smaller sub-categories which were not very competitive at that time. There was a lot of opportunities. We didn't launch random sites about just general Music stuff or Travel information that was available already on the web since 1990's and written about millions of times... We launched websites dealing with issues and topics that were up-and-coming and would be of interest for many years to come, hopefully. We were one of the first to produce that type of content and did a great job of putting it out there by doing the proper complimentary search engine optimization with the right domains. The search engines loved it and so did the people. Everybody was all over it. The search engines were happy. The visitors were extremely happy. We were also very happy because thanks to the content we were able to pull in a lot of traffic and from there on monetize it mainly with Google AdSense and YPN.
In today's day and age lots of people can produce great content but fail miserably when it comes to acquiring an audience for that content that can be in turn monetized. They cannot get those eye balls. It's not simple of course. It is tough work! The magic formula for a website's success involves only a few things really.. People will look at a website and valuate/ judge it by 1) type of content and amount of content it has and 2) amount of traffic it has. There is plenty of domains that have no content whatsoever, and never did, but are considered to be valuable because they have type in traffic.
Also there are many good sites out there that have some great all original and awesome content... But really what matters most is whether you are able to make money from that content one way or another. Whether you are able to make money from the traffic that the content is suppose to attract. Some content is old and the has-been type which will never again generate any traffic or revenues. Some content that isn't so popular right now may take off one day, eventually?! Not all content is equal. There is lots of different types of content and worth... Really. Lots of valuations and criteria to go by here.
So, you are a website owner and you know that content is king... Hmm... Yea?! It is. No doubt. We all love good content. But you need lots of traffic to throw at content in order for it to work for you. Producing content is fun and all but I am sure you don't do this for a hobby. You want to make some money off of it. When I hired over a dozen writers, I didn't do it as a public service just so we could write some stuff that nobody covered before because that would be such a very nice thing to do or something that would land me in the sunday newspaper... NO!! We did it because we saw many opportunities to cash in on. The work is not done, once you have the content on your website. The job ain't over... It is only the beginning. From there on, you have to market that content and get people to make use of your content. Every page. Every article. Every review. Every video. You need to market it all... SEO is the best way :)
You need people to like your content. You need people to like your content so much to the point where they share it with their friends, family, etc. You need to produce not just any content but the right content. It is so easy re-producing something... It is totally a different ball game coming up with something original and unique and with all that is involved with that. Sure, you can lose a lot of money but you also can gain lots. It's all about doing the right research. If you dig up the right niche and jump in on the opportunities that are clearly profitable where there isn't quality content or maybe it is crappy / outdated content.... You can easily own it.
If you don't do any real research or look into the niche that you are getting involved with carefully and take on it seriously with the right amount of resources... Well, you are playing a dangerous game here my friend and you will probably fail nine times out of ten because you never even had a chance in the first place. You never should of gotten involved with it.. Duh! It is really crazy to see but most people clearly don't understand the basics of how things work with internet businesses and SEO. They try to do too much with very little. It doesn't stand a chance. The wrong strategies. Waste of time and money. You can't come from the minor leagues and shoot straight for the top.
My point is... You need to know how to market the content. Where to market it and to whom. I've been doing this for many years now, building sites and optimizing them via "search engine optimization" and my best friends and biz partners Google, Yahoo and MSN help me spread the word all across the world about all of the great content I have produced. I feel really honored that they believe in us so much and refer many of their clients our way. Sometimes we manipulate them a bit, here and there... But who cares?! Ask any SEO expert and they will tell you to exploit to the fullest each and every opportunity you know of. You find something that works, you go at it til' it stops working. A lot of times we do clean whitehat, sometimes grey, blue, even black... Who cares though?! The only ones who complain are the guys who don't know how to do it in the first place. They can't. They won't. The only thing they can do is whine.
Running a website and making a profit off of it ain't easy this days. Running multiple websites and making money off of all of them is even tougher... Running lots of them... Wow!! It's nutz! Hehe... The search engine rankings in just about every category are pretty competitive.. You really gotta earn your spot. It's war out there!! Some require more work and effort in certain categories, some less... But it is all about finding your comfort zone. Find the level on which you are comfortable competing on. It can be a really small non-competitive niche which you can do well in. You can find 100 of them once you succeed a few times and rock them all. Even 1000s. Yes you can. They are all out there. You just have to go out there and find em. It is all about the research. You need to learn how to spot em and work em good. Real good!
I know you see people every day ranking for the big money and killer keywords and so on and so on.. But you have to understand that it didn't happen overnight for them. Those guys have been going at it for years. They have been doing lots of shit behind the scenes which you probably don't have a clue about and never will. You have to find a balance with content + SEO. Start small and work your way up by producing original content and marketing it properly. You gotta sell it first to Google, Yahoo and MSN. They love all original content, especially on exact match keyword domains. Once they fall in love with your website and content, assuming you did all of the right SEO tricks... They will send over lots of love right back your way... Targeted visitors. Highly valuable visitors which will hopefully put a few bucks in your pocket.
Content is king, yes... But without traffic, your content is worthless. It won't earn you a penny. It will just sit there...and it will sit there some more. That is why traffic is ace. It is much easier to monetize traffic, even without any actual content. Plenty of ways to make money off of traffic. Anybody who has a website knows how hard it is to monetize website's... But it is a challenge that has been around forever and since day one of the internet. It is up to you to find the right websites to invest in, build the right content, drive the traffic to it and monetize it with the right products/service offerings.
Search engine optimization cannot be ignored this days and it is more important than ever before to get with the program and get it right. It's not so difficult. A 12 year old could do it. Big fuckin deal, you can produce some content... It will stay buried if you don't market it properly. Nobody will know about it if you don't get off your ass and start building up some buzz around it. You can wait weeks, month's and years.... Things don't just happen on their own. You have to do the right SEO which includes on-page optimization and link building. Sometimes all it takes is a few links. Sometimes all it takes is a little careful optimization and targeting towards the right keywords that will drive some traffic. Not the most traffic, but the right traffic. Start small.. Grow slow!
Content is king... Yes, if it is used properly.... But it costs lots of money to produce a lot of good content consistently. SEO traffic is free.. Get it?! It is free traffic! You pay zilch. Nada!! So you think you are smart, and have been investing in producing good content... Why not invest in SEO too?! You have to :) Anybody who doesn't... One word: MORON! Have you been using your content properly?! Have you made the most of it??? Have you been working your content with the right SEO?! Do you even have the right content for your visitors and search engines!? Ask yourself some of this questions!! Good luck.
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