tdog.blog

Okay, here’s the process I follow when I launch a new niche marketing site. Of course, I’m skipping over most of the details in the first part, which is figuring out if a niche warrants a focused site….

But I know there are lots of folks out there (myself included) who need to keep it real, and by “real” I mean “concrete and specific.” So let’s talk a little about a site I’m launching called BestGuyMovies.com. I got the idea for the site when I finally joined NetFlix and started rating movies I liked.

Those of you who know me well know that I really like movies, but I especially enjoy a certain class of movie, the one I call a “guy movie”–the ones that feature explosions, gun play, thrilling action, a damsel/hellcat (in or out of distress), and all the rest. Don’t give me deep themes, foreigners (unless they’re villains or plucky sidekicks), or any of that high-minded stuff. I want to cheer, eat popcorn, and yell “Booyah!” when the bad guy ends up driving an exploding SUV over a cliff and impaling himself on the splintered blades of a disintegrating Soviet-era attack chopper, preferably with the entire smirking crew on board.

But how do I know this would make a good site? Well, I did the keyword research, figured out what the competition is like, and yes, there’s enough room for little old me. Furthermore, I know that there’s a way to monetize my little niche site, mostly because people like NetFlix.com, Amazon.com, and others have affiliate programs that allow me to make some bucks on the side while I’m having fun reviewing films.

And yeah, I am gonna have a lot of fun, and that’s a big test for me. Believe me, maintaining this blog will not be a pain in the neck. Plus there’s literally oodles and oodles of content out there I can talk about. Not just the movies, but the books these movies are based on, the posters, action figures, video games based on the movies, and all that. In other words, not only no end to material, but also no end to the kinds of tie-ins that can start (and nurture) very good relationships.

So believe me, this thing is ready to roll. So I go to GoDaddy.com and start looking for available domain names that involve my best key words: in this case, guys and movies. Hmmm, not that many left, but here is BestGuyMovies.com. That pretty much says it all, right? I mean, I want the site to feature only the best guy movies ever, even if that list consists of 500 or so movies.

I buy the domain and wait the half hour or so before it is processed by GoDaddy.com and put on my domain roster. I don’t sit around on my can, though, because now it’s time to run over to DreamHost (my hosting provider) and start the process of hosting that site.

I register a new domain on DreamHost (in this case, www.bestguymovies.com) and tell DreamHost to install WordPress in that domain. I’ve already decided that this is going to be a blog, but if I’d decided I wanted the site to be a reference I’d install a Wiki, or if I decided on a community site I’d chosen a forum. Believe me, later on there may just be time/room/opportunity to expand on the initial idea, but for now I’m going to create a blog with WordPress.

By this time, the domains are showing up over at GoDaddy.com, and I point them to the DNS nameservers over at DreamHost. That way, anyone typing www.bestguymovies.com into their browser will be pointed at the site I’m creating on DreamHost.

Approximately 15 minutes after installing WordPress, I get an email from the installer robot and go to the URL they’ve indicated to finish my install. With any luck, DNS is routing properly and I can go right to that URL, or I might need to use an IP address. Either way, I hit that address, which is basically a WordPress admin tool installation package. 

Once I hit that link, I’m prompted to enter my email address and the system generates a random password. 30 seconds later, I’m all set up and I can log in for the first time. So what’s next? Here’s my punch list:

1. I immediately add a bio to my user account and reset my password to something easier to remember.
2. If I’ve enlisted help from contributors, I might add them now, or I might do it later.
3. I activate the most useful plug-in in the universe, Akismet, which helps cut out spam comments. Once activated, I add my Akismet key, which I generated a year ago.
4. Couple of other useful plug-ins: Amazon Reloaded, which lets me add affiliate-friendly links to Amazon.com products; GD Ratings, which allow visitors to rate posts and pages.
5. I pick a WordPress theme. DreamHost has 50 themes available, so I’m likely able to find one that I like.
6. I make a snap decision to play around with the theme or maybe grab another theme from another site.
7. I go to the Adwords site and generate the Adwords code snippet that I then copy and paste into the footer template of my theme.
8. I generate Adsense code for my new site, making sure to create a channel for my new site (this helps me track my impressions better), and then I paste the code into the sidebar (at minimum).
9. I immediately generate 3-5 posts, one that is posted right away, the others scheduled out no more than a week.
10. I announce my new site on the other sites on my network, especially those that are in some way related to that site. If there is no relation, I use those sites to talk about some aspect of the new site (for example, I’m talking about the mechanics of niche marketing here) or (and here’s the genius of it all) I use the other sites to recruit contributors.
11. I make a note in my calendar software to check my traffic in 30 days, because at that point I’ll be able to add contextual text link ads, each of which might bring me 5-10 dollars or more per link.
12. I make a note in my calendar software for six months out, because at that point I can write reviews and be paid for them.
13. I then start figuring out how to add affiliate links, ads, and other content. For example, for BestGuyMovies.com I’m going to be able to sell NetFlix.com memberships, books and movies on Amazon.com, movie posters from wherever, screenplays from some other place, anything related to these movies (mugs, action figures, clothes, whatever).

Once all that is done, I can start working on driving traffic, but at least now I’ve got a there there. And by the way, I don’t pay for traffic unless it’s PPC (pay per click). I normally target 5-10 sites or blogs that relate to my niche topic and I write an article, guest blog, or otherwise make myself known in a non-hate-inspiring way (the easiest way to do that is to prepare a how-to article or something humorous).