Why Running Your Business Without A Website Is Risky And Dangerous

Recently, I read a thread in the Warrior Forum about an Internet Marketer who had his Blogger blog shut down by the Big G. He was earning about $300 – $500 per month from the Blogger blog and needless to say he was quite disappointed.

For some reason, I can no longer locate that thread. I guess it was removed.

But this is reflective of a dangerous myth that prevails in Internet Marketing. How often have you seen products and courses churning out with tempting captions.

- No Website
- No SEO
- No PPC
- No Products

Honestly speaking, you should NEVER build a business online without having a website of your own. Sure there are a ton of free services that you can take advantage of, but having your money site on Blogger, WordPress, Squidoo or Hubpages etc is a perfect recipe for disaster.

Why?

Because those platforms though free are not owned by you. So you can be banned, slapped or flagged as spam without any warning. It is simple, it is their turf and they can do whatever they want to.

And it is precisely for this reason why I am not a fan of any courses that advise you to build your business on Web 2.0 properties. They can act as good feeder sites but they SHOULD NOT be your money site.

I understand why Marketers want to come up with products that encourage you to take advantage of these Web 2.0 properties. First, they are so easy to lure prospects into buying since the tagline of “No website” is way too tempting. Second, it may have worked for them.

But the problem starts when there are changes in the way these sites operate or when the Big G decides to slap these Web 2.0 properties- Thanks to the ocean of garbage that is being thrown on these properties.

And really, there is just no excuse for you NOT to have a website of your own. It doesn’t cost a fortune and if you can’t afford to buy a domain name and hosting, I would suggest that you get a job or if you have a job, save some money to invest in a domain name and web hosting.

For my sites, I use Hostgator and personally I have been very satisfied with their customer service. I also buy my domain name via Hostgator from Registry Rocket.

As far as buying domain names are concerned, I know a lot of people recommend GoDaddy. But I have also heard horror stories and complaints from Internet Marketers and others who strictly advise against buying your domains from GoDaddy. Namecheap may be a better source for purchasing domains but again I personally haven’t used them.

Here Is An Interesting Discussion Thread

And when you look at the costs, it isn’t much.

Hostgator Baby Plan costs about $7.95 per month and a domain name costs about $15 per year. So really under $30 you can have your own website.

And if you are just starting out with Internet Marketing, I would advise you to go deep instead of going broad. What I mean is pick a niche and go deep within that niche. So for example, if you decide to build a weight loss website, here are some ways you can reach the sub-niches.

a. Diet Plan Reviews
b. Diet Pills Reviews
c. Fitness Equipments Reviews
d. Muscle Building Program Reviews
e. Weight Loss Tips
f. Muscle Building Tips
g. Expert Columns etc.

So instead of building different websites for each sub-niche, you can combine different sub-niches into a single mega authority website. But the key here is to be patient and just keep posting good quality content on a regular basis.

For my cricket friends, here is an analogy. Think of it as a test match and you are the bowler. The odds are stacked up against you when you are presented with a dead pitch to go with hot and humid conditions.

As a bowler, you can only do one thing- bowl the length, bowl the line in the corridor of uncertainty. In other words, you need to be like Glenn Mcgrath bowling that nagging line and length just outside the off stump and it is just a matter of time before the batsman nicks one to the keeper or slips.

Similarly when you building your website, do your keyword research, focus on long tail keywords particularly buying keywords and start producing quality content optimized for the keyword. Just keep doing that without losing focus and it is just a matter of time before you see traffic coming in.

And once you start generating traffic, there are so many ways to monetize the traffic in the form of ads, promoting affiliate products and sell your own products.

So the next time, you are sucked into the fallacy of starting a business online without a website, know that you are building your home on quick sand. It is just a matter of time before it comes down crumbling.

8 Best Practices Of Running A Successful Website

Running a website that sells is all about good communication. 

The internet provides new ways of communicating with your customers that could never have been considered a few years ago. 

When you are constructing your site there are various elements of successful communication that you could bear in mind.

1. KISS

Make your content easy to understand.  Website content should be written in short simple sentences. 

It should avoid complex words and the use of technical jargon that might put your customers off reading. 

Good spelling and reasonable grammar is essential, although your writing style can be fairly informal and relaxed if that suits your particular business.

When you are coming up with headlines, it can be tempting to try to be clever or cryptic.  However, this is not necessarily a recipe for success online.

A simple straightforward headline can tell your customer what to expect from the article or webpage and does not risk losing their interest through lack of understanding.

2. Get ‘em involved. 

 Make your site interactive.

There are many ways to allow your customers to interact with your site, and these can be very effective at making your customers feel really connected with your business.

Basic forms of interaction include a search facility and a ‘contact us’ link that allows your customers to send you a direct e-mail. 

More complex forms of customer interaction include discussion forums, product reviews, polls and surveys.

3. Keep it current. 

Unlike a printed document, which begins to go out of date as soon as it comes off the printer, your customers will expect the information on your site to be up to date and accurate on the day they read it.

 This means that maintaining a successful website is a never ending exercise.

Before you begin to build your site you might want to determine how much time you can dedicate to updating, archiving etc. once the site is up and running. 

You could consider making sections of the site time sensitive and updating these regularly, while other static sections just get updated and refreshed annually. 

4. Ever read the last page of a book first? 

The way a website is structured, with a network of internal links, leads to visitors reading information in a very different way. 

With a traditional book you start at the front and keep reading until you get to the end. 

However, with a website you can start at any page and read the pages in any order you wish.

Because your customers could land on your site at any page, each page needs to stand alone and have enough information on it to be easily understood without a great deal of explanation and introduction.

5. Are we there yet? 

On a successful site, visitors should always be able to see where they are on the site, and where any links on that page will take them to.

Navigation facilities should be easy to use, placed in an obvious spot, and should be well spaced out.

If customers are able to find their way around your site easily they are likely to stay for longer.

6. Give them what they came for. 

Appeal to various complexity levels.  It is not possible to know whether a single visitor to your site is looking for general information, or very specific technical details. 

Luckily, with a well designed website you can cater for both needs. 

Your home page can link directly to some main pages that provide general essential information. 

These pages could contain links to further, deeper pages that have much more detailed content with technical information.

7. Show, don’t tell.

Communicate through graphics. 

The HTML coding format of webpages allows you to combine text and multimedia elements. 

Using photos, graphics and even video can make communication with your customers easier and more entertaining.

It is worth repeating that all graphics used on your site should add something to your message. 

Meaningless multimedia files will just distract from the content on your webpage.

8. Let them take it with them. 

Many internet users still prefer to print out interesting articles or reports to read in the traditional manner. 

After all, most of us have experienced that square eyed feeling form trying to read from the computer screen for too long.

Providing your content in printable format is one way to cater for these customers, but you should also make sure there is enough information on the printed copy to put the document in context. 

Information to add includes document title, author, date of creation, a short description, and the keywords the document is optimized to.

Finally we will take a look at balancing your site design so it is attractive to both your customers and the search engines.