Competition Strength (SOC) vs. Yahoo Site Explorer Info

[Murderface]

I am researching a niche/keyword with an SOC score of 25 (according to Micro Niche Finder). However, by using Yahoo's Site Explorer to research the website that currently holds the number 1 position in Google's search engine results for this particular keyword(s), I can see that there are over 11,000 internal pages and over 95,000 in-links for this competing site (most of the in-links are from the internal pages themselves, but there are some back-links from external sources).

Here are the SOC results for this keyword from MNF:
SOC Score: 25
in-anchor count: 468
in-title count: 196
in-url count: 145

My plan of attack was to create a simple/small website with only a few pages of content and create back-links by way of article submission to directories such as ezinearticles and goarticles. I would, of course, create back-links for my homepage primarily, but I would also create back-links for my sub-pages.

Does this seem reasonable, or should I consider another niche?

Many thanks.

[Gary Becks]

Whether or not you want to pursue a different niche is totally up to you. If tackling such a niche will be profitable for you than go for it.

In regards to the whole SOC thing I wouldn't base the true strength of a competitor off of what any KW research tool tells me. You have to analyze all of the factors as you would expect the SE's to and then determine whether or not you can outdo them in a considerable amount of time.

As for this particular site that you are attempting to compete against it doesn't sound like it will be to easy to outrank them from what you have stated.

You should also know that the SOC in MNF only tells you how easy it will be to get to the first page, not the #1 position in the serps...

[Murderface]

Originally Posted by Embions

You should also know that the SOC in MNF only tells you how easy it will be to get to the first page, not the #1 position in the serps...

-That is a very interesting point - as I was not aware of this. I guess it would be pointless to serve as an affiliate for the competitor-site in question, huh?

Thanks.

[Gary Becks]

Not really true. If it is a specific product name and you are ranking #1 for "productnamereview" it could pay off.

#2 for a keyword with high search volume could also prove to be very profitable as well.

[Murderface]

Hmm.
Well, the idea was to take a specific product or subcategory of products that the competitor site offers - and, as you said, make small sites that focus on those particular products. I don't know how specific I should be, though. I mean, should I focus on brand names (not sure if that is legal), or should I just create sites that are focused on products of a certain 'type' - (e.g. www,dewaltcordlesshammerdrill,com vs. www,cordlesshammerdrill,com; with the domain name being my main keywords)?

My hope is to create an online business that doesn't rely on the mercy of Google - with regard to their adsense program. So, I was hoping that I could use a very similar approach, but, instead of doing adsense, doing affiliate marketing for products by going directly through the merchant website or a large online affiliate network like amazon. Unfortunately, this route is proving to be more difficult at first-glance.

Thanks for the tips. I appreciate it.
-M

[Gary Becks]

You will find a lot of differences of opinion on this subject but I prefer building larger sites. I have my own reasons for this preference but the main one being that I just prefer quality over quantity. Aside from that I aim to build authority to each site that I own which will in turn make it easier for me to rank for particular keywords in my niche in the future.

As for using the company name in the domain, I do it all the time and haven't ad any problems thusfar. I know a few people that have so it is really a matter of how comfortable you feel about it. If it is a site that you plan to build a steady long term income off of then I would advise against it.

[Murderface]

Thanks, Embions.

I still haven't decided whether or not I want to go with affiliate marketing for specific products, or create micro niche sites for specific products for adsense. Either way, I have decided that I will build up my sites to have more pages (15-20 minimum; then, if possible, I will add more - depending on how profitable that particular site is/could be, and how many more pages of content/similar products I can add to each website).

Obviously, if I decide to put more time/work in to a particular website, I want to make sure that there is enough monthly search volume for my keyword(s).

What do you suggest?

I am finding it difficult to uncover keywords/niches that have both, good monthly search volume and a low SOC score. What do you recommend - number wise?

Am I wrong to think that, in order to build a profitable website, while focusing on affiliate/product marketing, I need to be in number 1 or 2 of the SERPS? I know that people are profiting from adsense sites that do worse than that, but what about affiliate/product sites?

I'm getting off track here. -Sorry. I should probably start a new thread.

Thanks again.
-M

[Gary Becks]

Well again, number wise you need to remove the whole SOC thing from the equation. Really just forget about SOC in MNF. If you want to get true look at the SOC of your competition then you should be using a tool like SEO spyglass to analyze your competitors backlinks.

As far as what I would recommend in terms of search volume is concerned there are still many variables to take into consideration here. For example, if you are promoting a clickbank product that gets you say $30 per sale then you would be doing good to get 1 or 2 sales a day from your site. The amount of traffic needed to garner this many sales would also depend on a number of variables, how well your copy is and how high your conversions are for this particular page.

Obviously if you have a higher converting page then the amount of visitors needed to achieve your desired number of sales will be less.

The same goes for adsense it al depends on how high your CTR is and how much the cost per click is.

You are not totally wrong for your thinking as far as ranking #1 or 2 in the serps is concerned and I aim to rank #1 for any keyword I target, but you can make money anywhere on the first page the higher the better.

Also bear in mind that SE traffic is not the only traffic. I have 6 sites all based NO Saints products that did extremely well during the months of Jan,Feb, & March in adsense and Amazon sales. They were not even in the first ten pages of google. I am an admitted slouch when it comes to keeping stats on my sites so I have absolutely no idea where the traffic was coming from but it came.

My advise is to pick yourself a few keywords and go after them. A site can be monetized a million different ways so long as you have decent traffic coming in. Focus on getting traffic first and then converting that traffic into sales, clicks etc...

[Murderface]

Thanks, Embions.
I'll check out that tool. I hadn't really considered doing clickbank products, but that is a good idea, also.

I appreciate the help.
Thanks a lot.