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Client has 30 domains, need help/advice

by moodykitty
11 replies
I built a site with intentions of renting it but had a buyer so decided to sell it. He now wants me to do some other services for him! (my first paying client).

He's got 30 domains, wants me to build sites on them all. He wants to rank each for different keywords. This is all for one business in one town, he wants to dominate Google (his words).
I need some advice.
1. How would you set up hosting? All domains on one host account? or different accounts/ip's? does it matter? I've heard differing opinions on this.

2. He wants backlinks. I've been reading a lot here and I know that citations are the key, is anything else worth it? or is citations enough?

3. Now, what to charge to set up all these sites. I don't know what he makes per month. Should I ask? He has products that require descriptions, prices etc. I'm thinking setup and any extra such as images would be extra.
I don't want to overcharge but I need to make it worth my while too. I'm thinking do 5 at a time, give him a deal. Get them set up and going then work on the next 5. etc...
4. Maintenance. He'll need updates on plugins, etc (I'll be using wordpress) in addition to SEO. Not sure what to charge as for a monthly fee for 30 sites!

I'm going to talk with him more tomorrow & try to find out more of what he wants & needs. He's one of those guys that says he knows a lot about seo etc but doesn't have the time to deal with it.
I really want to help him in the best way that I can. Any advice would be appreciated.

Thank you!
Christine
#client #domains #help or advice
  • Profile picture of the author Rus Sells
    I would say, you better be ready to pay the bucks because handling all those sites for once client is a ton of time, effort, and money spent.

    You need to ensure you make it worth your time and the best way I can think of making them understand how much work it is, is to translate all the stuff he wants into man hours.

    I'm thinking with 30 sites you could justify 250 plus man hours per month or more.



    Originally Posted by moodykitty View Post

    I built a site with intentions of renting it but had a buyer so decided to sell it. He now wants me to do some other services for him! (my first paying client).

    He's got 30 domains, wants me to build sites on them all. He wants to rank each for different keywords. This is all for one business in one town, he wants to dominate Google (his words).
    I need some advice.
    1. How would you set up hosting? All domains on one host account? or different accounts/ip's? does it matter? I've heard differing opinions on this.

    2. He wants backlinks. I've been reading a lot here and I know that citations are the key, is anything else worth it? or is citations enough?

    3. Now, what to charge to set up all these sites. I don't know what he makes per month. Should I ask? He has products that require descriptions, prices etc. I'm thinking setup and any extra such as images would be extra.
    I don't want to overcharge but I need to make it worth my while too. I'm thinking do 5 at a time, give him a deal. Get them set up and going then work on the next 5. etc...
    4. Maintenance. He'll need updates on plugins, etc (I'll be using wordpress) in addition to SEO. Not sure what to charge as for a monthly fee for 30 sites!

    I'm going to talk with him more tomorrow & try to find out more of what he wants & needs. He's one of those guys that says he knows a lot about seo etc but doesn't have the time to deal with it.
    I really want to help him in the best way that I can. Any advice would be appreciated.

    Thank you!
    Christine
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  • Profile picture of the author Ikon
    Hosting - unless your interlinking they can all go on one account depending on traffic you will need to get a vps maybe. Id recommend a reseller account at the least as WHM is easier to manage for multiple domains than trying using 30 addon domains.

    Backlinks - citations are mostly to do with offline in the sense of google maps however they can be a good start for the site, the best links are related content to the keywords.

    Price - its really hard to say but personally on something like that Id keep the sites simple and charge about $100 each. But what id do is do 1 exactly as he wants so you know what the ground rules are what his expectations are for future ones. Its all to common that they will pull out all the stops after the price is agreed...

    Maintenance - not much to this really its more about monitoring the ranking and stuff charge $10 a month as flat maintenance and charge SEO seperately

    If you want to outsource the sites you can look into niche site services available on the forum they are basically the same but different keyword but youll know more after you get the first 1 done.

    Good luck
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  • Profile picture of the author moodykitty
    Thank you, all.

    Nathan, this is an offline business. I don't want to say the niche. For this particular city there's a lot of competition. He's already got a couple of sites up and ranking (tho they're horrible looking). I'll find out more when I talk to him what he wants on the sites. I have an idea of what he wants but have a feeling he may want to do some of it himself. One thing he wants is to be able to update them all at once when he runs a special. Which is easily something I can do with a little php code.

    Rus, everything you said was exactly what I was already thinking.

    Mill. thanks for the advice. I was also thinking $100 for basic site setup if it's going to be multiple sites. Yes, I need to be specific on what I mean by basic and what to charge extra for, i.e. uploading product images with pricing, information.

    Besides setup and seo, he wants help with getting sites ranked. This is the one that seems to me will take work over a period of time. Doing backlinks is by far my least favorite job so would want to outsource something like that but want to make sure it's done correctly. Any more pointers? Thank you so much
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  • Profile picture of the author Ikon
    The problem with offliners and rankings is the one thing they know is front page, the one thing they dont know is anything about keyword research.

    Which commonly means they will want keywords they cant rank for and they wont appreciate your efforts unless you get first page for a difficult to rank for keyword.

    You need to make sure you look into the keywords see if they are viable and if profitable for you and the client traffic wise.

    Outsourcing there are plenty of services that offer a guarantee but the problem is they cant guarantee a time frame most of the time, have a look into service provides and see whos delivering results.

    On that note check into your expectations of your client is he happy aslong as they are moving, or does he have set demands for when keywords should be achieved or if your guaranteeing them be careful.
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  • Profile picture of the author moodykitty
    Thank you. Any keyword search tools you can recommend?
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  • Profile picture of the author yesi
    Try to use WP Manager to Manage all 30 sites. If you need a discount on hosting or domain name let me know.
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  • Profile picture of the author Ikon
    niche finder brad callen
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  • Profile picture of the author leorocking25
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    • Profile picture of the author moodykitty
      Originally Posted by leorocking25 View Post

      That will be a huge job and you will need a lot of time to do that unless you get any assistance from any person. Now think what you are gonna do???
      Yup. Personally, I think 30 sites for one business is overkill... I also worry that Google won't like it.
      What I'm going to do is first find out what he wants done, then I'm going to do one thing at a time.
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      • Profile picture of the author ebookdaddy
        Hey, you’ve gotten some good feedback here and you should take it to heart. If I was in this situation I would start out by going into the niche and getting a good list of keywords that are low competition and people would type when ready to make a purchase.



        Another thing I would consider is what domain names he has, are they keyword friendly? What I mean is if you’re going to setup 30 sites and your niche is say “AC Repair” do the domains you will be using have any related words to the niche?


        It’s not crucial but it will sure help if you need to rank them for him on the first page. Another thing to consider is are all the sites going to look similar or does he want different themes for all of them? All of these things add to the cost and man hours you will need to put into it.
        I think if it where me I would do my keyword research, then find a theme which is easy to customize with different header etc and show it to the client. If he like the theme then I would go ahead and complete one site to perfection and then clone the site.


        Now, with the cloned version I would be able to upload the clone to the next domain and just change out the header images and change the colors and content for that particular site.


        I wish you well with this project and good luck!
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        • Profile picture of the author moodykitty
          Thank you for the feedback
          That's a very good idea, cloning and then changing the theme.

          I don't think all the sites should have the same theme. Google probably wouldn't like that and people searching probably wouldn't either.

          As for hosting, I really don't want to get into reseller hosting but would like to offer hosting maybe with a package deal.
          Any thoughts?

          Originally Posted by ebookdaddy View Post

          Hey, you've gotten some good feedback here and you should take it to heart. If I was in this situation I would start out by going into the niche and getting a good list of keywords that are low competition and people would type when ready to make a purchase.



          Another thing I would consider is what domain names he has, are they keyword friendly? What I mean is if you're going to setup 30 sites and your niche is say "AC Repair" do the domains you will be using have any related words to the niche?


          It's not crucial but it will sure help if you need to rank them for him on the first page. Another thing to consider is are all the sites going to look similar or does he want different themes for all of them? All of these things add to the cost and man hours you will need to put into it.
          I think if it where me I would do my keyword research, then find a theme which is easy to customize with different header etc and show it to the client. If he like the theme then I would go ahead and complete one site to perfection and then clone the site.


          Now, with the cloned version I would be able to upload the clone to the next domain and just change out the header images and change the colors and content for that particular site.


          I wish you well with this project and good luck!
          Signature
          I would rather live my life as if there is a God, and die to find out there isn't, than live my life as if there isn't, and die to find out there is.
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