Do I really Need A Website/Blog?

by 13 replies
16
Cant I just concentrate on Squeeze page --> Traffic --> conversions? If I build a site thats still traffic and conversions.. and with all of this google panda/penguin stuff going on I don't trust google.. you spend all that time creating content (unique) all it takes for google to do one of their algorithm changes and there goes your rankings possibly sales if you were ranking high to begin with..

People say it would be better if I have a site for branding purposes getting more exposure (more reach) from tweets and likes ect.. so do I really need a website/blog?..

But yet most internet marketers have blogs so it makes me have second thoughts..
#main internet marketing discussion forum #website or blog
  • Banned
    Technically you could operate without a website. The question you will have to address though is how you find traffic to drive to it and what will make them trust you enough to opt in?

    I use a website myself, and couldn't imagine trying to run my business without it.
  • You most definitely can. The Internet is a free world; you can do whatever you would like.

    In fact, you can go without eating food and drinking liquids in real life as well! Unfortunately, you won't last very long. I think the human body goes for what? 2 days without water before shutting down?

    My point is, don't cut corners. Building any business correctly takes time and effort, and taking shortcuts (like not building a blog) will just hurt you in the long run.

    -- j
  • [DELETED]
  • Ideally Yes, build a brand (your name, your company, your products) is way better than relying on Google sending free traffic. But how many can do that consider not everyone is a pro in the niche market they're after.

    If you're in IM niche, you may start a WSO here without even setting up a site though.
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • What kind of biz model you want to start ? If you are into email marketing you don't need a website or blog , only squeeze pages. any other model probably you still need a blog or a site . Forget Panda , pinquin and all this crap , do your job and you will be ok. writing unique content is still ok and the more the better even in google eyes , and you can use yahoo and all the rest to get customer too.
  • Banned
    Neither do I. I never have done.

    It's all too easy to read the accounts here of hundreds of Warriors who have made the mistake of building businesses that were dependent on Google for their primary traffic and have realised too late that, that way, they were only ever one algorithm-change away from a disaster. Which is certainly a reason for not being too Google-dependent, as you suggest.

    But that has nothing at all to do with whether you really need a website/blog.

    Search engine traffic is just one form of traffic. There are countless others. Not wanting to depend on search engine traffic (wisely) doesn't necessarily mean that you don't need a website/blog.

    Why have you put the word "traffic" between "squeeze page" and "conversions", with those arrows between them?! You have the order the wrong way round, here.

    Yes, you can build a business with a squeeze page and email marketing, and people have successfully done so in the past, but my own predictions are ...
    • that it'll be a struggle to establish the necessary credibility and trust to make enough sales, with no site apart from a squeeze page, as you'll clearly be very dependent on your open rates and continuity-processes
    • that you'll need to be a really good, specialist autoresponder series writer, to make it pay
    • that you'll need to choose your niches extremely carefully so as to avoid direct competition from people who are doing exactly the same as you but with the addition of high quality websites/blogs as well
    • that you'll need to build up some very good, very reliable sources of highly targeted traffic

    I agree with that.

    But the way you're talking about doing it (which is possible) doesn't obviate the need for all the high quality content, anyway: you'll certainly need it for your autoresponder series, won't you, if that's all you have "to make the sale"?

    I think you can do it, but take care that you don't put yourself under a great handicap by leaving out something that represents maybe 10% of the workload but effectively contributes about 40%/50% toward the income?
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • Yep, it could work but it would be kinda hard to rank any site with less than 10 pages..
    • [1] reply
    • Optionally yes....if you want focus on internet business model.
  • I think even if you don't use your blog to get traffic, you might want one to send people to from your emails.

    For example, lets say you have a list in the gardening niche. Maybe you want to promote a new type of fertilizer or something. Wouldn't it be better to send an email about the fertilizer that directs people to your blog that has a presell about how great the fertilizer is maybe with a comparison chart and a video?

    You can only put so much in an email and sometimes you can put more engaging content like videos on a blog.

    I *think* having a blog filled with expert information on your niche topic helps to build trust and repeat buyers.

    But, if your biz model is to just send out those short emails that just basically say "buy this" and you're not really concerned about building a long term relationship then you probably don't need a blog at all.
  • You could piggy back on sites like squidoo or hubpages if you don't want your own site.
  • Banned
    [DELETED]
  • I recommend a website to follow up the users and build a name for yourself
  • You can do well without a blog, but it is highly recommended to have one,
    certainly, it takes more work but the benefits are far greater.
  • I attended a webinar once where the presenter showed us a one-page squeeze page they had created and ran for a client. It was a white page, with one line of plain text and an email form. very simple. They pushed traffic to it with PPC and maybe other methods, I don't remember, and that was all they did, and it was very successful, according to the presenter.
    • [1] reply
    • Banned
      The easy mistake, in this context, is to measure the "success" of a page with an opt-in according to the proportion of visitors who actually opt in to it.

      Very easy mistake to make, of course: it's attractive, appealing, quick, easy, numerical, plausible ... and completely misleading.

      The mistaken assumption on which it rests is that bigger lists are necessarily going to lead to bigger incomes. This can easily not be so. In fact, sometimes, even fairly consistently (as I found out rather repeatedly in my own split-testing) the exact opposite can be true.

      It's easy to think that - for example - if you test (a) a squeeze page with 30% of the visitors opting in against (b) an opt-in on a content-rich site with 20% of the same visitors (same traffic source) opting in, that in case (a) what you're dealing with is the same people as those in case (b), plus another 10%. This is typically wrong.

      What you're actually dealing with is two different groups of people (albeit maybe with a slight overlap), of different responsiveness, different sensibilities and different spending patterns.

      Every single time I've tested this, building two lists and monitoring my income over a 6-month income (and that's four times, actually, in unrelated niches) I've earned significantly more money from the smaller list.

      So, yes: you can find that a very simple, plain-white-page sort of squeeze page opts in a lot of people, but it doesn't follow that they're your ideal list, at all. And in fact, in my business, they wouldn't be.

      That's why I don't use squeeze pages any more, myself. I have to produce the content for my autoresponder series and my syndication articles anyway, so I might as well have a content-rich website for the same cost, and opt people in that way - avoiding squeeze pages altogether - and get a much bigger income out of it.

      What are the essential things to know about list building?

      1 Page Squeeze Site for List Building

      I don’t believe this! Higher opt-in rate, fewer sales

      What gets peopole to sign up?

      Squeeze Page on Landing Page a Turn Off?
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    Do I really Need A Website/Blog?

    Cant I just concentrate on Squeeze page --> Traffic --> conversions? If I build a site thats still traffic and conversions.. and with all of this google panda/penguin stuff going on I don't trust google.. you spend all that time creating content (unique) all it takes for google to do one of their algorithm changes and there goes your rankings possibly sales if you were ranking high to begin with.. People say it would be better if I have a site for branding purposes getting more exposure (more reach) from tweets and likes ect.. so do I really need a website/blog?..