My plan to $10-$15k per month... Critique?

Nice idea. Good luck!

I've got Market Samurai and I love it. It's kinda on the slow side, but it's well worth it. It will tell you things like how much competition there is for a keyword domain name, how many times a keyword is mentioned on the web, what kind of money you can expect to make from being number one on Google and etc.

Thanks so far guys...

Yes, that was my only real concern - relying very heavily on the big G for traffic... Ok that can be one part of the plan where I'll flesh out with alternative traffic sources...

How is this plan going so far? I'm curious to know. Has it made as money money as you hoped?

I haven't started yet... This is me publicly getting my thoughts in order, and getting a little bit of advice before jumping in with two feet first.

I'll be starting with the keyword research next week, and looking to have the first website live by the end of October.

Having 100 articles on the site will definately help you get some traffic but I don't think it is your ticket to $15,000 per month every month.

Look into other traffic methods such as

1. youtube,
2. media buys,
3. solo ads,
4. google and microsoft PPC

The plan sounds great but Make sure you have an opt-in box on your wordpress blog! It is crucial that you build a list so you can promote affiliate offers in the future!

With one such website you will probably not reach anywhere close to 10k a month. But with 5-20 websites in different niches and each with a list, you can probably reach 10k pm if they are authority websites and if you monetize in several ways.

You have got to be practical. Some big websites may make 10k+ profit per month.

First thing is that I am talking of take home profit, not revenue.

Second, I am not talking of the top 5% websites but what the average successful website can do.

In a small niche a moderately successful website which is the first of a person is almost certainly not going to make 10k a month, even more unlikely within the first year. You may reach 1-2k profit a month within a few months. More, if it does really well.

But you can't bank on a website to make you 10k consistently, that too in passive income, especially if the niche isn't amongst the saturated ones.

If your primary keywords receive just 1000-2000 local monthly searches and if you only receive 10,000 monthly visitors, then I doubt that you will make $1 per visitor per month.

What you are saying maybe possible for an established webmaster but for somebody who is just starting out, keeping such a goal on Day 1 is unrealistic.

It seems there are differing opinions on this business model with some suggesting its a good idea, and others suggesting otherwise...

This is pretty much the internal dialogue I've been having over the previous few months - justifying why something would or wouldn't work... And ultimately deciding that it wouldnt... Which then led me to the next shiny object...

Paralysis by analysis I think is the common term?

I think regardless of which school of thought you come from... Having a website in a profitable niche, which has a few thousand visitors regularly each month CAN be monetised one way or another... Even if that 1 website is earning $50 or $500 monthly...

The advice and suggestions in this thread have already got my cogs turning on how to tweak the 'foundation' of the plan...

I recently read a blog from the owner of SecurityGuardTrainingHQ.com who advised that over an 18 month period has got this site earning him $2k-$3k net profit per month... Multiply that by 5, and there we go $15k per month.

As mentioned, my main income is from providing SEO to offline clients, so I have a stable and growing income from this, but would love a healthy passive stream of income too...

You know what, I'm just gonna go for it...

Don't reply on google or search engine traffic because it will take a long time to meet your goals due to google constant changes. it is best to start with reasonable goals ($150 1ST month, $250 second month etc) for the short term and then have medium term and long term goals .
You will need a fairly reasonable marketing budget to get to your intended goals and you will need few distractions so that you can focus. It's challenging but it is not impossible. Best of Luck

This is the most professional way to build a profitable website, well done. I just advice you to buy a domain because all your steps are full of professional except you can find a two or three words domain that the words are in your niche.

1 site can make $10 to $15K/month (it's unusual and not the norm). You don't necessarily need 100 posts either. It all depends on so many variables. Likewise a 1,000 page website can earn less than $100.

Rely on SEO at your peril.

Before Penguin 98% of my income was earned from affiliate offers on my websites. After Penguin, income dropped more than 50%. I was 100% dependent on SEO with the exception of some small lists I built haphazardly.

Since Penguin, I've completely changed my approach. I've managed to recoup about 25% of my lost income and should close the gap in 3 to 6 months.

My focus is now two-fold:

1. Build lists (I'm focusing on 1 list for the next 3 to 6 months); and
2. Promote quality products including 1 quality, high-paying recurring commission product. I do not sell a product.

Post-Penguin I pay very little attention to SEO. It's too unreliable. I'm getting traffic from PPC, solo ads, banner ads, article syndication, a Kindle books (only have 1 published for now) and YouTube. I focus on getting as much bang out of each piece of content I generate as possible (article syndication, videos and expanding on existing research to create Kindle books). I direct paid traffic and syndicated content traffic to my squeeze pages.

It's slow going as I'm in the beginning stages, but it's working. I expect my business will grow exponentially. SEO is great while it works, but having the rug pulled out from under me with Google Penguin was a nasty surprise. I prefer having more control over traffic via a list and buying traffic from quality sources.

How I started my new approach:

Chose a niche with which I was familiar.

Created a free offer/incentive. I spent a lot of time on this and consulted with an expert to fine-tune it.

Put together 3 months worth of informational e-newsletters in the e-mail sequence. I send e-mails out every 3 to 4 days in the first 2 months, then space it out every 6 to 8 days beyond that. I'll be tweaking this as I go forward.

Created/tested more than 20 squeeze pages over the course of 3 to 4 weeks testing them with purchased traffic. Used BingAds for testing. My cost per click went down a ton after 30 days so expect to pay a little on the high side when you start with BingAds.

Once I had decent conversions, I purchased several solo ads from 5 and 6 figure lists. Some of those ads have yet to run. I find it's more efficient buying from huge lists than dozens of small lists. It also costs much less per click. If you have the resources, look to the industry leading magazines in your niche for ezine ads. Many of them cost $500 to $1,000 for a sponsored ad sent out to 6 figure lists. Some however, cost $10K. They're out there in most niches (I'm in a fitness niche).

I published a Kindle Book this week. I'm starting promotion tomorrow. I placed links in the book to my squeeze pages. I have no idea if this will be worth it. I can say, however, that being able to reference the published Kindle book bolsters credibility when approaching other websites for syndicating content ... which made the effort worthwhile.

I run my BingAds every day now that my cost per click is low. It's a consistent source of traffic/subscribers on autopilot.

I bought some banner ads. They're okay ... not nearly as effective as solo ads, but can be inexpensive. I wasted $500 on one banner ad, but did really well with another one. Win some, lose some.

I use YouTube for traffic. It works well.

Now that I have consistent paid traffic sources flowing for the next month, I'm focusing on syndicating content to establish long-term no-cost traffic. I syndicate my blog posts. I'm just now getting the blog off the ground. I only have 36 posts published to date, but should double that within a couple of months and syndicate everything. Each post is over 1,000 words and well-researched and sourced with endnotes or based on my direct experience.

Once my list hits 10,000 subscribers, I'll do some adswaps selectively.

If you have funds, I've found BingAds and sponsored ads/solo ads from 5 and 6 figures lists from industry leading websites to be the most effective when starting out. It will supercharge your list. I consider it an investment because once my list hits a certain size, I'll be able to do some high-quality adswaps.

I also space out promotions to my list carefully. It's clear I'm promoting stuff, but at the same time I'm not promoting with every email. I still have work on the monetization side of things which I'll be getting to next week.

I'm not by any means an e-mail marketing expert, but within 5 weeks I've managed to achieve quite a bit and attract 1,500 subscribers with a low unsubscribe rate starting in a new niche. I expect to attract 3,000 subscribers in October now that much of the start-up effort is completed (product creation, testing, sourcing paid traffic, website set up, etc.).

Looks and sounds great!

Pretty simple formula. Seems like tasks everyone tell you to do. I wonder why 95% of people who do it, not making a penny with it?:rolleyes:

First of all, SEO is not a business. It's not even a product by Google. If you want a long term income and scalable business, then use paid traffic as a marketing channel.

it depends on your SEO abilities, as well as the funds. For an authority site your content needs to be excellent. 3 articles per week of the quality you're after will cost more than $5- $10 each.

They are, but you cannot rely solely on those alone. Since you work as an SEO make sure you analyze the SERPs yourself, as you'll see ad placement, which will affect your efforts, and you'll need to check the backlink profile of the top 3 using something like A Hrefs and Majestic to be as accurate as possible.

Think of any authority site that exists. They do not look the same.
"authority site" has become a buzzword thrown around and used in the place of "decent quality site". A true authority site is something like Amazon or Moneysupermarket. If that's what you're striving for you need to consider the value of what you'll be providing people more so than the amount of articles you'll publish per week.

A "rinse and repeat" of this sort of project isn't as straightforward as you appear to believe.
I mean you no disrespect, but do not underestimate what is involved here.

Does anyone here really believe this is any kind of 'plan' at all? It's not 2007 anymore. The slap content up and expect Google to send traffic days are over.

There are 70,000,000 WordPress blogs. I repeat. 70,000,000. When you're starting WordPress blog number 70,000,001 you are facing an uphill battle. You're taking on well established competitors who have successfully executed and IM strategy for years. To expect to knock them out of number one with backlink tricks is naive at best.

JGant seems to know what he's talking about. I'd recommend seeing how you can employ his strategies.

The one you mentioned would be perfect -- 6 or 7 years ago. The game has changed a lot since then. Unless you got really, really lucky, was a fabulous writer, or something along those lines, there is no way you would get even close to $15k/month. Especially if you were relying 'solely' on google traffic, "hoping" it might dribble a bit down to you.

If *all* you do is basic article marketing the 'traditional' way (write an article, submit to 100 online directories), hoping it results in sales from your site, you aren't going to get that much. Also, if you expect to make an 'authority' site with only a couple $100's "outsourcing" article writing, fat chance. (Also, if it was that easy, "tons" of people would already be doing that).

JGant's post has a bit more of a 'detailed' plan which can help you see some results.

Johnathan

I would say you have a skeleton plan which may work out but it's still rather fuzzy.

As with offline businees that I have also been involved in in the past I reverse engineer the process by beginning with what the final outcome will look like if it was a brilliant success...

Once I know what I'm in for then it's time to go about listing all the obstacles that stand in the way of achieving the goal. With obstacles identified daily core commitments are established to overcome each obstacle.

You have kind of spoke about this but there is key elements missing from your description.

a. you will need to become familiar with your prospects. In fact it's Jay Abraham that says we need to "fall in love with our prospects and clients." Business is dooooooomed without this essential first step.

I'm gonna leave it there and hope you heed the warning.

Marcus Rockey

It's a good plan, however I'd suggest you put more effort on driving traffic using more sources other than SEO.

Maybe youtube, banner ads, facebook...etc

In general it is a good idea but it will require A LOT of work, you should outsource.

I also suggest you use Thesis theme, very good community if you get stuck.

I think it's definitely possible to make some money off a blog like that. The only thing is that your outsourced articles need to be high quality and good grammar, otherwise you'll probably reap a lot less profit. You should be able to do trial and error and find yourself a good writer on odesk or something though.

Also, I would expect more like $1,000-$4,000 a month with a blog (cents in the first few months, not much for a year possibly, realistically) but it really can only increase if you keep optimizing it. Persistence will really pay off with your idea.

Oh and you should probably go read my other post I wrote that's semi-relevant: http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...-strategy.html

You've figured out the easy part. Now the difficult part - Execution!

Good Luck.

It's not that your idea is bad, but it may be outdated. Niche SEO research isn't as strong as it used to be. You obviously seem very motivated and I think you will get your 10k goal. I would just suggest something easier because niche marketing via SEO is a lot harder than it used to be and there are much easier options nowadays. But if you're very good at SEO, give it a shot.

I think its a good idea and Best of Luck !!

Very good Idea! I think that I can help you out! You plan sounds very similar to the on that I am working on now! Please check contact me personally! Facebook: Internet Wealth Ventures is a group and page. Check it out! Thanks
Brandon

Seems like too much work for little return. If you have these SEO skills and can rank on top Keywords, then build out Local Business related mini sites. Like... DenverDentistsOnline.com and get a top position and sell banner ads or get leads for that niche. Contact some business owners on page 2 or 3 on Google Places or Organic that wish they were ranked higher. Charge them a monthly fee to be only one on the site or some variation of that.
I personally an not a big fan of SEO and prefer to just sell business owners a monthly marketing package of $1,000 to $2,500 per month.