If you stop and think about it, building and maintaining websites is excruciatingly mind numbing. Those that have just started trying to build your virtual real estate empire probably don’t get that yet. I was pretty gung-ho back around 2002-3, too. Now I’m just tired of building sites. Tired of promoting them. Tired of linking them. Tired of creating the content. Tired of things breaking. Tired of fixing them.
I’m not creating a business. And I’m certainly not working very smart. Those are the keys to my malfunction.
I’ve known all along that to sustain any momentum and interest in this racket, you have to have a passion. I think my passion for awhile was simply building something. The technical aspects of websites. Learning to blog. Modifying themes. Creating content. Learning to use tools. I no longer get a thrill out of that. It’s booorring.
Passion. You have to have it to sustain anything. I admire what Jack Humphrey is doing at Authority Site Center. I’ve read his free ebook on Web 2.0 and his newsletter last month. He teaches to find something you really love and build your site from that. I think after helping pollute the web with crap site after crap site, I’d really like to build one or two sites on topics that I freaking love. What a novel idea. Yea, you’ve heard me say it before but it’s not that easy.
What’s seems easy is letting someone else do the work for you. Heck, I can pay for the idea, the graphics, the keywords and the articles. I have at my disposal at least 13 ideas a month. I can slam those ideas on the web pretty darn quick. That’s the easy part. But how are you going to get anybody to visit? You have to promote the sites. Holy crap. How the hell do you promote AND keep fresh content on all these properties? Seriously. Yes there are tools to help. But they each take time too. Outsource? Who among us is ready to roll THAT dice? I guess it makes sense. Crap labor for crap sites. And of course, what are you going to do with last months 13 sites when you just put up a new batch of 13?
So I think it comes back to building a site that you think matters. That you write yourself. That people bookmark to find out what kind of stuff you are leaving for them on the site. It can be funny, informative, educational, entertaining, but it just has to reflect you and be original. You have to be excited about it. That is the direction I am trying to bend myself.
Think how nice and relaxing it would be to build that one site that you come to every day to add the day’s content to. One site you promote. One site you trade links for. One site you write articles and submit to Digg or Netscape for. All your eggs are in one basket. But that is one bad-ass basket. How many baskets can you really hold anyway? One maybe two? All I’m saying is that it might be time to quit slinging and simply build a single authority site on something you are crazy about. I know for me, just throwing up site after site is not very rewarding. I need a change.
I gotta find a basket and start loading eggs into it.
9 responses so far ↓
Dan Cruz // Jun 12, 2007 at 10:10 am
Bro I know exactly what you mean…
I feel your pain and I was feeling exactly the same way not long ago when I decided to finally build that one site that I would pour my heart and soul into.
My dilema ( and I thnk this is usually the case when you build a website around something you love which is usually a hobby) is my huge concern over whether or not I’ll be able to monetize it.
The niche is pretty competitive and unforunatelty there aren’t many competitive sites with good monetization models to follow…
Anyhow you’re right, I wake up everyday ready and willing to produce some more content! I just hope I can make some money from this site (well actually now it’s a network of sites)…
Best of luck to you brother in finding your one basket and loading it with eggs.
cyan // Jun 12, 2007 at 1:23 pm
Yea, I was thinking along that same line too; that doing something with passion doesnt necessarily means it will yield good $$$.
So I thought, would a person achieve more $$$ if he, for example focus on adsense, by scrapping and churning out sites like a no-brainer thing and doing it repetitiously and as simply as possible instead of performing more time consuming, creative tasks that require concentration and constant focus, as in continuously learning about new unproven stuffs, creating original content, affiliate products or blogging etc?
And I am sure there are people doing just that, could you share your views on this Splork?
Splork // Jun 12, 2007 at 9:23 pm
You can certainly do both. I’ve done the churn and burn. It gave me zero satisfaction and polluted the web with crap. I made a few bucks and got sick of it. In many respects it’s where I am now. The problem is these days, no brainer sites do not work like they did a couple of years ago. You actually have to promote them. And no one is going to want to link to a crap site.
The time consuming stuff. The stuff where you actually build value is what will ultimately serve you the best. It’s just hard to know if you’ll make money at it. But like some say, don’t build sites with the intent of making money. Build a site you’re passionate about and the money will come.
April // Jun 15, 2007 at 7:49 am
Splork, did you ever do anything with ReviewMe? I’d quite like to get into something like that, which is why I’m starting to create blogs which are of the jack humphrey/john chow lines.
April
Splork // Jun 16, 2007 at 5:49 pm
Sort of. I did a couple reciprocal reviews for other bloggers. Haven’t in a while though. I didn’t join ReviewMe though. It seems like it may be pretty cool though.
April // Jun 18, 2007 at 7:56 am
It seems lots of bloggers are using either pay per post or review me. The problem is, some blogs on a topic such as cooking end up writing about credit card loans. That looks bad to me.
Marc // Jun 21, 2007 at 10:33 pm
Hey Splork,
You are certainly right mate, there is always a certain level of “grinding” as they call it in online games to be done.
Think of how all mmorpg’s are made (massively multiplayer online role playing games) you build your character, and you grind your way through quests, monsters and levels to build your “level” up.
Think of this as “grinding” and “levelling” up for your business.
I know for me personally there is always a certain amount of grinding to reach a new level of success weather it be emotionally, financially, health or spiritual.
Do I like going to the gym 5 days a week, for 1 hour every day and lifting heavy weights that make me freaking sore, and throw up if I push hard enough?
Not really (sometimes though
) but I crave the end result which is a healthy fit body and muscular physique that okay is probably pre-determined by society.
I guess what I am trying to say is you will always grind in life to some degree.
It’s when you reach the upper levels that you need to grind less, and manage more that becomes fun.
Hopefully that helps some and connects with others.
Regards
Marc
Wan // Jun 24, 2007 at 8:17 am
Hi Splork,
I too downloaded the free Authority Black Book by Jack Humphrey. It was full of information that it can beat any crap $97 ebooks by a mile.
Yes, the way to make money nowadays is to have a few (1-5) authority sites that you can be proud of to call your own with rich and informative content that benefits the readers, not thousands of sites with nothing but garbage, auto-generated content.
The way some of the guberus are saying is that it’s better to spread the eggs into thousands of baskets. That is pre-2005 days when Traffic Equalizer is the king of auto-generated content software. Now is 2007. Authority rules (think Trustrank).
How in the world are you going to launch thousands of sites with thousands of keywords with no real content, links and authority? Those sales page selling hype (see AdsenseWealthEmpire.com) works in theory but try doing it in real world with the push of a button. Supplemental results in google is the answer.
Regards
Wan
Franck Silvestre // Jul 4, 2007 at 4:21 pm
I still have several website, but some of them died because of non interest in the niche.
It’s better to focus on one big website, and become an authority.
Leave a Comment