Journey from Zero to Authority Site

[Plastic Bowl]

Hi BHW!

I'm a newly registered user here, but I've been lurking for years. Probably around 4 years at this point. I've always been interested in IM, but never felt like I had the time to dedicate to it to make it a success. Also a healthy bit of fear of failure.

Today that changes.

I've made this journey thread to help keep me honest and motivated to keep moving forward. I don't want to let you guys down.

Today I have purchased my domain name and hosting after doing a lot of niche and keyword research. The niche is in the Health and Fitness category and is, in my opinion, an evergreen niche. I also have influencer connections in this niche that I will leverage. I have around 1 year of experience doing SEO focused copywriting that I will also be using to grow the site. I don't foresee buying content for this site in the near future. So let's see what an IM newbie, with only knowledge gained here on BHW, can do with a fresh site with the ultimate goal of being an authority site in my niche.

This niche is interesting. There's a lot of competition for the keywords, there's money being made here. There are a lot of long tails that have very low competition and good search traffic (100-1000 or so each) though and I will be targeting those. A lot of the first page results aren't optimized, not a ton of off-page SEO that I can find. They have okay content, but next to no link profile and low DA and PA. I think I can rank top 10 for most of my targeted long tails. I'm prepared to eat these words, like I said, I'm an IM newbie.

So while I wait for my domain's DNS servers to update to my hosting provider, let's go over what I've done so far and what my plans for the future are. We're truly starting at square one here, so if this all goes up in flames, you'll get to see what doesn't work!

To Do List:
Keyword research - Done
Purchase domain and hosting - Done
Build the website
Research affiliate programs to promote
Write content (1 article per day for a week to start)
Create web2.0s (1 per day for a month)
Learn how to make a PBN and see if it's cost effective

There's my basic plan to start. I'm not afraid to spend money on this, but I'm going to be smart about what I use that money for and try to do most things myself. I don't want to get penalized buying sketchy services. If I do it, I know it was done right.

Keyword research was done mostly with kwfinder and competition scoping was done with ahrefs. Domain was purchased through Namecheap and hosting through SiteGround. I will use WordPress to build the website.

Thanks for reading my wall of text! If you have any questions, feel free to ask! If you have any nuggets of knowledge to pass my way, feel free to do that as well! I hope to update this every day, but no promises. This early going is going to be slow, so bear with me. This will be a multi-year journey, there's no shortcuts to long term success.

 

[shuvoimtiaz]

Good luck with your journey. Following this thread.

 

[hiepdn]

Alright, it is a good start. Good luck and don’t forget to update the thread regularly.

 

[Alex D.]

Good Luck with your journey. Be aware with Health niche it can be tricky nowadays. Check this thread

 

[Plastic Bowl]

Good luck with your journey. Following this thread.

Thanks!

Alright, it is a good start. Good luck and don’t forget to update the thread regularly.

I will do my best, thanks man!

Good Luck with your journey. Be aware with Health niche it can be tricky nowadays. Check this thread

Thanks! I know about that update and have planned for it. I'll read that thread and see if my plans need to change at all.

 

[cullinger75]

Good luck friend, following this thread

 

[Plastic Bowl]

Good luck friend, following this thread

Thanks man! I'm excited to finally start taking action.

 

[LEX ECOMMERCE]

Good luck with your journey

 

[Rikabu]

Good luck buddy, closely watching this journey as you're into health and fitness niche.

 

[Plastic Bowl]

DNS for my domain updated a lot faster than expected, going to start building the website now. I'll most likely be using a free WordPress theme, but I haven't decided which one yet. Going to go with a very simple and clean theme.

Good luck with your journey

Thanks!

Good luck buddy, closely watching this journey as you're into health and fitness niche.

Thank you! I hope I make you proud

 

[Plastic Bowl]

Update 1:

So yesterday went well! The website has been built and it ready for content. I ended up purchasing a premium WordPress theme. I think its worth it for the quality.

I made my first web2.0 and placed a spun article on it. I wont link back to my site for around a month. My first article wasn't written yesterday, ran out of time. I did get the outline done though, so it should be quick to hammer out today.

My girlfriend has an instagram account in this niche. It isn't big, around 2.8k followers, but with high engagement. She has also made friends influencers in the niche. This morning, one of the biggest accounts in the niche, around 500k followers, gave her a huge shoutout in a post, not even a story. And he only posts once a day! The followers are flying in now haha.

The plan is for her to be the face of this blog. She will also be making youtube review videos for products. I think with a real human face, especially a female one, Im going to have a lot more success building this into an actual brand that people trust and come back to.

I also paid an artist on fiverr for a logo.

How much content do you guys think I should have before I start linking to it on social media and such? Maybe 7 articles?

The plan is still the same. Focusing on web2.0s and making content this week!

To Do List:
Keyword research - Done
Purchase domain and hosting - Done
Build the website - Done
Research affiliate programs to promote
Write content (1 article per day for a week to start)
Create web2.0s (1 per day for a month)
Learn how to make a PBN and see if it's cost effective

 

[aidenhera]

you already making money OP?

 

[Seven4]

Hello. Best of luck to you on this journey. Will check in often.

 

[Plastic Bowl]

you already making money OP?

Nope, the domain and website were just built yesterday. It has no content on it yet. This journey is from literally square one. I dont expect to make money for a while and thats ok!

Hello. Best of luck to you on this journey. Will check in often.

Thanks man! I appreciate it.

 

[shuvoimtiaz]

You are already getting huge advantage for your GFs IG account. And surely you'll get much more benefit than competitors for using real face. By the way wishing you luck.

My girlfriend has an instagram account in this niche. It isn't big, around 2.8k followers, but with high engagement. She has also made friends influencers in the niche. This morning, one of the biggest accounts in the niche, around 500k followers, gave her a huge shoutout in a post, not even a story. And he only posts once a day! The followers are flying in now haha.

The plan is for her to be the face of this blog. She will also be making youtube review videos for products. I think with a real human face, especially a female one, Im going to have a lot more success building this into an actual brand that people trust and come back to.

 

[JOATMON]

Congrats on finally taking action. Are you able to write 1 article per day? if yes, then how many words on average? Best of luck.

 

[Plastic Bowl]

Update 2:

Super busy today and yesterday, but still worked on this. Wrote a big 3k words informational article that I'll be using to promote on quora, reddit, facebook, etc. I also have 5 other informational articles outlines for internal linking off this page. They should be around 1k words each. After that, I'll start on review articles. Get 5 of those and then do a top 5 "best of" article. @WebMinati is my inspiration for that ratio. His journies have been very inspiring and informational for me!

Built another web2.0, finished the about me and disclaimer pages on the website. Also outlined a preliminary site map for internal linking.

To Do List:
Keyword research - Done
Purchase domain and hosting - Done
Build the website - Done
Research affiliate programs to promote
Write content (1 article per day for a week to start) - Doing
Create web2.0s (1 per day for a month) - Doing
Learn how to make a PBN and see if it's cost effective - Holding off for now

You are already getting huge advantage for your GFs IG account. And surely you'll get much more benefit than competitors for using real face. By the way wishing you luck.

Honestly I would have never entered into this niche if it wasn't for her IG, connections, and willingness to help. It's a super competitive niche, so honestly Im still likely to fail! But that's ok, Im learning a lot.

Congrats on finally taking action. Are you able to write 1 article per day? if yes, then how many words on average? Best of luck.

Thank you! Im trying to write one article per day. 1k words or so. I did a 3k article today!

 

[Nomadic Marketers]

Nice share. Would you tell me how works spin web2.0??

 

[Plastic Bowl]

Update 3:

Late update, but I worked 14 hours yesterday, oof. Still worked on this a bit though. Did 1k words between 2 articles. Im finishing up another article today and I will be editting all 4 and getting them posted on the website today! Didn't make a web2.0 yesterday. Ran out of time. Will try to make 2 today to catch up.

If I still have time after that, I will start promoting the posts on reddit, quora, facebook, insta, etc. I wont be spamming, but answering questions with high quality answers and my link.

Instagram account is growing nicely. I thought it was at 2.8k the other day, it was actually at 2.4k at that point. 2.6k now! Engagement is still high. Thinking about doing a giveaway maybe at 3k followers?

Nice share. Would you tell me how works spin web2.0??

If you're asking how I spin articles, my friend has a wordai subscription that I use.

 

[Plastic Bowl]

Update 4:

Alright, guys, big things have happened since I last updated. Content is officially up on the website. I have 2 pillar articles at around 3k words each, 4 informational posts around 1k each, and a review. The instagram account is growing quickly, it should hit 2.8k followers today. An influencer with 450k followers has said he will shout out my website once it has a little more content on it. Totally free. It's good to know people. I have 4 posts in the backlog that are written and just need to be edited and formatted. Which I'll be doing today.

I've also been very slowly promoting the website in facebook groups. 5 comments have caused my best day so far. 30 UV! On day 4 of the website officially being up. None of the traffic is organic, but I don't even care. Any traffic this early in the game is crazy. Going to focus on filling the website with more content as my main goal. Driving traffic is going to be secondary until the website is a little bit meatier.

I've also decided to monetize the site with ads. People in this niche hate sales but are voracious for information. I know that I can get some clicks to the website by just providing value. I will have affiliate links too, but since 99% of this traffic is going to be tier 1 countries, I feel like putting some ads on it is probably a good idea. Thoughts?

Also this niche is way, way, way more saturated than I thought. I'm getting a little discouraged by it but trying not to be. Organic traffic to this site is probably going to be a year or more down the line. There are some truly crazy sites I'm competing with. Like one site has over 7m monthly traffic, but most of the big sites are around 300k-700k. Some of their link profiles are insane too. Like 200k backlinks from 1k+ domains. I'll never beat that. There are some sites that get good organic traffic (~100k monthly) that have around 6k backlinks and 400 referring domains. That seems more realistic to reach one day. Am I crazy for trying to do this? I only need a small part of this very large pie to make good money. I just don't want to be screaming into the void. Any thoughts?

The plan, for now, is to really focus on grinding out quality content. I'm not trying to look like I'm selling anything. Just providing value with ads in the future + affiliate links. Providing value seems to bring in the clicks. Do you guys think I'm going in the right direction with this?

Thanks, everyone!