Hey there,
I am basically just a normal guy with no deep knowledge of SEO and internet marking but always had a passion for startups and internet things. While I have been very passive so far regarding online businesses (sold some gold in mmorpgs when I was younger...) I was curious when I heard of Viral Nova and its success. I watched their site and thought that anyone can make a site like them.
And this time I said to myself: Enough of just watching others having success. It is time to stop thinking and start doing. So without any experience I bought a domain, web hosting, a theme and set up a site like Viral Nova in July 2014.
I am using this thread to keep me motivated and hopefully to inspire others. I have also set up a blog covering more details and strategies I use.
My strategy:
I am creating a site quite similar to Viral Nova with the focus on touching stories & animals but not solely for the US market. Still I expect a large enough audience to make the site profitable. Speaking of the audience: I have clearly find out that the target audience for my niche (stories and animals) is female and between 18-45 years old. This is very important for Facebook advertising! If you have another niche (e.g. sports) you might want to target males between 13-32 that like soccer, football, baseball...Knowing your audience plays a key role!
The focus will be on a fast and mobile-optimzed website and a Facebook fanpage to get traffic. One aspect that may differ from what you expect and what others suggest is that I am not going to push 5-10 posts every day. Instead I am planning on 2-3 posts a week combined with quotes, facts and images.
This tactic is important to a) save money in the beginning, b) reduce the danger of people getting tired of a new page that keeps posting & posting. I rather want my audience to slowly grow with my site in order to establish long term relationships with them.
I also made the experience that Facebook advertising can be more effective if used from time to time rather than several times a day. In the beginning I solely boost single posts on Facebook rather than advertising my site or the fanpage. It worked very well for me to start with 1-2 pictures before I post a link to my website.
My main source for content will be what other sites have posted 1-2 years ago as people seem to forget what they have seen pretty quick. I am also looking for 1-2 unique stories a month for differentiation. Reddit, tumblr and Pinterest as well as community boards are a good source of inspiration.
As for SEO: I will use the SEO Plugin by Yoast to optimize my site and posts but not do any off-page optimization as I rely on social media traffic heavily in the beginning.
My progress so far:
July income report:
Income: $0
Expenses: $98,49
August income report:
Income: $876,75
September income report:
in progress
Thank you for reading and feel free to ask me any questions!
I am basically just a normal guy with no deep knowledge of SEO and internet marking but always had a passion for startups and internet things. While I have been very passive so far regarding online businesses (sold some gold in mmorpgs when I was younger...) I was curious when I heard of Viral Nova and its success. I watched their site and thought that anyone can make a site like them.
And this time I said to myself: Enough of just watching others having success. It is time to stop thinking and start doing. So without any experience I bought a domain, web hosting, a theme and set up a site like Viral Nova in July 2014.
I am using this thread to keep me motivated and hopefully to inspire others. I have also set up a blog covering more details and strategies I use.
My strategy:
I am creating a site quite similar to Viral Nova with the focus on touching stories & animals but not solely for the US market. Still I expect a large enough audience to make the site profitable. Speaking of the audience: I have clearly find out that the target audience for my niche (stories and animals) is female and between 18-45 years old. This is very important for Facebook advertising! If you have another niche (e.g. sports) you might want to target males between 13-32 that like soccer, football, baseball...Knowing your audience plays a key role!
The focus will be on a fast and mobile-optimzed website and a Facebook fanpage to get traffic. One aspect that may differ from what you expect and what others suggest is that I am not going to push 5-10 posts every day. Instead I am planning on 2-3 posts a week combined with quotes, facts and images.
This tactic is important to a) save money in the beginning, b) reduce the danger of people getting tired of a new page that keeps posting & posting. I rather want my audience to slowly grow with my site in order to establish long term relationships with them.
I also made the experience that Facebook advertising can be more effective if used from time to time rather than several times a day. In the beginning I solely boost single posts on Facebook rather than advertising my site or the fanpage. It worked very well for me to start with 1-2 pictures before I post a link to my website.
My main source for content will be what other sites have posted 1-2 years ago as people seem to forget what they have seen pretty quick. I am also looking for 1-2 unique stories a month for differentiation. Reddit, tumblr and Pinterest as well as community boards are a good source of inspiration.
As for SEO: I will use the SEO Plugin by Yoast to optimize my site and posts but not do any off-page optimization as I rely on social media traffic heavily in the beginning.
My progress so far:
July income report:
Income: $0
Expenses: $98,49
- Hosting
- Theme
- Wordpress plugins
- Facebook Ads
August income report:
Income: $876,75
- Adsense
- Hosting
- Facebook Ads
September income report:
in progress
Thank you for reading and feel free to ask me any questions!
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