Authority Site SEO Case Study

Shaunm said:

Evening BTB,

I might look to outsourcing some articles soon then, I have a decent guy for $4/100 that I used for my kindle books.

Could you please clarify your income as I have gotten myself a little confused. I saw you said some of your sites have thousands of pages and bring in a minimum of $1500 a month. Does that mean some of your pages only bring in $1 a month?

Cheers

Shaun

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More like most only bring a few cents a day at most then there's a few that bring quite some money.

Probably what BTB tries to do is he posts thousands of articles "hoping" that some will "glue" and bring in the money and to be honest I can see it working with that absurd amounts of articles
I feel like smaller authority sites should give a little bit more attention to the offsite SEO to each of the articles, by giving a little bit more attention I mean doing more than what BTB does for his offsite but not doing absurd stuff. After all if BTB ranked in top 3 all those thousands of articles he would easily be banking 5k$+ monthly per website which means that some keywords just can't get ranked without extra help and if you don't have the money to invest like he does focusing a bit more on each of your articles should be a priority





PS: BTB, what's your view on showing full post content on homepage/category? It would increase total word count on both homepage and category

spectrejoe said:

How many monthly searches does your keywords have as average?

Also when you pick those keywords do you pick them because no one else is literally trying to rank for them (as in not having them in title etc) or because you're confident that even if you have a bit of competition, you'll be able to get above them

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I have no idea as to average... my base KWs I do not even look to see what they, or even if they are searched. Those are conversational KWs and more for a general base of the site. I've no interest in whether I have competition or not as I don't really consider that with the kinds of sites I build.

Shaunm said:

Evening BTB,

I might look to outsourcing some articles soon then, I have a decent guy for $4/100 that I used for my kindle books.

Could you please clarify your income as I have gotten myself a little confused. I saw you said some of your sites have thousands of pages and bring in a minimum of $1500 a month. Does that mean some of your pages only bring in $1 a month?

Cheers

Shaun

Click to expand...

I don't look to see what pages earn what, I look at the whole body of work. I am 100% sure if I spent as much energy on off site as I do on my on site that I would be making more from my sites but that is not really my focus on these kinds of sites. I want the content to do the heavy lifting and am not overly concerned with a lot of off site SEO.

The offsite I do is generally very light for my sites... I know it would be a pain but if you dig through this thread, you will see what I have done as to off site for this one and you will see that I don't have but about 65 backlinks total (if that many) to the site and I am pushing 350 pages.

My vision when I build one of these sites is to content it up and let it go... off site SEO is pretty whimsical when it comes to Google's algo changes but on site for a Global Website is usually fairly stable so I concentrate on the stable. That is my personality as well... I'm not big on the latest and greatest, I just want to go though life without a lot of twists and turns.

This is the kind of site that mimics that kind of thought process... build and relax.

BTB, what's your view on showing full post content on homepage/category? It would increase total word count on both homepage and category

I heard this was a technique used on some PBN's to improve backlink quality since homepage would show about 5-10k words of content and the link that the post was backlinking to

BassTrackerBoats said:

The offsite I do is generally very light for my sites... I know it would be a pain but if you dig through this thread, you will see what I have done as to off site for this one and you will see that I don't have but about 65 backlinks total (if that many) to the site and I am pushing 350 pages.

My vision when I build one of these sites is to content it up and let it go... off site SEO is pretty whimsical when it comes to Google's algo changes but on site for a Global Website is usually fairly stable so I concentrate on the stable. That is my personality as well... I'm not big on the latest and greatest, I just want to go though life without a lot of twists and turns.

This is the kind of site that mimics that kind of thought process... build and relax.

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To me, this is where a lot of people with a lot of motivation to succeed get stuck. They want to build big, authoritative sites in the beginning, however, they try to "jump start" the rankings of the site with the latest "in" thing in backlinking and social signals. Instead of just letting the site evolve in a natural manner they allow their dreams of big bucks push them to become too aggressive in off-site SEO which, ultimately, throws up big red flags to google and they end up killing their project before it ever has the chance to get off the ground.

spectrejoe said:

BTB, what's your view on showing full post content on homepage/category? It would increase total word count on both homepage and category

I heard this was a technique used on some PBN's to improve backlink quality since homepage would show about 5-10k words of content and the link that the post was backlinking to

Click to expand...

I never show the full post on the home page... I always truncate and that is one of the few absolutes I do on a site. I do not use plugins nor do I allow the theme to dictate the truncating either as they are not random so that is a manual process.

BassTrackerBoats said:

I never show the full post on the home page... I always truncate and that is one of the few absolutes I do on a site. I do not use plugins nor do I allow the theme to dictate the truncating either as they are not random so that is a manual process.

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Hmm I see, do you have any special amounts of words you truncate the posts to or just at random as long as it shows a small part of the article?


Also is it okay to always show the author box at the end of the articles? I'm working with black hat niche and looking as legit as possible is a really big deal for these niches

Hmm I see, do you have any special amounts of words you truncate the posts to or just at random as long as it shows a small part of the article?

I vary that and that is why a plugin or theme option won't work for me.

Also is it okay to always show the author box at the end of the articles?

I do not show the author box at the end of the articles on my sites.

I read that you are slowly rebuilding at least one of your sites that you experimented with on a backlink blast. The way it was phrased lead me to believe you meant you are reuploading the same content from the sites that you blasted?

If I understand this correctly and it is what you are doing do you think there is any chance of any form of punishment from the blasted site moving over to the new one cost of google knowing it is the same content?

I presume you are deindexing and deleting the old sites too before reuploading to avoid any duplicate content in the index penalties?

Cheers

Shaun

Shaunm said:

I read that you are slowly rebuilding at least one of your sites that you experimented with on a backlink blast. The way it was phrased lead me to believe you meant you are reuploading the same content from the sites that you blasted?

If I understand this correctly and it is what you are doing do you think there is any chance of any form of punishment from the blasted site moving over to the new one cost of google knowing it is the same content?

I presume you are deindexing and deleting the old sites too before reuploading to avoid any duplicate content in the index penalties?

Cheers

Shaun

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Yes, it is the exact same content from those 2 sites that I used and abused. I've done this before on a much smaller scale (50 articles or so) and there were no issues. It is just a matter of deindexing the old stuff, grabbing a different domain, and reuploading the content.

Google has not had an issue in the past so I don't expect any in the future.

BassTrackerBoats said:

The offsite I do is generally very light for my sites...

My vision when I build one of these sites is to content it up and let it go... off site SEO is pretty whimsical when it comes to Google's algo changes but on site for a Global Website is usually fairly stable so I concentrate on the stable. That is my personality as well... I'm not big on the latest and greatest, I just want to go though life without a lot of twists and turns.

This is the kind of site that mimics that kind of thought process... build and relax.

Click to expand...

This is as close to that elusive / mythological "passive income" that "gurus" buzz about as I have seen in BHW.

The churn and burn approaches / methods seem to be highly intensive and highly variable in results.

BassTrackerBoats said:

Yes, it is the exact same content from those 2 sites that I used and abused. I've done this before on a much smaller scale (50 articles or so) and there were no issues. It is just a matter of deindexing the old stuff, grabbing a different domain, and reuploading the content.

Google has not had an issue in the past so I don't expect any in the future.

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Thats excellent news! I have around $500 worth of content on a penalised domain that I will try to reuse.

Referencing deindexing the penalised site, do I simply just delete all of the pages and posts on it?

Avid Learner said:

This is as close to that elusive / mythological "passive income" that "gurus" buzz about as I have seen in BHW.

The churn and burn approaches / methods seem to be highly intensive and highly variable in results.

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I'm about as far from a Guru as one could possibly be for sure as those guys are usually selling something (I'm intentionally not selling so that anyone can do this without outsourcing) and usually proclaim that this is the "only way", "the best way", "the latest and greatest", and are closed to others thoughts as to what is good, bad or ugly... this is just a share to get people to see a long term process that pays for years as opposed to the churn and burn methods that are prevalent.

Nothing wrong with C&B (I do that periodically when I see an opportunity), it is a viable way to make a living; this is just the flip side.

BassTrackerBoats said:

I'm about as far from a Guru as one could possibly be for sure as those guys are usually selling something (I'm intentionally not selling so that anyone can do this without outsourcing) and usually proclaim that this is the "only way", "the best way", "the latest and greatest", and are closed to others thoughts as to what is good, bad or ugly... this is just a share to get people to see a long term process that pays for years as opposed to the churn and burn methods that are prevalent.

Nothing wrong with C&B (I do that periodically when I see an opportunity), it is a viable way to make a living; this is just the flip side.

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Ah, I see now that what I wrote may seem the opposite, but I was trying to be complimentary, sorry.

Creating something that lasts is closer to the "passive income" (though, in reality, there is no such thing). C&B is more what gurus sell, usually with a twist on some method. It works for a while, then blows up. Seems much more stressful, and not at all "passive" like they are selling.

I'm following this and similar threads as it seems no use in putting serious effort into something that won't last long and cannot be extended. It is more of a strategic approach. Anyway, that is the impression I get from my research on BHW.

So for the Web 2.0 content, is it ok if you use broad niche content? For example, if your site was on nursing school and your Web 2.0 content was in college in general, would that be ok?

Would enjoy an update on this case study site if you're in the mood BTB. I believe you're getting close to your "season" now?

Retraction said:

So for the Web 2.0 content, is it ok if you use broad niche content? For example, if your site was on nursing school and your Web 2.0 content was in college in general, would that be ok?

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Absolutely that would be fine.

gtull2 said:

Would enjoy an update on this case study site if you're in the mood BTB. I believe you're getting close to your "season" now?

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Season actually starts in about a month or so but we are pushing 350 articles now. I've talked to my friend that I mentioned earlier in this thread as well about coming aboard and will probably bring him on as a partner at the very least. It would be a good way for him to start in this industry and he can put into real life practice some of the things he learned in the writing classes I taught back in the day when I was volunteering.

Regarding backlinks and anchor text. Do you have any fixed % for your backlinks? Or you simply link to direct URL on your web2.0's?

My own version of Authority site has now going on for 3 months, it has About 600 posts and Traffic is 50+ UVs a day. My site is pretty hands off, since 100% content is outsourced and my va's make the posts (based on strict guidelines). The only part i've to worry is SEO & paying my writers & VA's Site's now making few bucks a day already and once it reaches $10-15 a day, it'll be paying for its own content. Later plans include flipping the site.

BTW, This is the most EPIC thread on Authority sites' not sure with tons of quality info, that could easily be made into a Guru WSO or Site, But Greg is much more classy than that.

Kudos to BassTrackerBoats helping out newbies & Seasoned IM'ers at the same Time!

howard_hughes said:

My own version of Authority site has now going on for 3 months, it has About 600 posts and Traffic is 50+ UVs a day. My site is pretty hands off, since 100% content is outsourced and my va's make the posts (based on strict guidelines). The only part i've to worry is SEO & paying my writers & VA's Site's now making few bucks a day already and once it reaches $10-15 a day, it'll be paying for its own content. Later plans include flipping the site.

BTW, This is the most EPIC thread on Authority sites' not sure with tons of quality info, that could easily be made into a Guru WSO or Site, But Greg is much more classy than that.

Kudos to BassTrackerBoats helping out newbies & Seasoned IM'ers at the same Time!

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What is your SEO plan. And how do you go about targeting keywords. Wouldn't it be easier to target the easy to rank keywords first ?

spectrejoe said:

Regarding backlinks and anchor text. Do you have any fixed % for your backlinks? Or you simply link to direct URL on your web2.0's?

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I vary that an awful lot as to %... I don't think it is wise to have anything set in stone. If one backlink is all I need I use only one to a page. Typically I link to the inner pages with just a very few direct links to the root url.

Not all my tier ones (when I tier links) are going to be Web 2.0s or Parasite pages... that is a poor strategy in my opinion. I'll be mixing in a variety of other links that link direct to the site. I'll probably be adding some of those in this month once my buddy comes along; I'd like to wait until he is involved so he can participate with that on a hands on level.