Kikerinka
Elite Member
- Dec 18, 2010
- 2,575
- 9,357
November 2023, everyone is counting loses from the latest Google updates. People are quitting SEO and selling their websites. The YT channels that I used to watch for inspiration in the IM niche are practically all dead. Few people that still try something with websites all use expired domains and AI for content production. What's more, the SGE is coming soon, and many people from the industry expect it to be the "last nail to the coffin" of SEO and the blogging business for people like you and me, as we have known it for the last decade...
Speaking honestly, only a crazy person would invest time & effort into an authentic niche website with a hand-written content, on a fresh domain. And yet that's exactly what I will try to do in this journey
.
Before I dive into some details, let's check the starting point:
- Traffic in last 30 days: 1.5K sessions.
- Traffic distribution: 80% Organic, 15% Direct, 5% social.
- Earnings in last 28 days: $1.64
Some stats about the domain/website
- I won't say the exact age, but it is fairly new, the 2nd youngest website in my portfolio, counting both for-profit and non-profit projects.
- The domain has virtually no incoming links, with an exception of few links from Reddit, and some spammy links that all domains get nowadays, and such links do not really count for anything.
- There are some articles posted on the domain, with mixed quality. Again I won't say the exact number, but as you can see on the chart from GSC, there isn't much content posted...
- The website is monetized at the moment, but the monetization isn't done properly.
- The theme sucks, there is virtually no EEAT, and I haven't really invested any time into making the site particularly visually appealing.
Some information about the niche
- I won't disclose the exact niche of the website at the moment. I will likely disclose it in the future, when I reach the goal, or when I decide to close the journey. Please do not ask me about the exact niche, I will ignore questions/guesses related to this.
- The niche is fairly competitive, but in my opinion that's the case nowadays for all niches that have some real profitability potential.
- Contrary to my main niche (the niche of my authority website), this niche has a potential to attract regular visitors, repetitive visits, etc. It can also get a decent chunk of traffic from social media. You can see below traffic distribution of one of the biggest websites in this niche:
- I have a first-hand experience in the niche, and people who know me well (both my past and present) would likely consider me an expert in the niche.
- The niche is fairly seasonal, with the peak traffic in summer, but there is also content that can bring traffic in winter months.
- The niche is quite big, and the biggest websites specializing only in this niche attract between 200K-700K visitors monthly in the summer months, depending on the type of the website and the content they focus on. Please note that we speak here about serious authority websites, all of them older than 10 years and with loads of content.
- There are many ways to monetize traffic in this niche, but to be eligible for some of them, you need decent chunk of traffic & an approval which is not easy to get... I won't go into details here in order to not reveal too much information, but some websites I know in the niche have more than 5 different sources of income (methods of monetization).
- The niche has a potential for some high RPM content, but that one is incredibly hard to rank for.
Why I start this journey, and why do I start now?
- I am sure many of you wonder why. Why I start with a new website, instead of investing time in my authority website, that is well established and bringing thousands of $$$ monthly. Or why now, when everyone else is quitting the business.... And why I start another journey on BHW??? Let me try to answer these questions the best I can:
1. Why a new website? I start with a new site, because my life has changed a lot recently, and I do not have much motivation working in my original niche anymore... I actually got rid/sold some of the websites I had in this niche, and my portfolio in it is relatively small now. This new niche, however, interests me greatly, and I believe I can bring high quality content to the readers, content that they won't find anywhere else. On the top of that, I have some other, non-monetary goals with this website, and the more traffic is has, the more likely it is that it will help me reach these goals.
2. Why do I start now? I start now from a very prosaic reason: Because I have time now. I've been extremely busy this year, and will be likely extremely busy with my offline projects & ventures from March onward, but until the end of February 2024 I have quite a lot of time, and want to dedicate part of it to this website, to this online project. Sure, the future doesn't seem very bright for niche sites, but I want to give it a try nevertheless. Maybe a few years ago with the same effort I'd get 2 times more traffic, but I am fine getting only half, because I still feel it is worth giving it a try.
3. Why do I start journey on BHW? I have a few reasons for this.
The plan, the timeline & the journey
- My main goal in this journey is simple: To devote 200 hours of serious work to this website, mostly on creating new content. Now my definition of serious work isn't what you see in corporations nowadays, or what most of you probably consider serious work.
For me, serious work means really sitting at the desk (no working from bed or beach this time around), being 100% focused on the task. Clear table, mobile phone in airplane mode or in another room, no BHW checking, no music, simply no distractions whatsoever in whatever form... Believe me that in such 200 hours a lot can be done, and a lot of great content can be produced.
- The first day of the work will be the coming Monday, 13th of November. I hope to be done with 200 of serious work by 13th February 2024, hence in 3 months. I may get it done earlier, but I have certain things planned and won't be able to work on all days or weeks. I may eventually decide to give it more than 200 hours of work (if I work more than expected), but with reaching the 200 hours I will be satisfied. During this period I will update the journey daily, on weekdays (Monday-Friday). I may work on weekends sometimes, the hours & tasks worked on during the weekend will be reported always on Monday.
- I will focus on one topical cluster only, but it is a big one. Until the summer months the content will have enough time to age, and after the summer I will see the real traffic potential it has, what works and what not, and be able to re-evaluate things.
- From March until November I won't work on this website, since I'll be busy with other things. However, I will update the journey once in a while with traffic/earnings/other interesting stats.
- Unless the results are extremely disappointing, or something unexpected happens in my life, I will resume daily work on the website in November 2024, again aiming for 200 hours of serious work, or even more, focusing on another topical cluster. I know in person a few other people who know a lot about this niche, and may even decide to involve one or two of them in the content production process. However, it depends on how well the content I write myself this winter will eventually do during the summer season....
- The financial goal for the website is $1K/month, altough I know the potential is much higher. But I prefer to stay modest at the beginning--after all it made less than $2 in last 30 days.
- For me this is a long time project, and I definitely plan to keep this website for many years--regardless of how well it eventually performs. Hence I am in no rush, but at the same time I know that law of action and reaction cannot be broken. If I don't work on the website at all, it simply won't grow... Hence there is this journey, I will give it a serious effort for a few months at least, and let's see what the results will be.
That's if for now, for the initial post. I will write at least one more post during the weekend, about the hypotheses I want to test with this project. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them here
Speaking honestly, only a crazy person would invest time & effort into an authentic niche website with a hand-written content, on a fresh domain. And yet that's exactly what I will try to do in this journey
. Before I dive into some details, let's check the starting point:
- Traffic in last 30 days: 1.5K sessions.
- Traffic distribution: 80% Organic, 15% Direct, 5% social.
- Earnings in last 28 days: $1.64
Some stats about the domain/website
- I won't say the exact age, but it is fairly new, the 2nd youngest website in my portfolio, counting both for-profit and non-profit projects.
- The domain has virtually no incoming links, with an exception of few links from Reddit, and some spammy links that all domains get nowadays, and such links do not really count for anything.
- There are some articles posted on the domain, with mixed quality. Again I won't say the exact number, but as you can see on the chart from GSC, there isn't much content posted...
- The website is monetized at the moment, but the monetization isn't done properly.
- The theme sucks, there is virtually no EEAT, and I haven't really invested any time into making the site particularly visually appealing.
Some information about the niche
- I won't disclose the exact niche of the website at the moment. I will likely disclose it in the future, when I reach the goal, or when I decide to close the journey. Please do not ask me about the exact niche, I will ignore questions/guesses related to this.
- The niche is fairly competitive, but in my opinion that's the case nowadays for all niches that have some real profitability potential
.- Contrary to my main niche (the niche of my authority website), this niche has a potential to attract regular visitors, repetitive visits, etc. It can also get a decent chunk of traffic from social media. You can see below traffic distribution of one of the biggest websites in this niche:
- I have a first-hand experience in the niche, and people who know me well (both my past and present) would likely consider me an expert in the niche.
- The niche is fairly seasonal, with the peak traffic in summer, but there is also content that can bring traffic in winter months.
- The niche is quite big, and the biggest websites specializing only in this niche attract between 200K-700K visitors monthly in the summer months, depending on the type of the website and the content they focus on. Please note that we speak here about serious authority websites, all of them older than 10 years and with loads of content.
- There are many ways to monetize traffic in this niche, but to be eligible for some of them, you need decent chunk of traffic & an approval which is not easy to get... I won't go into details here in order to not reveal too much information, but some websites I know in the niche have more than 5 different sources of income (methods of monetization).
- The niche has a potential for some high RPM content, but that one is incredibly hard to rank for.
Why I start this journey, and why do I start now?
- I am sure many of you wonder why. Why I start with a new website, instead of investing time in my authority website, that is well established and bringing thousands of $$$ monthly. Or why now, when everyone else is quitting the business...
. And why I start another journey on BHW??? Let me try to answer these questions the best I can:1. Why a new website? I start with a new site, because my life has changed a lot recently, and I do not have much motivation working in my original niche anymore... I actually got rid/sold some of the websites I had in this niche, and my portfolio in it is relatively small now. This new niche, however, interests me greatly, and I believe I can bring high quality content to the readers, content that they won't find anywhere else. On the top of that, I have some other, non-monetary goals with this website, and the more traffic is has, the more likely it is that it will help me reach these goals.
2. Why do I start now? I start now from a very prosaic reason: Because I have time now. I've been extremely busy this year, and will be likely extremely busy with my offline projects & ventures from March onward, but until the end of February 2024 I have quite a lot of time, and want to dedicate part of it to this website, to this online project. Sure, the future doesn't seem very bright for niche sites, but I want to give it a try nevertheless. Maybe a few years ago with the same effort I'd get 2 times more traffic, but I am fine getting only half, because I still feel it is worth giving it a try.
3. Why do I start journey on BHW? I have a few reasons for this.
- First of all, I hope to motivate some people, as I've done with my first journey. Maybe they won't work on niche sites, maybe they will even work with AI, and I do not really mind, as long as what I do motivates them to give a serious shot to their projects.
- Secondly, because I want to test some hypotheses (more on them later, in my updates), and believe it can be interesting for people here to see whether these hypotheses are correct or not.
- And last but not least, because I lost a bit my drive when it comes to computer work in general. Since I do not struggle with money anymore, do not have any material goals unfulfilled, and have many activities I like to do more than working on a computer (or using a computer in general), I find it really hard to motivate myself to sit at a desk properly, and work with real 100% focus on something online. I plan to update the journey daily during the the first phase of the project, to hold myself accountable, and since the daily updates helped me a lot in my authority website journey, I hope for the same effect with this one.
The plan, the timeline & the journey
- My main goal in this journey is simple: To devote 200 hours of serious work to this website, mostly on creating new content. Now my definition of serious work isn't what you see in corporations nowadays, or what most of you probably consider serious work.
For me, serious work means really sitting at the desk (no working from bed or beach this time around), being 100% focused on the task. Clear table, mobile phone in airplane mode or in another room, no BHW checking, no music, simply no distractions whatsoever in whatever form... Believe me that in such 200 hours a lot can be done, and a lot of great content can be produced.
- The first day of the work will be the coming Monday, 13th of November. I hope to be done with 200 of serious work by 13th February 2024, hence in 3 months. I may get it done earlier, but I have certain things planned and won't be able to work on all days or weeks. I may eventually decide to give it more than 200 hours of work (if I work more than expected), but with reaching the 200 hours I will be satisfied. During this period I will update the journey daily, on weekdays (Monday-Friday). I may work on weekends sometimes, the hours & tasks worked on during the weekend will be reported always on Monday.
- I will focus on one topical cluster only, but it is a big one. Until the summer months the content will have enough time to age, and after the summer I will see the real traffic potential it has, what works and what not, and be able to re-evaluate things.
- From March until November I won't work on this website, since I'll be busy with other things. However, I will update the journey once in a while with traffic/earnings/other interesting stats.
- Unless the results are extremely disappointing, or something unexpected happens in my life, I will resume daily work on the website in November 2024, again aiming for 200 hours of serious work, or even more, focusing on another topical cluster. I know in person a few other people who know a lot about this niche, and may even decide to involve one or two of them in the content production process. However, it depends on how well the content I write myself this winter will eventually do during the summer season....
- The financial goal for the website is $1K/month, altough I know the potential is much higher. But I prefer to stay modest at the beginning--after all it made less than $2 in last 30 days
.- For me this is a long time project, and I definitely plan to keep this website for many years--regardless of how well it eventually performs. Hence I am in no rush, but at the same time I know that law of action and reaction cannot be broken. If I don't work on the website at all, it simply won't grow... Hence there is this journey, I will give it a serious effort for a few months at least, and let's see what the results will be.
That's if for now, for the initial post. I will write at least one more post during the weekend, about the hypotheses I want to test with this project. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them here
