Wordpress MU. Squidoo. Blogger. Money
In Grey Hat Techniques | 19 comments | permalink
I’m not sure what category this idea/concept falls under except the “money” side of things. Once your initial ’setup’ is complete you can pump out a new ‘niche’ a day and turn it into some pretty instant traffic.
Ready?
Here is what you will need:
- Hosting. I recommend a VPS for this – but you can put 5 to 15 instances of this concept on the same server. VirpusHosting has treated me well, will ’secure’ your network, and help you. If you do some googling you will find a nice discount in a forum somewhere I am sure.
- Wordpress Mu. This is your secret weapon. It’s going to let you burst into new markets fast and easy. Go get it here: Wordpress MU.
- squidoo Account, Blogger Account, and Bookmarking Demon. (this is optional but really really helps).
- An Account at the Promotion Center through Niche Site Special 2 (black hat membership). (this is optional but really really helps)
In regards to the hosting, you can use a shared host but you must ensure they are willing to set up wildcard subdomains first. I’ve always found this to be a hassle and it’s just easier to get a VPS. If you get a good support staff it will take them a few minutes to do, or you can take this opportunity to learn how to do it yourself. There are tons of tutorials out there.
For my example we are going to be busting into the computer market. So I go register a domain such as “computer-cheap.com” or something similar. I install and set up Wordpress MU. Normally at this point I take the time to do a few other things to get the most out of this.
GET THE MOST OUT OF YOUR WORDPRESS MU SETUP:
1. I make a newsletter series. Usually just 5 or so messages. I take companies I find in linkshare, commission junction, etc… that are related to computers and I just e-mail out a promo for each of them. I load them up in order, them load them again, then load them again. Basically I’m just hitting them up with something like this:
Check out tigerdirect, check out apple, check out dell. Then check out tigerdirect again, check out apple again, check out dell again. Over and over again. If they manage to get on the newsletter I don’t care if they opt out after 25 weeks and getting the 3rd tigerdirect mailing. Chances are they won’t, but eventually I’ll hit them up when they are looking to buy.
Adding the newsletter isn’t a requirement – but it is worth it usually even if it does add on an hour or so to this set up.
2.) Take the time to customize a template (there are hundreds of them out there). I add in my opt in box directly to the template and since I use Aweber for my newsletter I also make a “pop up” box to make the ad pop up when visitors first arrive. (I want them in that newsletter). Since MU allows each user to select their own template you could easily have a mix of adsense,affiliate offers, etc… just by having multiple templates.
3.) I’m not worried about adsense income with these – I want them to purchase something from MY affiliate links not someone elses. I’ll make some pennies off the other steps we take. Plus since I’m not using my adsense account(s) I can be a little risky with some of the promotional methods I chose to do.
5.) Make a wordpress mu user for each topic.
You end up with urls like this:
dell.computer-cheap.com
apple.computer-cheap.com
macbook.computer-cheap.com
hp-laptop.computer-cheap.com
acer-with-xp.computer-cheap.com
Make a few posts for each user account (make sure model numbers and features are in the posts, titles, etc… ). Write em down – your going to need the urls of each of your links. For the rest of my example I’m going to pretend that I’ve made a post on a the “handy dandy laptop” under the macbook user account. My url is going to look something like this: www.macbook.computer-cheap.com/1/12/07/handy-dandy-laptop
Next I’m going to open up three browser windows. squidoo, Blogger, and Wordpress. I’m going to make a quick post about “handy dandy laptops” using keywords I think (or have researched) people will be using to find these things. For squidoo I’m going to activate at least 4 or 5 moduals.
End result:Â I now have:
My Wordpress MU page, a squidoo page, a blogger blog, and a wordpress blog. I’ve interlinked all of them but the focus is my MU page because I OWN that one. I’ll use the others for traffic and ranking help, but I sure as heck don’t want to depend on any of the things hosted elsewhere to stay there forever.
I’ll take my keywords, and each of those urls and head on over to Bookmarking Demon and get the initial links to get me spidered and to increase my “squidoo rank”. Next I’ll go use “eli’s Quit Tool” and submit all those sites to the “Promotion Center” at Niche Site Special 2.
Eli, and bookmarking demon take care of my intial linking strategy. I just want them indexed. The Promotion Center takes over the long term link building and I can move on.
If after a few days I start seeing some good traffic at squiddo or to my MU site, I’ll go ahead and start making comments on related blogs. I’ll use Comment Hut for this. Basically Comment Hut goes out and finds related blogs, lens’s, hub pages, etc.. Spits em out in a text file and I can go comment on them. I have a few choices there – and it really depends on how I want to do things.
I can:
Manually make a comment to each one.
Use a script to make fake comments on each one.
Trackback Spam them.
Referrer Spam them.
Or just start linking to those posts in future blog posts so I get the trackbacks the acceptable way.
There are also a few more things I can do. Usually there is someone somewhere in some forum selling submissions. For like 20 bucks I can get my MU site put in a couple hundred directories, but I normally don’t have to go that far. There is always myspace, hubpages, and a few hundred other social networks out there just waiting for me to drop links in. That’s what they are there for right?
That’s just a drop in the bucket, there are still hundreds of other ways to build links… and even generate content for these sites. There’s rss feeds, viral stuff, link injection, and more.
Moral of the story and your game plan:
1.) Set up MU.
2.) Make a page on a individual product.
3.) Find 3 ways to build sites pointing to it.
4.) Get them indexed.
5.) Figure out how you are going to keep building links steady over the long term.
AND FINALLY – never ever do anything with the root of computer-cheap.com. Don’t link to it, don’t reference it, etc.. That way if you ever do anything to get banned your other users will be fine.
Have questions? Ask away.
Blackhat – Whitehat Techniques
So I’ve been thinking about the other things I do when I do find a popular product beyond this. The methods above are a fast and easy way to ‘test’ markets and find the ones that are profitable and usually not waste your time regardless.
But let’s say for a minute that our “handy dandy laptop” pages are just kicking butt. Should we let it sit? HELL NO.
Time to strap it on and find other ways to monetize this traffic. BANS is probably the first thing I’ll fire up. (link)
I’ve got 4 or 5 “standard” Bans template that I just have to swap an image or two out and change a couple words to get it kickin. Of course I’ll be putting this on a new domain (because that’s how I do it). I’ll also be making another lens (squidoo), another blogger, and another wordpress hosted blog. Then it’s time to go through the same promotion methods I’ve outlined above with the new pages and sites.
New income stream – More sites interlinking upwards towards MY (again note – I’m more concerned with the sites I own ranking well and getting the link love) sites.
The next thing someone is going to ask me is “what if it’s a dud?”
That’s gonna happen. People just might not be searching on-line for “handy dandy laptops” because they don’t know about them, aren’t interested, or would rather go stuff themselves with an entire cheesecake instead of picking their fat butts off the couch and buying my stuff (how rude).
So I’ve got 3 or 4 places I’ve pushed links to that aren’t getting any traffic. They are getting “SPIDERS” though – and that means I can push that link love towards things that are going well.
Another way to monetize is through “DATAFEEDS”. If your a NSS 2 Black Hat member you’ve got access to the shareasale datafeed site builder. Chances are you can find something related.
You could also make something up from linkshare, doesn’t matter. But make the sites large.
I consider these MU sites as foundations (along with all the supporting stuff I do for them). I’ll link upwards towards a white hat site faster than you can blink if I feel I can monetize that better.
If you do find a topic is doing well, set up a white hat site for it where everything is legit. It’s another income stream and you have already proven there is traffic for the topic.
[...] Wordpress MU. squidoo. Blogger. Money [...]
Wordpress MU – it’s about time someone mentioned this gem. Moreover, there now exists a plugin to take this
from the subdomain/directory realm to the multiple TLD realm – a damn beautiful thing. It doesn’t get any better than multiple domains managed centrally. Previously, a database tweak was required, but not any more.
Sorry about the funny characters that are showing in this post – I upgraded the blog and blammo.
I’ll have to see what’s up shortly so I can fix it.
Fixed those characters – sorry for hurting your eyes
I’m going to have to check out that plug in as well John. I’ll write it up after I get it running.
Great info as always. What a great way to get a new idea tested and rolling.
What kind of content do you use on the services like squidoo and do you writhe all the content you’re self or do you make use of tools like content spooler?
Thanks
Harry
Harry,
The lens’s are all about the products and there is usually content available via product descriptions, etc…
Don’t do much more than change a few words and then pull in rss feeds, videos, etc… to round the page out.
Thanks man.
I am new in the “mainstream”stuff (comming from adult) and this is a nice step to get my feet wet
Thanks
H
Nice way to diversify Harry.
I’m not much into the adult side of things (kids, wife, etc..) but since I do pay a little attention to what the adult affiliates do because they are usually on top of their game.
I’d like to think the ’switch’ would come pretty easy to you if you have been succesful with the adult industry.
Same concepts man – links, pages, and more links….
[...] showed you how to set up wordpress mu to test affiliate markets here) [...]
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[...] » Wordpress MU. squidoo. Blogger. Money Black Hat Techniques: Black Hat Webmaster Tips [...]
[...] However, my favorite way is to use Wordpress MU, squidoo, blogger, and my existing sites to rank VERY well for individual products. Instead of re-writing it all – I’ve already wrote it in another blog. Here is the link: Wordpress – squidoo, Blogger = $$. [...]
[...] Working with wordpress MU and Parasite Hosts. [...]
“AND FINALLY – never ever do anything with the root of computer-cheap.com. Don’t link to it, don’t reference it, etc.. That way if you ever do anything to get banned your other users will be fine.”
I was following along until I hit that statement…
If I don’t link up to the root from my subdomains and I don’t like down to my subdomains from the root. I should be okay, right?
What if the root gets banned, are my subdomains all hosed? Is that why you want to avoid putting anything on the root?
If one subdomain gets banned, the rest will still be okay?
Maybe it was the word “users” that threw me off. Either way, that throws a wrench in my plan because I intended to use MU for subdomains yet still have a homepage with data feed generated content.
nice work, dude