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WHERE WILL I GET CONTENT FOR MY SITE?
Remember how we started off by saying you could convert your passion into profit?
Well, if the topic of your website is, for example, your hometown, then you will have access to a bevy of materials:
!. Government Statistics
2. Photos
3. Business Listings
4. Maps and Travel Guides
If your site is about ‘How to Restore a ___ Car Model:’
1. Restoration Photos
2. Product Specifications
3. Product Comparisons
4. Your Own Insider Tips
What are other sources of information for the articles or pages you are about to write?
Reference Books. Please do not attempt to copy a book word for word as you will be in violation of the author’s copyright, unless you ask for permission to reproduce the same in whole or in part.
However, reference books can serve as a good guide to the different subtopics you can include in your website. You can pick up ideas from there and expand, using your own words and supplemented by your own research.
Reports. You can analyze reports and publish your findings. This need not be too technical. For example, if you find that there are 200 hotels operating in your hometown, you can expand this into a hotel review section or maybe use the information for the benefit of your readers by telling them how many visitors can be accommodated for a convention and the like.
The Internet. You can research a topic by entering your subject matter into your browser’s search box and go through the results. Many useful websites will turn up and each will have a unique approach to the subject.
You can now go one up on the competition by combining the unique information found on each site into one article.
Your own experiences! There is nothing folks love more than “insider” information. It can be as simple as recounting a good experience in a restaurant that you like, or telling folks what to watch out for when buying a puppy!
What types of materials can you include in your site?
1. Videos. Hot items these days are videos! You can search for a video on You Tube, copy the code and embed it onto your site. For example, if you are making a site about a particular location in the Philippines, find someone who has uploaded a video about his sightseeing trip and use it as your material.
2. Photos. Pictures are hot items, too! And I’m sure you can take oodles of them even with your phone. Web photos should not be very large so that the page loading time will be fast. I hardly use photos that are more than 500px wide. But since the search engines cannot read photos, make sure you include captions below with your keywords included and use the ALT text function so that when anyone does a mouseover of your photo, it has a title or some description.
3. Interviews. If you want free, fast, professional-looking material, interview known experts on your topic. You can upload an audio interview, a video or even a transcript in question and answer format onto your site that will add value to the user’s experience.
4. Gadgets, Tools and Fun Stuff. There are many available for free on the web, such as a weather sticker, or a currency converter, or joke of the day. Try to make these relevant to the topic and try not to clutter your site with irrelevant stuff.
OWN YOUR TOPIC
My point here is, you are the expert on your topic.
Over deliver information and services regarding your topic.
In my site about my hometown Baguio City, my website does not merely listdown general information, or the history of the place, or hotels, restaurants and shopping areas… The site also adds useful information about visiting the place like when and where to fuel up, what to pack, things to do for free, my recommended products and places, how to save of food bills — and folks love it!
Keep the information fresh and relevant.
Make sure you quote the correct prices, give them current information, update your website should currency exchange rates fluctuate, for example (or add a currency converter tool), add a news feed from other sources on the topic.
Be the compleat resource for your topic on the internet.
Anticipate all the information your visitors are looking for and write about it, make sure it is included. This builds trust with your readers and they will look to you as their most comprehensive resource. You don’t want them to be the regular visitors to any other website other than yours.
And folks will love your site!
It’s the same as offline businesses — it takes great effort and expense to attract news customers. The essence of making money is to keep your customers coming back! And better yet, having them tell others about your site (folks can do this by recommending your site via email or even by posting a link to your site on their blogs)
WRITE FOR YOUR AUDIENCE
Do not make the mistake of writing for yourself.
“I woke up today, fed the dog, brought the kid to school, got back home and found my husband drunk as a lord!” will not get you raving fans (although you may save yourself some hefty therapist professional fees).
Basically, folks like sites where they will come out learning something useful or where they will find exactly what they are looking for. Even when they are looking to buy online, a lot will compare prices and check product reviews.
So when you write about your topic, be sensitive to the wants of your readership.
What are the Feedback Mechanisms available to you?
Comments. A blog is very useful for that purpose because site visitors get to place their comments, that you can choose to publish or disapprove. Comments give the blogger a very good feedback mechanism.
Guest Book. On your static website you can add a guest book for the same purpose as comments on a blog.
Contact Us. For both those kinds of web sites you can have a contact page so the readers can get in touch with you directly with requests, questions or concerns.
Search Engine. You can add a search engine to your site and monitor which search terms is most popular among your readership.
Site Statistics. Your webhost can offer you a visitor tracker so you will learn which pages are most popular, where your visitors are coming from, or which browsers they are using, and a whole lot more useful data. This information is important both for content and design purposes.
There are also many other independent providers of site stats that you can turn to for more detailed reporting.
