Stuart McHenry - My Internet World

I wanted to start off the “Beat Today’s 36,000” series with something that is very basic… biting off more than you can chew. Sure most people have heard that expression before in their life usually from their dad, mom or colleagues but I see this happen way too often on the Internet.

Somebody makes a posts how they make $XXX,XXX dollars per month on the Internet with KW’s (KW’s = keywords) usually dating, viagra or ringtones and tons of newbie webmasters run out and register new domain names and start optimizing hoping to rank for these highly competitive KW’s. Now let me tell you the facts of what is going to happen and why.

99.99% of these people are biting off more than they can chew.. why??? Here are the top three reasons:

1) They lack the knowledge to rank for such a highly competitive KW
2) They lack the funds to rank for such a highly competitive KW
3) They lack the commitment to get the job done

First… you have to have the knowledge. Sure maybe the person has had some success with small KW’s like “blue widgets in Bumblefuck, IA” but that is often little league Vs MLS. It can take several years to gain the knowledge and then you have to stay on top of it as it’s always changing.

Second… how much money do you think it will take??? I have sites that rank for some of the most competitive KW’s in finance. This takes tons of money… the old saying “it takes money to make money” is still true today. Some of our link budgets are well over $5,000 per month. I’ve never been afraid to spend the money… people might think $5,000 per month is a lot but when you get a site that makes that in two days… you can see it’s totally worth it.

Third… some people spread themselves too thin by trying to get too many sites to rank or they let other things distract them. This has happened to all of us at one point but the key is staying focused.

So what do I recommend… well unless you have been in the business for a while and have a decent size budget don’t go after the top KW’s. So if you start a dating site don’t go after “online dating” stick to smaller KW’s that you can handle. Focus on cities or even states like “San Jose Dating” or San Jose Online Dating” and your success rate will go up.