Web sites.. and you?

[Fatal]

Over the years different people have expressed interest in running their own web sites and I have given input where I can.

I have this software that allows me to create a niche web site on the fly. I have been thinking about helping some people set up their own sites for free and doing an experiment. I would host the site for you, and you get to pick your niche. As a group, we could discuss the different methods to market the site and come up with different strategies that work for your niche.

This isn't really going to be of much interest for people who already run and market websites, but it could be interesting to people who are interested in this sort of thing and would like to get their feet wet for no cost. It is quite possible you will make money off your site. If you do, it is your money. I don't want it.

All of the sites will basically be the same, except for 2 things. The niche you select and the method of marketing you select. Well, the third is, you can use your own domain or I might have one I can let you use if it would be appropriate to your niche (I have hundreds, millions if you include subdomains). That is up to you. A domain name only costs 8 bucks a year so its no biggie either way).

I will make all stats for your site available to you and anyone else participating. Maybe we can learn a few things together and you'll go on to create the next ebay. Or maybe nothing happens and you lose nothing but learn from the experience.

Would anyone be interested in doing something like this? It would only be us as I really don't want to try this with more than a dozen sites or so to start.


Thoughts?..

[ryum]

sounds good, gonna think of something to make a website about

[Fatal]

Ryum,

You have a pm.

[Wonton]

i kind of always wanted to create an eq gossip site. it would keep track of serverwide competition(like the one momentum hosts i think?), but prettier. also, there would be forums for pointing out awesome things like ghost monks, people with bad reputations, and other interesting tidbits.

it would be nice to be able to see who's what kind of tradeskiller on the different servers, and things along those lines. something community oriented that isn't run by sony.

[Maereax]

I'd be interested in something like that, for an EQ based site...

[guice666]

What software are you referring to? I'm curious about that part.

[Aamen]

Interesting discussion. I setup a simple site for a client because he thought we could get a high google ranking just by using one of those search engine submission tools and some meta tags.

I explained that's not how it works, that google's bots look for specific things. And more importantly, people pay money (sometimes lots of money) to bid on search words to get a higher ranking.

[Fatal]

I have just about every software package available, but I was specifically thinking of Bans when I posted that. The goal wasn't to make a long term web site but to pick something easy and then go through the different stages of marketing, seo, statistic tracking etc. By having multiple sites running the same software and the only difference being the marketing techniques etc, i was thinking it would be a decent 'study'.

After some of the responses and PM's though, I think it may be more interesting to make something with a bit more substance. Socialmedia, Clipshare, Phpmotion, muWP, Pligg, or whatever. I don't personally care. I will leave it up to the people in the project to decide. If the consensus is an EQ fansite of some type, I have a couple ideas we can use.

It really depends on what people want to do and how in depth they want to go.

[Phung Kuu]

Interesting discussion. I setup a simple site for a client because he thought we could get a high google ranking just by using one of those search engine submission tools and some meta tags.

I explained that's not how it works, that google's bots look for specific things. And more importantly, people pay money (sometimes lots of money) to bid on search words to get a higher ranking.

Google not only uses metadata.

But also links to the site, and what kind of site those are.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/google.asp

[Stormfyst Starbringer]

so wait, you will only be creating one site, or are you taking multiple requests?

[Massif]

fatal, I have a few ideas on this score, but absolutely no time to implement them.

PM me and we can talk about it.

[ashalonmonk]

i dont really have a lot of time or many ideas for a single website run by just me but if this is a group site like it sounds then i can contribute some time to it and would be interesting. if nothing else a learning experience. besides who can turn down a chance at possible free money :D

[Kaane Feiwong]

Branding the same website product is what my company does for a lot of banks. Not that many people go from bank to bank's website or account management, but you will find many are the same software just with a different logo and colors. It's all the rage in the corporate market with coopetitors and coopatition.

It's a good idea Fatal, especially for a study.