Hi Everybody!
I have been studying a lot lately to make an informative decision on whether I should start a site on sbi (if it's right for me). I'm sure that it has been the right decision for many people but I don't know if it would work out for what I intend.
I know of some people who have simply optimized their site (as a store) and not as an informational site. These people have been able to rank high for good keywords that people are searching for to directly buy. In other words- they get the traffic from people who are already wanting to buy and so their conversion rate is much higher.
They don't spend a huge amount of time creating a humongous content website.
They actually spend a big amount of their time getting quality backlinks to the pages they are trying to rank high in. The pages that they are trying to rank high in actually have keywords that are profitable because people are searching to buy things in those terms.
I would think that this strategy for online selling gets much faster monetary results for the effort invested (not that it's get rich quick- as I don't believe in get rich quick). I am not talking about getting rich quick but in having a monetary strategy that is not solely based on information.
Some people go online to buy. As I understand that many of them want information-- wouldn't it be better to try to rank high for those that are already wanting to buy instead of spending so much time writing information in the hopes that someday it will convert??
I know that SBI has worked for many people. I don’t doubt the effectiveness of it for some sites ( that have a well planned marketing strategy). It just makes more sense to me to find a way to convert all of the hard work of getting backlinks to a page that is optimized for keywords that people are searching for to buy stuff (instead of informational)
Thanks for any clarification……..

The reason people go for the information sites is that it's often harder to get ranked for products than it is information. Let's say you're trying to compete for the phrase diamond jewelry. Well you will be competing with all the popular diamond retailers.

Remember, the way to get on page 1 of Google is to have a ton of people recommending you and linking to you using the keyword phrases you are targeting. The average person looking for diamond jewelry would go to their favorite retail stores and even if they did search for diamond jewelry they are going to find the major stores.

It would be difficult for you to compete with them because what is going to encourage other people to link to your site when they can go to reputable sites to buy diamonds.

Now unless you have some incredibly low prices for the product / keywords you are targeting then it will be hard to compete. Remember you have to get a bunch of people to link to you in order to boost that Google rank... especially if it's for a popular phrase.

But if you create a content rich site about diamond jewelry for people who want information about diamonds (type of cuts, etc.) and you build your site up with tons of great info. People may begin linking to you because you are becoming a great resource for diamond info. In the long run this may help you compete with some of the top retailers for various diamond searches.

Take Ken's daughter's site, anguilla-beaches.com. If she had just tried to optimize for "anguilla tickets" or "tickets to anguilla" she would have been competing with Travelocity and all the popular travel sites. But because she decided to start with basic information about the island of anguilla, she created a site like no other out there and people began recommending her.

If you want to start out by selling products and optimizing for the product name, you better make sure it's in a niche that's not very competitive and very specialized, otherwise you'll have a hard time beating some of the major retailers.

So even though the information route is more work, it gives you a chance to become an "authority site" on the topic/keywords of interest. Authority sites with tons of backlinks is what google is looking for and if you can't get people to link to you, your traffic will be limited.

I hope that makes sense. I know I was rambling.

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Hi Lisa!
What a perfect answer!!!! One of the reasons I am considering SBI is because I could tell you are really smart and you have an sbi site. Many times when I talk to someone who doesn't have the capacity of understanding exactly what I am talking about I get really frustrated. Not with you-- you understand exactly what I am saying and answer in such a clear way!! Even though I don't know you I really admire your capacity. Not everyone can write and analyse like you can-I've told my hubby this many times. The reason I have been considering creating my own site is because of your writing. I truly didn't even give it credit to SBI (I'm a very skeptical person) before I found your site.
I understand now why an information site is better in many ways.
I read in another post of yours that you optimized your flat stomach site for lots of other keywords. How exactly do we learn how to do this? Optimize the site for various keywords inside of a niche?
I have seen some people using wordpress to create niche sites (of course buying the domain and uploading a wordpress blog onto the host). What are the differences between doing this and buying an SBI site?
I would love to create a site with 3 columns on the site. Are there 3 column templates in SBI?
Why are SBI sites with images slower to get into? I have found sites with images that are not so slow to get onto the page, but it seems to me that the SBI sites with images are very slow--- is there a reason for this?
Thanks for all your help

I'm glad I could help. I am on vacation in Hot Springs and when I wrote it I was dog tired and felt I was writing in circles. LOL

What I mean is that my main keyword phrase is flat stomach, but I've created other pages for related topics like getting a six pack, abs crunches, stomach bloating and all the related topics that you get.

I'm not sure what you mean by images "slower to get into?" Do you mean slow loading on the page?

__________________
2 Create a Website | 2 Create a Website Blog

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Recent Blog Posts...

Don't Discount Amazon's Affiliate Program
Finally! AdSense Ads for Feedburner!
Is Making Money Your Only Motivation? [Video]

When there is a page that has images on sbi I have noticed that it takes longer for the page to show up than other types of sites that also have the same amount of images but are on a a different platform. For example-- Sites built with wordpress seem to load much faster
I am really looking forward to content 2.0 that SBI is working on right now. I think it is the next really big thing. If SBI can be a host for a Web 2.0 site-- I am sure that many techie guys and current marketers that are totally into that will buy SBI in 2 seconds and be faithful customers.
Do you know if he offers the option of uploading a wordpress template onto SBI or not?