Working on the Periphery: How to Make Any Website You’ll Ever Create a Success
I’ve been reading a lot of books lately. My time this week was mostly spent on researching business ideas and connecting with other people. I soon came to a realization: what you do away from your site is even more important than what you do on it.
Everything adds up in the end. Peripheral activities contribute to the core. All relevant actions are causes which lead to relevant results.
It’s very common for business owners to focus too much on their niche audience and hence, fail to consistently pull in new customers/readers. In the same way, it’s easy to overlook the importance of knowledge acquisition and transferable assets when it comes to making money online.
You probably spend a lot of time and energy on growing your flagship site because you want to make it profitable and attractive. That’s understandable. But don’t neglect some of the things you can and should do away from your site.
On the days when I don’t publish any articles on Dosh Dosh, I am not writing or preparing posts for the next day. I don’t touch the blog at all, except to moderate comments and reply to some of the more pressing questions or emails I receive.
So what do I do with my time? I generally do three main things which I think are highly beneficial to Dosh Dosh and all of my future websites/businesses:
1. Learn Skills and Acquire Knowledge
I’ve mentioned before that online business or webmastering is a knowledge-based discipline. The more you know, the easier you can write better content or improve your site to make it even more successful.
If you don’t set aside time to learn, you’ll always write the same articles and pursue the same marketing strategies. You will inevitably miss out on a lot of ways to enhance your website or business model. Learning is intrinsic to success so don’t ever stop acquiring knowledge and useful skills.
Some things to do in this area:
- Read blogs and publications that are not in your niche to pick up fresh ideas.
- Keep an open mind and read both broadly and deeply on topics of interest.
- Study the methods of influential people to develop strategies for use.
- Go over tutorials and practice the skills you’ve newly acquired.
- Enroll in online classes or paid mentor programs to gain specific knowledge.
- Keep a notebook and develop the habit of recording your ideas/thoughts.
2. Network and Make Friends
Friends are long term assets that are extremely important for any online endeavors. They often have a high lifetime value, especially when you build a deep relationship that is marked by mutual respect and generosity.
You can pay for a monthly ad on most sites if you have the cash but friends will push every website you create for free because they believe in you. These are the people who will give you feedback and support when you need it the most.
So treasure relationships and always seek to make more friends than enemies:
- Email bloggers and journalists to say hi and thank them for their work.
- Talk to people you already know on IM to establish deeper relationships.
- Do favors for people you respect or for others you want to befriend.
- Connect people to one another and help them build meaningful relationships.
- Be helpful to everyone, including clients/commenters by answering questions.
3. Build Transferable Assets
Always seek to develop assets with carry over benefits. Each individual objective must be integrated with the end goal of increasing your overall potential for profit and your ability to influence. These assets are transferable, in the sense that they should benefit every business or website you’ll ever create or own.
This means you should develop interrelated websites that generate income for re-investment and social profiles whose influence can be used to easily promote all your projects. Here’s what I do to build up transferable assets:
- Develop and maintain influencer accounts on all major social media channels.
- Build websites in related niches to leverage established audience attention.
- Set up an expansion fund to fuel the development of new business ideas.
Now you know what I’m probably doing on the days when you don’t see any new articles on Dosh Dosh. Why don’t you try a similar strategy too?
Stay away from your flagship web site on certain days and whole heartedly work on either one or all of the three main points above. I’m pretty sure it’ll make a huge difference for every website or business you’ll ever create in the near future.
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Good schedule. I can’t say I do all of that but I do what I can. Social media is an area I’ve been working on. Takes some effort but it can be worthwhile.
For marketing my sites I have them prioritized. My flagship site does get more of my efforts, but by prioritizing things I make sure that I’m not neglecting my other sites.
I do some of what you’re describing here and the benefits are well worth it. Setting aside time to keep in touch with others is vital. The relationships I’ve formed with others has opened up new opportunities and helped me increase my traffic and subscribers.
I have a business coach and he has helped me learn a lot more about running my own business of blog coaching and consulting. I now can better serve my clients. Education and mentorship have been of tremendous benefit.
I tend to spend more time on social networking with bloggers and friends on the Internet. I put my business operation behind me and have someone to take over.
I have been reading a lot of blogs like yours to learn Internet Marketing to boost my business. I think more web sites you build, the less time you will be able keep up with them. So I start transferring my knowledge and tasks to others, so I can move on to the next one to learn new things.
I call it one tree at a time strategy. It’s slowly moving forward, but it’s moving forward nonstop.
I definitely agree with Michael in post #2.
I set aside time to make sure I write other bloggers, comment on blogs, write coders I’ve used in the past, and so on. It’s essential to networking and growing. Sharing ideas and maybe trading advertisements, ect.
I also am getting into the Social Marketing more. Stumble Upon is the first one I’m working on using and will expand more myself to the others later on.
Awesome article.
Mike
Nice list. I especially like the focus on continuing education, it’s where many people lag behind. Keep learning to stay in front of the pack.
2 other things I do are reviewing performance and strategizing goals.
Early on, without looking at and tracking numbers about my website, things meandered along. Now, I’m obsessive about knowing exactly what’s going on, how I’m doing as compared with before, and spend spare time looking at trends and seeing which areas need to be improved.
Strategy planning also has moved up from being a once or twice a year thing to more frequent. For instance, after reading Caroline Middlebrook’s nice post on blog commenting, I changed my marketing plan to include commenting on blogs – and have started seeing very encouraging results from that one change almost instantly.
Thanks, Maki, for a nice list of ‘things to do’ away from my blog/website.
All success
Dr.Mani
Great blog!
This is a great guide for those seeking what to do during their idle time.
Most blogs teach people to think and draft upcoming posts when we are free but Maki, you did some other things that I see as more productive or equally important to drafting our upcoming posts.
I do agree with you on acquiring knowledge all the time. Online and offline reading has proved vital for me to stay on the Internet for so long. I am always learning and it has proven to me that if you know more than others, you will have the edge.
Also, because I am young, through reading, I learn some powerful words to use along the way and to all those great blogger wannabes out there, you really should read to become a better blogger.
I do agree with Wayne Liew, as i’m new to IM and trying to search a lot of blog.. Your blog is much more productive than others..
It’s really encouraging for us as a newbies to get this kind of information.
Thanks
secretsofgettingprosperous.com
I agree on what you said, people who want to profit from their blogs should continually seek to expand their knowledge so as to be able to provide more and better content for their websites.
I often see very good blogs who lose their fuel after several months, I think they have ran out of interesting ideas – which is too bad. As with any endeavor, specially blogging, one should be willing to commit and plan for the long term.
I make it a point to do (or vigorously attempt to do) all the things on your list. Research, studying patterns, reading blogs, as well as thanking, connecting, and networking. I really should start on building transferable assets , but I’m going to take it in a planned step-by-step process so as not to burn out. Thanks for the great tips.
I do read a lot of books to improve my knowledge and enhance my skills. The only thing I don’t do is keep away from my flagship blog on the days when I am not posting.
And while we are at reading books, Maki can you recommend any good books that’ll increase my webmastering/internet marketing skills?
A favourite aphorism of mine –
If you’re not on a learning curve, you’re going nowhere.
You definately have a point there. I assume that I should take a look on the long term. Insightfull article !
Great article. I have been starting to work on a few of these ideas. I’m going to a meetup in NYC next week to try to actually meet some of the people in my niche. It’s good to see that I’m on the right track.
Thanks
When not working on my site I spend quite a bit of time researching unique and successful entrepreneurs.
There is a tremendous amount of opportunity out there and these days many people are willing to share their keys to success.
To all out there, let 2008 be your year to get inspired, innovate, and take the next steps toward your goals! Whatever they may be.
I agree 100% about the knowledge part of your post. I’m a huge believer that you’ll never know EVERYTHING…you have to keep learning, keep teaching yourself new things, etc.
I even pay for a membership site that takes internet marketing education to a deeper level and I think it’s completely worth it.
Great blog DOSH DOSH.
-Ryan
very nice step of tips!
Lately I have been extensively involved in forums and social networks responding to help on topics of interest. This has required online research over several months, so as to reply with relevant informed answers. But to increase my profile on the profile section in those sites, I learnt from online classes and tutorials such as the HP Learning Centre and about com how to use html and Javascript.
This enabled me to enhance or rather promote my profile sections with images, tables, links, etc. This certainly has increased visitors to my blogs and sites. So it’s about constantly researching, reading, and subscribing to online classes, forums, and optimisation blogs (such as dosh dosh) to gain or remind us of new ideas and techniques to apply them effectively for our benefit.
Great advice Maki. One thing that I’d like to comment on (more praise)is your writing style. You don’t get caught up in your own ideas and become too wordy, or try to push TOO MUCH information on your readers all at once. I appreciate that today, as I’ve encountered many posts that are just overwhelming with LANGUAGE alone. Along with great info and original ideas, you are very easy to read and I’d like to say “thank you”.
Great tips and keep pouring good info.
Some excellent thoughts and advice here. In my online years I see the major problem has been that people do not know enough about basic business principles and human interaction skills. We get so focused on technicalities … why, oh why isn’t my page rank higher, etc. that we lose site of the overall picture.
Good points and excellent ideas. I agree to Dave Starr that many people do not know the basic principles and invest a lot online and later on fails. They don’t understand that they need to focus more on content and its quality.
Hey Maki, you did not know I am Russian..:)
With a name like Igor The Troll? Trolls are origionally from Russia…I am sure you know my father, Igor Chudov…
Great list. You have a point there. Will try to use.
oooo Claymore pics, one of my fav animes
Hmm I like this blog but one question … what does the anime pics have to do with the topic?! I know you are throwing them in to cause more attention but that doesn’t work for people like me. Instead you should add some pictures that feel like they make sense for the topic. The childish anime pics give this site a bit of an amateur feel! … just my two cents!
sascha, does life represents art or art represents life?
Looking at your list Maki, I will say that I’m only into Step 2 of the process. I have been thinking of moving into step 3 by building related niches, but am not forwarding at the moment as I am already on a steep learning curve seeing as I started out only about 3 months ago. And I would say it might not be a good idea to tackle all 3 areas at once, or to move progressively between steps 1, 2 and 3 though sometimes the tasks do overlap.
I’m probably taking a slower time building my blog than most, but prefer to learn and read and plan the direction of my blog in stages with a general long-term goal, and then targetting specific short term goals as I move along and realize the need to re-focus or rework my goals when I gain new insight or perspectives. It’s easier to get it right and the beginning than to find yourself having to restart your blog because you jumped too far ahead because of lack of planning, research or insight. This can be very painful, as building traffic takes a lot of time and commitment.
There are only so many hours in a day, and posting good solid posts a few times a week rather than giving myself the pressure of writing one each day gives me the space to learn from others, brainstorm further on ideas for my blog, develop relationships with other, and I’ve seen the quality of my traffic and relationships with other blogs improve, and I am growing more as a blogger now than as one who was blogging every day. However, there is a tendency for traffic to dip during non-posting days as I have a pretty new blog, and I must say it did take quite a bit of willpower for me to stop pushing the “Publishing” button everyday.
@ Terence
Passing your knowledge on to others so they can do the work for you is a good strategy to save you some time.
@ Mike Smith
StumbleUpon is a great social website to start with. Be sure to check out this article of mine on StumbleUpon networking
@. Dr. Mani
You’re welcome!
I always track my metric everyday and do a big analysis once a week. It makes sense to know where traffic is coming from and what people are clicking on and reading on your site.
@ Wayne
Definitely… the more you learn, the faster you can apply techniques/strategies to grow your blog. ^_^
@ jblu
You’re welcome! It’s great that you’re already doing two of the points mentioned above.
@ Mohsin
I have a lot of recommendations and I’ll write more about them in my Weekend Media spot so look out for that.
@ Gillian
Good aphorism… now where have I heard it before…
@ VitaminCM
Cool… networking events are very useful and fun so enjoy yourself!
@ Michael
I’m glad you’re seeing the benefits of constantly learning early on.. good to see that it has a positive impact on your websites as well.
@ Dav Noel
thanks for the compliment and you’re welcome.
@ Dave Starr
Sometimes the old school stuff works better… we do get lost in a lot of technicalities and fads online.
@ sascha
Thanks for the feedback concerning the images.
@ Ivy
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. The steps aren’t really sequential and I think ideally, you should probably do all three at once… although not the same day (because that could be too tiring). Networking is something that could easily done… in fact you’ve just networked with me in a sense by leaving a comment on my site.
Eventually all the knowledge you’ve gleaned and the connections you’ve made will push you naturally to expand and build other websites. This is somewhat inevitable, particularly if you’re the ambitious sort so fret not about moving slowly.
And I know what you mean about not publishing everyday, I am a little tempted myself sometimes although I shrug it off easy when there are other fun stuff to do.
Dear Maki, your posts are very nice. I like them, but I have a feeling that you are in fact talking about the same thing and same steps again and again. May be I am wrong …….. may be not.
I’ve only recently discovered DoshDosh and this article maintains the high standard of posts that I’ve already browsed through. In the early stages of moving from a salaried web design position to laying the groundwork for a long term independent and freelance existence, the guides that you put together are invaluable. This is one of the most impressive, really like the examination of the wider vision and its long term benefits.
It’s good of you to write on this topic and expose people to the idea that our successes are actually a summation of our learned experiences applied toward the achievement of our goals.
The best investment we can possibly make is in our own ongoing personal development. Thanks Maki.
Hi Maki,
You have summarize it beautifully.
Thank you.
I loved this article and all the information that give a great outline as to what to do when not updating a website/blog. I think I do half of this list but I am still working on trying to increase in the area of social media. Thanks for great insight into a great blog.
wow. super helpful tips for someone launching an online retail site. i did two weeks ago and i’m overwhelmed with the amount of people i should know/contact. prioritizing isn’t as easy as i thought it would be. thank you for this post.
Good list. Some people might already have known one or two of the items but maybe they had no idea how to go about it. Thank you for the tips on how to acheive each of the things.
I like the idea of setting up an Expansion Fund. It’s like having your own mutual fund, and people can earn a return on it. Sometimes good ideas can’t take off unless there is some venture capital behind it.
I like the emphasis on setting up good relationships. Having friends online can help so much and give you good influence.
That’s spot on. Effective networking is an integral part of success.
Great summerize of what you do
i will think about what i do myself
Good pointers. It would help me a lot when I start monetizing my website. Having a good niche is an important one. How about those Adwords can it be mix up with your guides?
Solved my problems. Thanks I’ll stop being a perfectionist and get on with the important things.
Invaluable article
yup..good relationship with other bloggers will bring you to a level of having great friends online!