Today I discussed the process of finding a billing and payment solution for my Lowell.com website that is being developed off line. While Paypal would have been the easiest solution, it wouldn’t accommodate the needs of many businesses who would want to advertise on Lowell.com but don’t use Paypal.
I had a number of needs that had to be met, and I discussed why I chose BestMerchantRates.com as my payment vehicle. Check out the Lowell.com Blog to read more about the process of finding a payment and billing solution.
The Lowell Project: Finding a Billing & Payment Solution
Building a Website Using an eCommerce Affiliate
My great-grandfather, grandfather and father were and are in the home textiles business, and each built and owned his own retail store. While growing up, I visited many of the Manhattan showrooms of my father’s suppliers, and I attended many tradeshows at the Javitz Center, domestics buildings and gift buildings. I spent my summers in high school and college working in my father’s store, which is one reason he and I are so close.
Although many people speculated that I would end up taking over my father’s business, my entrepreneurial spirit led me to become a domain investor, where I found this neat little niche. I didn’t think I would follow in my father’s footsteps in the home textiles business, but this assumption may change due to a timely introduction.
A few weeks ago in my “5 With Mike Berkens” interview, I mentioned the success my friend Mike Berkens had with his affiliate development of LuxuryBedding.com. He built a relationship with Torrey Commerce, an ecommerce affiliate site that builds, maintains, and operates websites as an affiliate. Many of the brands offered on LuxuryBedding.com are brands in which I am familiar, due to my experience working with my father.
After speaking with Torrey Commerce and Mike, I am going to try an experiment. I recently registered a *nice* two-word domain name related to the home textiles business. I am going to use Torrey Commerce to build an affiliate site on my domain name. (I know what you are thinking – not impressive. Even if 100% of the traffic converts and buys product, 100% of 0 traffic will yield $0.00.)
Here’s where my experiment comes into play:
Instead of hoping or wishing that people type this domain name into their browsers when they haven’t before, I am going to do keyword research and build content around many of the pages. My goal is to build a hybrid site around the affiliate site, helping my site rank higher in the search engines. Torrey’s content management system will allow for easy insertion of text, and I will try to optimize the pages as best I can with unique content.
I will focus on the highest value luxury products, as the margin is the greatest. Incidentally, based on a bit of research I have already done, there aren’t many searches for many of the luxury brands, and there aren’t many developed sites either. While traffic will presumably be light, by focusing on the smaller niches, I hope to convert this traffic. I intend to use Google Adwords to buy niche keywords where the potential payoff is greatest.
I also plan to work with my father to build a blog on the site in phase two. My father is an expert in the home textiles business, and this would be another differentiating point to drive traffic. Additionally, I may work with my father to meet potential vendors for my website. Perhaps my father can open doors for some of his smaller suppliers, and he could receive a small percentage of ALL sales from these vendor across the Torrey network of websites and affiliates, similar to a brokering fee. This is well down the road, but there are many opportunities.
The cost for me is fairly minimal, as I am basically only paying for the domain name ($7.50) a unique logo ($150), and Adwords (TBD). Of course I plan to spend my own time building content for the landing pages, but I think the potential benefit will outweigh the risks. And, one of the best parts of this project is that it will allow me to work with my father again! I guess some people were right about me going into this business after all.
Affiliate Sites Help Build an Internet Based Business
Large travel companies like WC Travel are making it easier for people to start their own travel business. I believe that if a person creates enough unique content on a website, visitors will find the site either by search engine or word of mouth. If the site owner offers visitors relevant advertising, the visitor is much more likely to click through. More (qualified) traffic and trust in the website lead to higher click through rates, and higher click through rates generally mean higher close/sales rates, generating more revenue for the site owner.
For a person that loves to travel and write about traveling, using an affiliate site like WC Travel to create a white label reservation engine is a great solution. Instead of having to seek out potential advertisers or rely on Google’s Adsense to display relevant advertising, affiliate travel sites can actually brand a travel search engine using the website’s logo and header. This can lead to much greater revenue opportunities than other alternatives.
For my Lowell.com project, I will be using a few affiliate sites in areas that would be difficult for me to maintain. If I give visitors the most efficient way to book travel, find tickets or a job, they will benefit, and they will surely return to my site in the future. Associated Cities is a great organization for city .com owners as they have relationships with many affiliate sites. In a few days, I will provide more details about where I plan to use affiliate relationships on Lowell.com and give reasons why I believe that’s the best option.
There are many different affiliate sites out there who are willing to build a white label product to help you generate revenue for your website. Although you may generate less revenue through an affiliate than if you were to sell your own products, it can be much easier to start an Internet based business using affiliate relationships. You don’t have to worry about customer service, fulfillment, credit card authorization, billing…etc. However, since your site will be associated with the affiliate companies, it is important to do your due diligence on the company to make sure their standards are as stringent as yours.
The Lowell Project: Creating Relevant Content
Part of the search engine optimization strategy for Lowell.com is creating relevant content that will help drive search engine traffic to Lowell.com. Today’s Lowell.com Blog post is about researching the keywords people are using to generate unique content that will attract them to Lowell.com.
I have been using Trellian’s Keyword Discovery tool, and I found it very useful. I am sure I am not even using it to its full extent yet, but I was able to extract some great data that is helping me build Lowell.com. Creating unique, relevant content is just one aspect of my search engine optimization strategy, but its important. I plan to discuss other aspects of the strategy in a few days, and I may have a guest poster for that.
In the meantime, please feel free to check out what I wrote regarding the content I am creating on the Lowell.com Blog.
Lowell Project: Creating Unique Content
From a search engine optimization standpoint, unique content is one of the most important things a website must have. Likewise, from a visitor’s perspective, unique content on Lowell.com is important because the visitor knows that the information was written by the website, rather than by the city.
On my Lowell.com blog, I discussed the process of creating unique content for the website that is being built on Lowell.com. Everything on the site will be completely unique, which poses many challenges. I discussed how I am researching, the motivation behind the research and how all of this is being created with the help of a copywriter.
Much more in-depth information can be found on the Lowell.com Blog.
Lowell Project: Beautifying the Site
Enticing visitors to want to visit Lowell, Massachusetts will be one function of Lowell.com. Since many visitors to the website may have never stepped foot in Lowell before, the website will need to give visitors a good feel for the city. Posting updated photographs is the best way to convey the feel of the city, and I plan to take my own photos in addition to partnering with a local photographer. I’ve detailed this aspect on the Lowell.com blog.