There is a dangerous trend in online business that can rob you of your opportunity to succeed, rob you of your money, and rob you of your time.
If you have fallen prey to this bad idea, you need to know it’s not your fault.
You also need to know that going down this wrong road is not a deal killer.
You can still succeed online, even if you have been a victim of this wrong strategy. I have clients who are succeeding who were trapped in this wrong idea for years.
The problem is having too many sites.
The problem started when clever marketers realized they could make success seem easy by persuading customers to build many “niche” sites in order to make sales.
While this idea seems like it might work, it leads to disappointment and wasted effort in far too many cases.
If you have ever suspected that “niche marketing” by creating 10 or 30 or even 100 blogs sounded too good to be true, you were right.
Don’t lose hope though because there is an answer inside this very article!
And if you are a person who owns 10 or more sites now, it is very possible that the seeds of your future success lie within the work you have already done!
Before we look at the answer, let’s look at why having too many sites is a problem for almost everyone who tries this approach.
Having too many sites to manage …
- Splits your focus.
- Makes posting articles harder.
- Dilutes your authority.
- Weakens your ad spends.
- Causes you confusion in your work.
- Increases your monthly expenses.
- Leaves you open to your sites being hacked.
- And even more!
To make matters worse, well meaning people are building blog after blog on topics so obscure, and with audiences so small, that monetizing them is next to impossible.
Does anyone really make any money at all with a site about adirondack chairs?
I don’t think so.
Now let’s look at the solution and why it’s vital for you to take action today and focus your efforts in order to make money online.
The solution is to focus your time and attention on ONE BLOG … your home base.
Let’s start with the obvious question … why one BLOG?
I believe you only need one profitable WordPress blog to succeed wildly online. The reasons I believe it are:
- It’s what I do. I know it works.
- It’s what all major marketers do.
- It’s what large companies do.
- It’s what I do for clients.
- It’s what works. (Just ask Arianna Huffington)
Now for the second question …
Why Should You Have ONE Blog As Your Online Home Base?
Experience has proven that there are many reasons for having one blog as your home base.
Setting aside reasons like “it’s what the gurus all do” let’s look at the top five reasons why a WordPress blog should be your online home base.
Reason 1 – Focus
We all know that focus is important, right?
- We work best when we focus.
- We don’t like it when we are interrupted.
- We don’t perform as well when we “multitask”.
But the kind of focus I’m talking about is not work focus but marketing focus. The need to have your site be about one big thing and one big thing only.
When you have a powerful, profitable blog you can become a leader in your market using content marketing.
You become the trusted resource in your field. The “go to” person for when people need an answer.
And you can develop relationships that last a very long time.
I know because I’ve been there. We have customers who started with us at the Directory of Ezines over 15 years ago and are still buying my new products today.
Focus is how you build an army of loyal buyers and friends.
Reason 2 – Makes Posting Articles Easier
Stop for one moment and think about a topic you know well.
- It might be golf.
- It might be cooking.
- It might be something spiritual.
- It might be how to have a successful marriage.
Now answer this – if I paid you $100 per article for articles on THAT topic, how many could you crank out?
I’m guessing it’s not three! 🙂
But if I made the same $100 per article offer and told you they needed to be on lean manufacturing AND on rock climbing AND on parenting AND on Bible study AND on planning a family vacation your job would be almost impossible.
And yet that is the struggle niche marketers face every day.
And it is this struggle that drives them to Fiverr or PLR for articles that end up making them look far less than authoritative.
If you stay with what you know posting, research, writing, and recording all become easy.
Reason 3 – Strengthens Your Authority
I know many of you will not be comfortable with the idea of being an “authority” But what is an authority anyway?
Is it not simply a person who knows more than their audience and can help their audience make progress in a specific area?
Let’s take WebMD for example. WebMD is the most trusted site online. They have more page 1 rankings on Google than any other site in their niche.
But consider this … WebMD publishes about hundreds of topics related to health.
Why do they not have hundreds of blogs, each one about a specific topic?
Because they know that they would never achieve as many Page 1 rankings, or as much authority, if they split their focus.
No matter what Big Topic you cover, do yourself and your audience a favor and host ALL of that content under one roof.
Your audience will thank you. Your schedule will thank you. And Google will reward you.
Reason 4 – Maximizes Your Ad Spend
Let’s say you could run ads and successfully drive 1000 visitors to any site you wanted.
I know that sounds like fantasy to some, but believe me when I tell you the day will come when you can do that at will.
So, you have 1000 visitors … to which site do you send these 1000 visitors and WHAT WILL HAPPEN based on your choices?
… IF YOU HAVE 12 WEBSITES …
If you have a dozen websites, and many people do, and you split those 1000 visitors between them, you will send only 83 visitors to each website.
Here is the crushing truth …
You will not sell anything online by getting ONLY 83 visitors to a website.
Not trying to be negative. Just sharing the facts.
Here is why this is true …
If you get 1 out of 100 visitors to buy you have a 1% conversion. And a 1% conversion to sales is high in most peoples’ experience.
So sending only 83 visitors to a site, in most cases, just does not create sales. You would not even get one sale.
You miss that magic 100 number by 17 visitors. Remember, we are dealing with averages here.
… IF YOU HAVE ONE WEBSITE …
If you have one website and drive ALL 1000 visitors there your odds of making a sale rise dramatically!
Let’s say the site has a 1% conversion rate as in the first example. That means 1 out of 100 visitors makes a purchase.
How many sales would you make?
If you send 1000 visitors to one website, and that site has a 1% conversion rate YOU WOULD MAKE 10 SALES!
And TEN SALES can create enough profit to keep going!
By focusing ALL traffic to one website (your blog) you can achieve real results and put marketing power on your side.
Reason 5 – Costs Less To Run
Even with today’s cheap hosting, and even given that WordPress is free, there is a cost for each site you own.
- A cost of money for additional plugins, hosting, etc.
- A cost of time to check on each site every day.
- A cost of focus as you struggle to keep up with content.
Perhaps worst of all, you run a huge risk of your site being hacked if you are not checking on it regularly.
When I work with clients who are doing niche marketing using many blogs they often report not logging in to their own blogs for months.
That means that plugins and themes are not being updated, comments are not being approved and spam comments deleted, and it all adds up to risk.
In my experience online (over 18 years as I write this) there is no doubt in my mind that having ONE powerful home base is the right strategy.
After that site is succeeding you can expand to more sites, using what you learned while building your powerful home base.
There are many reasons for starting with ONE powerful home base and expanding after that home base is profitable.
But the big one– the most important one of all – is that sending all traffic (from all sources) to ONE website gives you the best chance to succeed early and keep going.
If you want to stop chasing shiny objects and begin focusing your marketing efforts on something that can work consider having one home base first, and then expanding only after that site succeeds.
Because having a powerful home base from which to help people, build your list and, yes, sell things too, is a beautiful thing indeed!
