There’s a growing movement out there based on flipping websites. It’s very similar to flipping a house, but with virtual real estate. The process is similar to a house, too – buy low, fix it up, sell for a profit. Flippa is doing a great job of catering to this group of ‘flippers’ and sometimes has some really great deals if you pay attention.
I’ve dabbled in the flipping world, but in a reverse kind of way – I’m flipping my own sites.
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Currently my business has openings in the following industries:
These industries have a decent amount of traffic and we are confident we could help your business rank among the top for your industry.
These openings are only available for one client each, serious inquiries only.
For information on our policies, see Why We Only Take One SEO Client Per Industry
To inquire about getting your business set up for SEO, contact me at toll free at 1-888-379-0417.
Many business owners see SEO and related services as an expense instead of an investment. This line of short term thinking has long plagued many a SEO business.
So what can the average SEO do about it? Well, we can educate them (assuming they are willing to listen). We can show them case studies. We can simply say ‘trust me’ (which rarely works).
Today, while thinking about this exact thing, I had a great thought.
Let’s say you are a business owner, and you have a building where you sell things. Everyone knows that the first three rules of business are ‘Location, Location, Location’, right?
So let’s say that I came to you and told you that every day I’d come by and move your building an inch closer to a major intersection in your town. I’d spruce up your building, make it attractive and at the same time I’d pick it up and move it closer and closer.
Now, being closer to an intersection means more people will see your signs, right? And once you get to the intersection (an inch at a time might take you a while), you’ll have more traffic, more people will be aware of your business, and your revenues will go up.
So after (whatever amount of time), I say let’s take this to a new level. Let’s move your building toward the local highway. It may cost more, but you’ll see more and more traffic. Your brand awareness will go up. People will see your building from many streets.
Soon you’ve moved past the highway toward the Interstate. Thousands (or more) of people are seeing your building, your sign, your brand every day. Revenues are going up, and you are enjoying success you never thought possible.
Now, let’s take this one step further. What if, the highway that I moved you towards just happened to contain only people that were interested in your products? Nearly every car that drove by was a targeted customer. Your target market, delivered to your door.
To be fair, let’s define an expense. dictionary.com says a cause or occasion of spending. Perfect.
If I were Joe Average Business Owner, you’re probably right, SEO is an expense in the short term scheme of things. There’s going to be a definite amount of time when I’m out spending my return. There will be months of payments gone to the wayside before I will ever see any return on that money, and it may seem like it’s not working.
And SEOs see this a lot. It takes time for the search engines to crawl your site, and it takes even longer for your website (which is competing with thousands, if not millions of others) to creep up the SERPS. That’s why we ask for 6 or 12 month minimum contracts. Our ‘salary’ is performance based. You climb the ranks or we lose our job. Simple as that.
Back to expenses – sure, an SEO campaign is a serious cost for your business. In the short term, it will look like you’re losing money out the wazoo, but long term you’ll see that the money you invested is returning at a rate that has turned it into a nice business asset.
Investment: a devoting, using, or giving of time, talent, emotional energy, etc., as for a purpose or to achieve something
I bargained with life for a penny
And life would pay no more
However I begged at evening
When I counted my scanty store
For life is a just employer
He gives you what you ask
But once you have set the wages
Why, you must bear the task
I worked for a menial’s hire
Only to learn dismayed
That any wage I had asked of life
Life would have willing paid.
For those of you just getting started in SEO / SEM consulting, listen up.
Earlier this year I partnered up with a business colleague to do some revenue share for him. Basically it was this: I do SEO for him and I get a percentage of the revenue that the website creates. I actually do this for several local businesses, but I’m not sure that it’s the best option.
While small businesses love to ‘partner up’ with other business owners, I’m really having second thoughts about doing this in the future.
Here’s the deal. You offer a great service, one that can propel a business (literally) into a new revenue stream. You have the know-how and understanding to create wealth. And wise small business owners will see this and want it. However, most small businesses lack one thing – money. While this isn’t always the case, it has been my experience that a lot of small business owners want a lot, particularly things they can’t pay for. Of course, who wouldn’t.
If I owned a coffee shop, and in came a guy with a laptop, having meetings, talking to business owners, I’d want to know what he offered. I’d want him to market my business. But I’m just a little coffee shop owner, I don’t have that kind of money to throw at marketing.
Just a word of advice – RUN!
My wife often tells me that I’ve got this soft spot for people in a pinch. For some reason I feel bad when I see a business owner struggling, and I want to help. I don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes – perhaps they’re really bad at accounting. Perhaps they are funding useless causes. Perhaps they have no idea what’s going on at all in their business. Whatever it is, all I see is the outward sadface, and I offer to help.
Most often she’s right (dammit!). She sees me working for these people ‘in hopes of a future return’. She sees the kids wanting new this and that, and she sees me working away, but the bank account doesn’t increase. I can’t blame her for getting aggravated.
So if you’re good at SEO, and you know it, don’t fall for these things. You offer a damn good product, quality advice and the power to increase sales. Don’t let it go for cheap.
Disclaimer: There are plenty of reasons to help out a small business. I am in no means telling you to avoid these altogether – rather I’m telling you to be wise. If you have a friend that needs help, throw him some link juice. Do a small link building campaign. But don’t go overboard just to prove yourself. If you want to do that, do it on your own website, not someone else’s.
I watch a lot of CNBC. I’m not in to the whole financial scene, nor am I into stocks. But I do love to watch those shows about rich people, how they live, and most importantly how they got rich.
I read a lot, too. I’ve read all the ‘Rich Dad’ books, even bought one for my son. I’ve read Tim Ferris’ 4 Hour Workweek (loved it) and many more. Now I’m reading a great book called The Millionaire Next Door.
You could say I’m obsessed with being rich.
But I don’t think I am. I do think that money is an awesome tool, and there are plenty of people out there who could use more, me included. I’m not a believer in lotteries or unexpected windfalls. Sure, that’d be nice, but I’d prefer to earn it myself.
(There’s a saying in the custom auto industry – build it or buy it. I prefer build it. A little old fashioned hard work never hurt anyone.)
Anyway, I pay attention to how these people make their money. The guy on Untold Wealth: The Rise of the Super Rich made his money doing what he loved: mortgages. There’s another guy on there who is in to leveraged buyouts of undervalued companies. Most of these guys grew up in an average middle-class family, started working in an industry that interested them, and soon thereafter started their own companies doing the same thing.
It’s no secret that you’ll most likely never get ‘rich’ working for someone else. Most all millionaires in the US are self-made, and they did it by starting their own company. So I guess I’m on the right track.
Can an SEO firm make a millionaire? I don’t know, but I’ll let you know 
As I mentioned a few weeks ago, this ‘bad economy’ is a great time for your business to grow. The down times are causing people to scale back on necessities, and the government is hoping that their new stimulus package will help some small businesses continue to operate.
As part of the stimulus package, the government has also increased the amount that a business can expense (section 179). This one-year exception means that if you buy business stuff (a van, a computer, some new software) you can write off a larger chunk of that up front, which will help come time that Uncle Sam visits you again in April.
I’m not a tax expert, so do some research on the section 179 details.
This is a great time for small businesses to get their fannies in gear in relation to online presence. I’m not going to rehash what I said earlier, but man what an opportunity! Cut back on those Yellow Pages ads and push that money into your Internet plans. You won’t be sorry.
“Can I just pay a couple of months now? We can’t afford to do the whole year at once”
Sometimes my hosting business gets requests to extend a hosting account just a month or two. I’ve always accommodated these requests, as I can understand money can be tight.
However recently I’ve had two instances where people have requested an extension (and they’ve paid their $9 bucks or whatever it is) just to move hosts. They had planned all along to do so, and just needed a little more time to do so.
Well, no more extensions. From now on you pay for a year or I terminate the account.
What is that saying, lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part? Something like that…
Many people stumble across SEM and think that it’s too hard, or too saturated to make any real money. After a few months of pushing through something you’re probably not really interested in, you give up. Small checks come, but it’s not the big payday you thought you’d get.
Well I’m here to tell you that hard work and persistence pays off.
In October 2004 when I stumbled across an Internet Marketing ebook, I started promoting timeshares, lemon laws, and teleconferencing. None of them ever paid, but I kept at it.
In Feb 2005 I met Derek Chew, then a self employed (and single) SEO. We hit it off, and I mentioned to him that I was averaging $5/day between Adsense and the few little things I was trying to promote.
Cutting to the chase, I’m now averaging over $3000 a month in side money. That’s right, I’m still working part time on an Army web design contract, which provides me a nice steady income, and making that money on the side. I recently bought my wife a nice GMC Denali and have my eye on a Cadillac STS.
If some country boy from Arnold MO can do it, so can you.
Last night my wife and I went to the Three Doors Down concert at the local outdoor amphitheater. The venue has some under-roof seating, but the vast majority of the seating is on the lawn, a huge grass-covered hill where you can just pick out a place, flip out a blanket, and sit.
You can also rent lawn chairs. After about 15 minutes of sitting on a blanket, my back was hurting and I was ready for a chair. So we walked all the way back down the hill (about 10 mins) and scoped out the rental place.
I noticed the sign right away – Lawn Chair Rental $5. Excellent. Five bucks. I can handle that.
So we go up there and hand over the $5 bucks. I get a chair and a ticket. The lady explains to me that if I bring the chair back, along with the ticket, I’ll get a dollar back.
Wow, really? I can walk all this way back for a dollar?
If you’ve read the book Freakonomics, you’ll remember a story about daycares in Israel that were having problems with parents picking up their children late. So the daycare decided to issue a ‘late penalty fee’ of $3.00. And what happened? The amount of late arrivals increased dramatically. The parents realized that for only $3/day, they could extend the time they had without the kids to get things done. The daycare’s plan backfired.
Same for the lawn chair. I had walked up there fully expecting to pay $5 for a rental. Once there, they informed me of the deposit return, but instead I heard “For no extra money, you can leave your chair on the hill after the show”. They just saved me from walking all the way back over there, thanks.
So in my little marketing mind, I started thinking about things they could do that could actually work. We know the chair rental really costs them nothing, other than the initial purchase price of the chair, which I’m sure they recouped in the first two shows of the season. That means the other 100 or so shows are pure profit, minus having to pay the girls that man the rental booth. So let’s just say the profit per chair per concert is $4.50.
There are many businesses who would love to get the exposure of thousands of people nearly every night of the summer. These businesses would be wise to contact the lawn chair rental place and work out a deal. For example’s sake, lets say I own a sandwich shop near the ampitheater. I could print up some buy-one-get-one sandwich coupons, and give them to the lawn chair rental booth (up to $5 value). Now the booth can promote something of more value for each returned chair, a free $5 sandwich, making the rental “free”.
They’d do even better if they got a few vendors to offer deals. A local nightclub/bar would do well after most concerts. A free bucket with purchase of a bucket would pull people in. A skate shop (for the teen visitors) could offer a $5 discount off shoes. Dave & Busters (which is very near the amphitheater) could offer $5 in free tokens.
Even if the lawn chair company paid $1 for each coupon, they’d still come out was ahead.
Be careful how you portray ‘value’ to your customers. I was fully willing to pay $5 to rent a chair, and when I found out that I could just leave it, and didn’t have to bring it back, it was even better. I was in no way notified of the $1 ‘refund’ until I had already paid for the rental.
A ten minute walk with an already-hurting back vs. a $1 refund was an easy decision. Someone come get this chair. I’m going home.
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Will Hanke is part husband, father, geek and all kickass SEO. Follow on Twitter or stalk elsewhere.
