Authority Site Set Up/Questions

[marcp]

Hi after starting some Amazon niche sites with somewhat success I am wanting to start an authority site in a competive marketplace. I have done a lot of keyword research and have found keywords/phrases that I can target with exact match search volume in the 3600/month range. However competition is more but doable. In each keyword it looks like I can get to top 3 but #1 would be a challenge. I realize this would be long term. I like the idea that I'm very interested in this marketplace and often search for info for my own benefit.

My questions are how to go about this. With amazon niche sites there are 7-8 plug ins I use and I use exact match domains.

Do I go about this with the same on page SEO?

I see a lot of the competition links to other sources in their content.

Any thoughts or recommendations?

[janeth]

You need to have a credible website. You need to have a credible blog. You’ve got to be participating on sites like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and the like. By participating I mean providing good, meaningful helpful, insightful content for free with no strings attached. This means a steady stream of tips and advice about things that are important to the people that are following you.

It’s about leaving no stone unturned.

You want to be everywhere. You want to be hanging out, giving out great information and advice, no matter what direction your potential client turns.

[Rick Noel]

Based on my experience, @janeth is right on the money. Great content is the key to SEO and earning links/followers/fans/circles/pins/etc. It's not easy, it can be outsource with sufficient funding but is the best long term strategy if you want to survive search engine algorithm updates. Beyond creating awesome, relevant, original content, active link building from relevant sites can help, especially from trusted, high page rank, authority sites. Leaving real, non-automated comments that add to the conversation in a meaningful way provides your link context and adds to your brand, drives traffic and helps with the SEO, even if comments links are nofollow. Its an investment, but for long term results, we find it worth the time. When leaving comments, make sure to not use keywords instead of your real name, else comments get trashed. Links from .edu and .gov sites carry extra weight as they are harder to manipulate and more trusted by the search engines. Your niche and competition should drive your social media strategy and tactics. Make sure to use Social Channels to share yours and relevant 3rd party content. We share about 4 to1 (3rd party content to our content) which we have found is a best practice. The key is to make sure all content is high quality and relevant to your target market. Good luck @marcp.

[claybutler]

I realize this would be long term. I like the idea that I'm very interested in this marketplace and often search for info for my own benefit.

I think this quote says it all. To have an authority site you need to have a true passion for your subject. Since you already have that, the rest is just doing all the regular stuff that people do when following their passion. The above advice from Rick and Janeth is excellent. Right on the money. And don't follow what everyone else is doing either and don't second guess your passion. I recently wrote this ridiculously long tutorial about how to create a great product package label. It's almost 6000 words long. Lots of images. Lots of technical as well as theoretical content. Most bloggers would say that's crazy and I should break it up into several smaller posts because people won't read something that long. Well, that post landed me three jobs last week. And it's already being picked up by some graphic design instructors as recommended supplemental reading. So for my target audience it's perfect. I've found this to be true every time. Write from the heart, provide really useful content, don't sensor yourself and speak openly and honestly and write as much as you need to make your point.

[alphaomega]

And thanks for the great tutorial Clay.

[janeth]

There is so much to learn that I don’t think I'll ever stop learning. Hell…as long as I continue to apply myself I know I’ll ever stop learning.

Great content is actually about step 4.

You first have to create accounts on sites like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, and the like. Then you need to become active on all those sites. Answering questions and finding out what your customers are really interested in. You need to turn those conversations into stories and post those as content on your blog.

But wait…first go to http://ifttt.com and set up accounts so every time you make a post on your blog it automatically updates your twitter followers with a twitter update. It automatically updates your LinkedIn followers with a link to the new article and the title. It updates your Facebook page with the same information as you got on your LinkedIn page. And it post a couple sentences from your post on your blogger page.

Now, you’ll want to create really cool photos for your site so you can pin those are Pinterest.

And now we are on Step 4:

Step for is where the hard part begins. This is where it all changes. You are no longer trying to get them to the site they are already here. Now you have to keep them on the site.
And some of the best in the industry have failed to do this.

You don’t have to look far to see examples of this. WPW is as far as you have to go.

Here’s a forum that when Brittany ran it a post like this one would have gotten 7 pages of comments in less than a couple hours.

WPW had Phil Craven, William C, Mel Nelson, Black Knight, Jill Whalen, John Scott and many others showing up here and posting on this forum.

So what happened?

Getting folks to the site is just the start.