[jeromec]

I actually just looked into your site healthgazelle.com. I'm afraid I would recommend pursuing another avenue to reach $2,000-3000 per month. One area you seem to be good at is writing. I'd pick another area you're an expert in or passionate about which is far more popular, then build up a blog audience writing about it.

There are two problems. The first, good traffic quality, can't be changed. The second, your site not being optimized for search engines can, but without the traffic there isn't much point.

It took me several seconds to find out that the topic of your site seems to be cystic fibrosis. You actually have a decent store of content about your topic, but right now it's practically invisible to search engines (for example, you refer to it as "CF", and you're not implementing good page title tags, or effective headers, urls, etc.). As I said, that can be fixed. The bigger problem is that Google's keyword tool for "cystic fibrosis" (exact match phrasing) shows not many are searching for what you're offering.

The general term "cystic fibrosis" has decent numbers, but that can include everything from people checking what it is to students doing reports on it. You are interested in people looking for treatment for it, and those numbers are very, very low. Perhaps people don't think to look for a treatment for it. Whatever the case, you would need to be near the #1 result for the keyword "cystic fibrosis treatment", beating out sites like mayoclinic.com and nlm.nih.gov, and you still wouldn't have more than a few thousand clicks per month. Maybe that's enough for you, but I'd pick a more popular traffic topic.

Also, please note I have a typo in my recommendation above to learn more about effective SEO. You need to type into Google "seo site:news.ycombinator.com" with no space after "site:" to see only results from HN.

[Mz]

I have no plans of making $2000-$3000 off that one site. I have other things in the works. They need a great deal more fleshing out (one project has exactly zero actual content). Nor is the site intended to be about cystic fibrosis per se. I advocate eating right, exercise, "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" and so on. Those things are more broadly applicable than just treating my specific condition. And I am quite well aware that very few people go looking for info on how to get well while living with CF. Still, I want to use this site to learn about building traffic as it is the most developed site I have. So thank you very much for your suggestions and for correcting the typo.

One area you seem to be good at is writing. I'd pick another area you're an expert in or passionate about which is far more popular, then build up a blog audience writing about it.

:-)

That's kind of the long term goal. Only I am thinking webcomic. Time will tell.

[jeromec]

Still, I want to use this site to learn about building traffic as it is the most developed site I have.

Okay, if you want to learn about building traffic you need to learn either SEO (learning best practices for Google's model), or how to write content people want to read and feel compelled to refer others to read. That site appears primarily about cystic fibrosis, which isn't a very popular topic. It's fine to have the idea of talking about other things, but if you're taking the SEO route your goal is to be seen as an authority on some specific area of information. Also, having a fully developed site which is set up incorrectly by SEO standards means very little when it comes to SEO. For example, it's sometimes advisable to start from scratch building out page structures, title tags, content, etc. correctly (for example, as I mentioned using a Wordpress structure), and you can often get better results faster by doing this.

That's kind of the long term goal. Only I am thinking webcomic. Time will tell.

A webcomic sounds fantastic! Are you any good? If you can put out something like xkcd.com, then simply add Twitter/Facebook share buttons to it, that can be a quick way to build an audience right there.

[Mz]

For example, it's sometimes advisable to start from scratch building out page structures, title tags, content, etc. correctly (for example, as I mentioned using a Wordpress structure), and you can often get better results faster by doing this.

I added a blog at some point. It's done in WordPress. The plan is that most new content will go up there, in part just to make my life easier since the old part of the site is such a pain in the butt from so many perspectives.

A webcomic sounds fantastic! Are you any good?

I have no idea. It's still in the concept stage. My 23 year old son thinks in pictures, like Temple Grandin. I did the full-time mom thing and homeschooled both my sons for some years as well, so spent lots of time with my kids. I developed an image-rich speaking style without really thinking about it because that is the most effective means to speak with my oldest. This style of communicating with him has impacted my online writing and I think it is part of why my writing is praised as much as it is. My hope is that this will lend itself well to developing a web comic. I am encouraged that the artwork for XKCD is so simple and that the artwork for a couple of other web comics I know developed enormously over time. My drawing is not that great but I did pursue art as a hobby somewhat as a kid and did have an art class in high school, so I am aware that there are certainly worse artists out there. :-D

I also have a history of being "fascinating" to people (and controversial) and I am hoping this will be a much more positive experience for me as someone in the entertainment space than as someone attempting to share helpful info. The degree to which the focus gets put on me rather than on "these are good ideas to try" has been a huge thorn in my side for many years.

If you can put out something like xkcd.com, then simply add Twitter/Facebook share buttons to it, that can be a quick way to build an audience right there.

Oh, that's awesome. Thank you for that.

I remain frustrated with comic press software and similar. Any ideas on that? I don't really want to grow my own. My coding/web-mastering skills are not that great and, hey, you see what that got me for Health Gazelle. Not really keen to repeat that experience.

Thanks.

[jeromec]

Yes, I saw the link to the blog, but that's not what I mean. In terms of SEO you want to think of your site as a house, or library. You don't want to have people be presented with distractions or have to enter through some back door to get to the main goods. You want to offer your best right up front and be clear about it. That means the Wordpress structure should be the main site. Now, if you know what you're doing for SEO, and your main site focus is not the blog content, then that's when you can have a different site upfront and the blog attached with a link.

I have absolutely no idea about producing comics. If it were me I'd just start with blank white paper, draw out my comics then scan them in as JPEGs to post online. If the comic content is good, like Garfield, for instance, people are going to like it, and I'd say that's fine starting out.

[Mz]

Yeah, I kind of know that. I have been told by someone who knows way more than I do to just leave the main site in place to preserve the URLs for pages that have been around a while. I have debated making the domain point to the blog portion but then I don't know what to do with the main site. I have debated making it an archive. One technical issue I have is that the blog is a subfolder of the main site, so changing the name of that upper folder breaks the blog and I don't want to migrate it and lose the dates and ...yadda yadda. I am stumped as to how to change the spotlight to the blog, where more current content is, and leave the existing site intact as an archive, so people who do know of it can still find it and so it can serve as background info/introductory info.

Thanks for all your feedback.

[jeromec]

...to just leave the main site in place to preserve the URLs for pages that have been around a while.

Google shows about 4 links pointing to healthgazelle.com (http://www.google.com/search?hl=&q=link%3Ahealthgazelle....) ... all from healthgazelle.com. There is nothing to preserve, and if there was the way to do it and preserve search engine rank is by using a 301 redirect (http://www.webconfs.com/how-to-redirect-a-webpage.php).

You seem to be holding on to your established site, almost with nostalgia, and I can understand that, but that's not the way to be effective when it comes to building traffic. You have to be prepared to start out on the right course, even if it's new.

Healthgazelle.com says it's been around for about 7 years, and it has 4 links pointing to it, all from itself. If you follow the steps I outlined above I guarantee you will see significant results in less than 12 months.

If I were you the first thing I'd do is ask myself what I want to be known for, in terms of traffic. I'd choose something far more popular than cystic fibrosis, but using that as an example I might buy a domain like howibeatcysticfibrosis.com. Next, point that to a newly set up Wordpress blog. Now, you need content for your new site. You have existing content at healthgazelle.com, but Google doesn't like duplicate content, so you have to make a choice. You can either plan on producing all new unique content for your new site and leave the old site, or cut the content from healthgazelle.com and redirect it to the new location.

If you want to use the name healthgazelle.com you can do that too. Although it's not a very good name in terms of informing search engines or people what the site is about it does at least have some age on it. If that's the case I would download all the content from healthgazelle.com, delete the current site, set up the wordpress blog on the server, then start reposting the content you want to use.