One week gone – Stats so far
11 Jan
As mentioned in my previous posts on the Affiliate Challenge, I decided to launch a new site dedicated to Unfair Bank Charges.
I thought that it would be interesting to post my stats since it went live. To give a little overview of the timeframes involved, I purchased the domain on the 1st January. On the 2nd put up a Wordpress install and started to get content up for the 3rd / 4th January. The site was at a €œcomplete€ point on the 6th January.
The first crawl by google was on the 3rd January and the second on the 9th January. I saw my first rankings appear on the 10th January. (Sorry for the quality of the images below – I only have MS paint at work, which is a bit crap).
Obviously the visitor levels are quite low at the moment, but it’s good that I have started to rank for some terms & with the addition of further content this should start to improve over the next two weeks.
Although the domain name was picked because there were few avaliable, I’m starting to regret this. It’s hard for people to remember & i’m starting to think about buying a new name and redirecting it.
I know a great little Internet Consultancy that is in the process of being set up that could have helped with the Domain Name problem/issue.
They’ve come up with…
reclaimcharges.com
bankfees.org.uk
bankfeesclaim.com
claimbankfees.com
Ste
Damn,
I’m the 5th biggest traffic driver!
Domains like reclaimcharges.com and bankfees.org.uk are great for long term branding, but for a one time hit the choice James has gone for is good enough.
For short-term challenges it’s not always a great deal to go for .com’s as you can never predict how Google will handle them when it comes to geo-locations.
For .org.uk’s have had great success with them here and there, I’ve still not tested them widely enough, but I know Kieron enjoys the fruits of the .org true.
Good luck Jimbo, and sorry that I’ve been a bit distant, been up to my eye-balls and unfortunately it’s not rum and coke!
Enjoy,
Lee
I must be knackered (only been up 18 hours or something) as I’ve lost the ability to spell!
Hey Lee,
Very valid points you make, which I agree with to an extent, especially as to how Google et al will handle them geographically.
However having spoken to James about the site itself and (by his own admission) the long lead times involved I believe the site is aimed at a long term market and not just the Affiliate Challenge that gave birth to the concept.
The subject matter itself is only really at the beginning, many people to whom I mention that they can claim back these fee’s and that they are illegal will scoff (I hold my hands up here, I did the same when I first heard about it) or will be sceptical at the possibilities but as it gains more and more media attention and more and more word of mouth I think the long term branding of the site will become more and more important, especially as the “clones” will soon be flooding the market.
I can see where you are coming from an the perspective of an affiliate looking for immediate/quick returns (aren’t we all!?!) but I definately think investment in the sites branding will pay off long term. I think this is a superb idea that James has come up with and it has a lot of potential for future growth, albeit a slower life-cycle of revenue.
Ste
Hi Ste
I haven’t spoken to Jimbo recently (mad busy for which I apologise!) so didn’t realise it was a long term project. If so, I’d go for those domain names, but make sure you know where you’re physically hosted:
http://toolbar.netcraft.com/site_report?url=http://www.fasthosts.co.uk
comes as UK
where as
http://toolbar.netcraft.com/site_report?url=http://admin.1and1.co.uk
comes as DE.
so I’m always resistant to getting .com’s on my 1&1 hosting so normally get my .coms with fast hosts.
also I always look at charts like this to determine how much outage I could expect. Because we know outage can effect Google rankings when you most need it.
But, that’s just me rambling again.
Also there a good article on the Beeb today http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/working_lunch/6253477.stm
that may proove interesting reading.
Lee
I’ve just read this and checked my own site in the same sector it is now on page 1 of google.co.uk. It’s still there under the ‘pages in the UK’ option even though it is hosted on 1&1. it has a .org.uk domain name.
Looks like the TLD takes precedence over anything else, though I would agree with lee that if you’re using a .com then you need to pick your hosting carefully.
I have 2 other hosting accounts, one in the UK and one in the US and, for a variety of reasons not all to do with SEO I’m slowly moving stuff off 1&1 .
I’d agree that this is a slower burn than the recent press deluge might make you think, 150 people a week claiming is nothing compared to the number who could profit from this.