By Old Tom
Jojasa has legs.
Jojasa is my web partner. Her name is pronounced joe - jay - sa. Like I said, Jo has legs.
Right now we are building clusters of sites in various niches. One of those niches is leg/foot. Jojasa agreed to take on the leg/foot project, so let me explain the project to you, the way I just explained it to her.
We're not building just a single Leg site - we're building a cluster of sites. Therefore, it won't do, to just buy a single set of 20-25 Leg pics. Well, it will, but then we'll just have to go back and get a second set, and a third, because we're building three sites.
So let's back up to the beginning, explain what we're doing, and also explain why we're doing it, as we go.
Vip-id
The subject is Legs, and Jojasa has 'em. To build a Vip-id site, we need 100 pics. We found a series of 50 pics, a collection of 37, and a series of 20 pics. That gives us our hundred.
Like myself, Jojasa knows how to build award-winning nice sites. No ads, no consoles, surfer friendly. We both enjoy building those kind of sites, the bigger the better.
The vip-id site is a perfect fit. The requirements are that it be a nice site, with a maximum of five sponsor or other exit links, and that it have at least 100 pics. So all we need is a menu page with links to the pic galleries.
Since we're doing a bare minimum of advertising, the pics do not need to load onto html pages. Just organize them and make it look nice, and we're done. We'll throw in a text link or banner to one sponsor, and a link to our leg/foot hub, and that's all we need. I'll explain the hub below.
My objective for a vip-id site is to sell vip-id memberships. I don't care about the traffic inside the site. If I sell a sponsor that's great, but my objective is to sell the vip-id membership in the first place. (Your game plan might be different, but that's my current game plan.)
So why do we even bother making it a nice site? So it can get listed. We're building a reputation with the vip-id folks. We want vip-id to be eager for submissions from Old Tom and Jojasa. And, it's fun to do a "nice" site from time to time.
Now we have the site's content built. The next step is the tour. This is the critical part, because our objective is to sell vip-id memberships. We'll place the tour at index.html, add the vip-id script, submit it to vip-id for approval, and we're done.
Or are we? What about traffic?
Sure, Jojasa has Legs, but if nobody sees them, what's the point?
We need to get that site submitted to any search engines we can, and to any links sites we can. It's a good thing we placed the meta tags as we built each page! Now we need to take a moment and get that site submitted.
Hub Stub
But wait... I mentioned a hub. We have a link to a hub that does not yet exist. So, first, let's build a hub stub so we don't have a broken link. We can expand the hub later.
The hub, for now, is two pages. The first page is a full page ad for a leg and foot sponsor, and the second page is the hub itself. This Legs and Feet hub only has a couple of items to begin with... the vip-id site itself, and a sponsor site "for the hardcore stuff." Later, as we create more legs and feet, we can add them to the hub. So long as all leg/foot sites we build include a link to that hub, we can continue to circulate our traffic.
Now that we have our hub stub, we can submit the vip-id site to the search engines and link sites. If the tour is three pages, those pages would be index.html, index1.html, index2.html. That is our clean entry point. In other words, there are no reciprocal links to other sites or search engines. We make a second entrance for reciprocal links, legs.html. legs.html is an exact copy of index.html except for the recip's. It links to index1.html, and continues the same tour from there.
Remember, the reason for having Legs, is to sell vip-id memberships. Therefore, we want to bring as many prospects to the vip-id tour as we can. We've gone directly to the search engines and link lists, but we can do a lot more.
Triple Split
The next step is to split our collection of 100+ pics, into three collections of at least 30 pics each. Jo split her Legs as follows:
Can we do a site with 18 pics? Certainly. Will it get listed? Maybe not. And, if we want it to be an adultcheck site, we need at least 30 pics. 18 pics is perfect for a tgp gallery. 12-15 pics is the norm for tgp galleries, but I've had good results with 18-20, so if we have a natural fit for 18-20, we can use that.
We took a look at Snow White. Can we build three 12-15 pic pages from that series of 50 pics? Yes, that will work. So, we have three 30-pic sites like this:
We may decide to split things out differently, but that is a Leg split that will work for what we need.
Okay, it's time to do the first 30-pic site. We already use CashQuest and AdultRevenueService, and both have leg/foot sites. We tossed a coin and picked ARS as primary sponsor for this site. The vip-id site is our secondary sponsor.
Inside Out
Let's start on the inside and work our way outward.
Ultimately, we have pictures. We want them to load on html pages, to maximize our advertising exposure. Now, think about this a moment. If a surfer sees the full size pic, what does that mean?
It means he did not click on any of the sponsor links, or anything else, on the disclaimer page. Nor on the main menu page. Nor on the gallery page. He just kept coming, to look at the photo. When you're doing a specific html page, it's always important to know how and why your surfer got to that particular page.
Okay, we know he wants to see the picture, and we know he wants to see that picture. He clicked on the thumbnail, so he knows exactly which picture he's looking at.
If he has a normal modem connection, it will take a few moments for the full-sized picture to load. This is the perfect time to leave him staring at your best pitch. Well, your best pitch for him. You know he didn't bite on your best softcore pitch, which was on your disclaimer page. He didn't bite on your menu page... yet. He didn't bite on your gallery page, yet, either.
But he did click on the thumbnail. He's expecting to wait a few moments while the full-size picture loads. But what if your advertising banner is already loaded in his browser cache? That's why I'm suggesting your design from the inside out.
Carefully design that html page which has the full-size image. Nothing else caught him; give him your best and raunchiest pitch! Let him stare at that while he's waiting for the full-size pic to load. You know why he's there; tell him how and where to get what he really wants.
Since Jo has that vip-id site already built, I'll put a link to that below the full-size pic. Below that I'll put a link that says Return to Gallery One (or whichever gallery he's on).
So, from top to bottom, my html page for the full-size pic looks like this:
Why would I bother with the Return to Gallery One when they can hit the back button on their browser just as well? It's part of my strategy. At the bottom of all of my pages, I have the link they should click on to continue, so that they never have to use the back button. Return to Gallery One, Return to the Main Menu, and so on. By doing this, I'm trying to develop a mind set. I want our surfer always moving forward and clicking - never just backing out. As long as he keeps clicking on my stuff, I can nudge him in the direction I want him to go.
Notice that just above this "Return to" link, I have the link that takes them on to my vip-id site, or to my hub. That too, is part of the mind set I'm trying to develop in my surfer.
At the bottom of the main menu page, and at the bottom of the last gallery, and at the bottom of the last pic, I leave off that "Return to" link. Therefore, when they click that bottom link as always, they continue on to the sponsor, or to my hub, or to my vip-id site.
So, I develop a mindset, by having them expect to click on that bottom link, which clearly says where it's going. The last bottom link, however, helps place them back in circulation.
Continuing Outwards
Remember that we wanted our surfer staring at the sponsor banner while the full-size pic loaded? The way to do that, is to already have the banner loaded in cache. In other words, place the same banner on the disclaimer page, the main menu page, or the gallery page. What I normally do is place that banner at the bottom of the gallery page. The banner at the top of the gallery page was, in turn, already placed at the bottom or middle of the main menu page.
In this way, as the surfer rolls on in, he can stare at whatever's at the top of the page, while the rest of the page loads. He just might get impatient, and see what he wants, and click for the sponsor. That's what we want, so I do everything I can to nudge him in that direction. Remember that a single nudge won't make the sale. He needs to be warmed up as you nudge.
We now have a complete freesite... clean disclaimer page (clean meaning no reciprocal links), menu page, gallery pages, and the individual full-size pic pages. We have a primary sponsor which is a leg/foot paysite, and the secondary sponsor is our own vip-id site.
It's time to submit this site to the search engines and linklists.
Multiple Entrances
However, we are far from finished with this 30-pic site.
We need to build a disclaimer page with recips, for those linksites that require them. I normally call that page disclaimer.html, and the no-recip freesite entry, clean.html. Some sites allow a full page ad between the disclaimer page and main menu page... call the full page ad legs.html, the main menu page, menu.html, and the disclaimer page leg.html. Thus leg.html links to legs.html which links to menu.html. Also, clean.html links to menu.html, and disclaimer.html links to menu.html.
This can get confusing in a hurry... so what I do is start with a blueprint for all these entrances. I normally call the blueprint page, links.html. It might look something like this. Again, I organized it to work from the inside outward:
Once I have the above page written (links.html), I can use it as a checklist to make sure I get everything built, and the right pages linking to the right entrances.
Remember that hub? I can now add the above site to the hub. Remember that only I link to my hub... so if a surfer found my hub, they have already been through at least one of my sites. I never submit my hub to a linklist or to a hand-edited search engine listing. I do put meta tags in the hub page, and make sure the search engine spiders can find it.
From now on, whenever possible from the hub, I will send him to an AVS site, or to a paysite. In this case, when I add the above site to the hub, the hub will link to sindex.html. That is, they go through a full page ad to arrive at the sexkey door. I figure if they rattle around between enough avs entrances, they just might buy the avs pass, and be done with it. Once inside, of course, it is the freesite, with the targeted advertising we already discussed.
Another reason for getting the AVS versions, by the way, is to get the sites listed. Both sexkey and AdultCheck send traffic. Why not take the traffic, and see if you can't send them to a sponsor, or to the vip-id site?
TGP Galleries
Are we done yet? Of course not! There's a lot more traffic we can squeeze out of those 30+ pics. We have one gallery of 18-20 pics, and a second gallery of 12-15 pics. Since we planned it this way, we have two nice tgp galleries. We'll call the clean (no-recip) versions tgp1.html and tgp2.html, and add their names to the list on links.html.
Everyone knows tgp traffic is crap traffic. It can be profitable crap traffic, but it is still crap traffic. When tgp'ing, I try to keep bandwidth down and profit up. I don't know how to control profit, but I do know how to control bandwidth. I plan on a bandwidth expense of 20-40 cents per thousand visitors, and when I make a dollar per thousand visitors, I figure I did okay.
The first thing I do is consider why I am tgp'ing. What is this gallery's purpose? If you will recall, Jo has Legs, and therefore Jo's Legs become my purpose.
I consider the gallery page as a single self-contained whole. Most tgp surfers have trained themselves to ignore any banner slapped on to the top or bottom. A tgp gallery has precious little opportunity for advertising. The thumbs must open into the full size image not into an html page containing the image. I generally allow myself two subtle sponsor links, a link to my vip-id site, and/or a link to my hub.
That's it. I keep the gallery extremely clean - the ads are there, but subtle. I pull them into the story line, if any. Click on my hub link for the rest of the story, or for more of the series. That sort of thing.
Again, I need to consider the tgp gallery page as an integrated whole, and consider its purpose. Its purpose is to bring me productive clicks. I need to consider why they found my gallery in the first place (Legs are a turn-on). I want to get them warmed up to the point that they're quite willing to pull out a credit card to get what they want. In other words, the pics are the advertising... the pics warm them up, and have them interested in what I have to offer. I then make it easy for them to Click Here as part of the natural flow of things.
Do I get very many clicks? No, I do not. But I keep the bandwidth down to a low enough level, that a few clicks is enough. If they click, it's a good click. That is, they're expecting to go to a sponsor, or to my hub, or whatever. They know where they're going, and they're going on purpose.
I call it trolling. I'm looking for the few surfers who might be interested in what else I have to offer, and I feed them into my hub for further filtering. The vast majority are gone before the thumbs even finish loading - which is fine by me. It is these few for whom I designed the page.
Finally, I have to keep track of my tgp schedule. So long as I keep my gallery submissions 4 days apart, I'll be fine. Everyone seems to allow one gallery per webmaster per four days. Most allow more; but keeping to this worst case ensures I won't get blacklisted for being too prolific.
Second and Third
We can now build the second and third 30-pic site in the same manner we just built the first one. Freesite, avs entrances, submit for search engine and linklist listings, tgp galleries, full page ads leading to the various entrances, and so on. The second and third sites do need to look different from each other. After all, we do want to pull traffic in to each of our sites, and surfers wouldn't want to see the same site three times over.
As we build each site, we can add it to the leg/foot hub.
Triple Triple
Once we have built the second and third site, we'll have four sites - the vip-id site, and the three freesites. Plus the avs versions, the tgp galleries, and so on. With a leg/foot hub, we can circulate and filter the traffic, sending our surfers to the most appropriate sponsors, properly warming them up along the way.
However... which would bring you more traffic overall? Three different listings in the leg/foot category, or three different listings in three different categories? So, the game plan is to not build just one site cluster, but to build three site clusters in three different niches simultaneously.
In my case, the game plan is to build a Mature site, a teen site, a leg/foot site, then another mature site, another teen, another leg/foot, and then the third of each to complete each of the three triples. When we have completed the triple triple, then, we have three clusters of sites in three different niches, each with its own hub.
We'll then be doing the same thing again next week, with another three niches, and a third time the third week, with three more niches. As we complete the triple triple triple, that will be 9 different categories... but counting overlapping subjects, and our collections of bdsm stuff, we'll actually have 12-15 different categories.
We will then have enough to connect everything together with a real hub site, and perhaps begin to see the snowball effect.
Then we'll do another triple triple triple, with nine more categories, building a wider and wider base to draw traffic with. Then we'll do it again... and have completed our triple triple triple triple. We'll then be well past our first 100 sites, and hopefully know what we're doing, and where we want to go next.
Meanwhile, I'm finding the triple triple
to be quite a challenge for a single week. Mature and Teen is
enough for me; I'm glad Jojasa has Legs. [an error occurred while processing this directive]
Last modified: Mon Jun 26 15:05:05 CDT 2000