I built my simple personal comedy ebooks website –

A surprise really. I haven’t dedicated much time to it. I’ve just been fiddling around whenever I’ve had a few spare moments. 

Key phrase: comedy ebooks

• number 2 on page 1 Google UK
• number 1 on page 2 Google web

Key phrase: comedy ebook

• number 1 on page 1 Google UK
• number 10 page 1 Google web

Key phrase: funny ebooks

• number 2 on page 1 Google UK
• number 5 on page 1 Google web

Key phrase: funny ebook

• number 4 on page 1 Google UK
• number 4 on page 1 Google web

Here’s how I got my ebook site onto page 1 of Google

• named the pages sensibly so they match my key phrases: funny-ebook, comedy-ebook etc
• used at least 300 words of keyword-rich copy on every page for search engines to grab hold of
• wrote reasonably seo-aware meta data
• updated the content at least twice a month
• added a sitemap
• did a few hours’ consistent manual link building via online directories with decent page ranks – from 2 to 6
• wrote about it in a couple of blogs, using key words and phrases in my link text

This is what I did to keep human visitors happy 

• made the site interactive on a very basic level, with special offers and free ebook previews
• added images of the ebooks’ covers for visual interest
• provided payment by PayPal for customer trust and familiarity
• added extra services: ebook design and ebook editing 
• launched a new ebook, with its own web page, every three months

This is NOT a perfect site… in some ways blancminge.com is fairly awful. I’m only part way through completing the basic things that make a site SEO-friendly. And if I’d had my head straight the day I bought it, I’d have dreamed up a url with ’comedy ebook’ or ‘funny ebook’ in it.

Despite all that, in ten months my comedy ebook site hauled itself up onto page one of Google’s SERPs, for a variety of key phrases, across the entire interweb. Cool, that.

It just shows you how far you can get on your own, taking regular, sensible steps to build up a solid presence via nice, additive free, natural SEO. No tricks, no dodgy stuff and no big bucks. Just persistence.

Four months down the line, the results are dramatic with almost 1000 unique visitors so far to my site in month 5 (January 08). Worth sharing with those of you who fancy getting your marketing hands dirty!

Between January and July 2007 my professional copywriting and editing website, helpinthecity, averaged 144 unique visitors a month. Because I hadn’t paid any attention to SEO they almost all came from direct marketing campaigns to my prospect database of 225 local new media and marketing businesses. A very reasonable response rate of 64% but – in the scheme of things – very low visitor numbers.

In late August 2007 I began spending an hour a day on DIY SEO and basic online marketing. Since then I built and launched a WordPress blog, launched a marketing ebook and built and launched my new helpinthecity site, structured to be more SEO-friendly. Plus a huge range of marketing and SEO-related activites:

• regular website updates
• new directory and listing entries
• online press release distribution
• joining freelance and creative networks
• online advertising
• blog posts
• chasing quality inbound links
• fiddling with my html…

As you can see, there’s a steady increase in unique visitors month on month:

September 2007 – 210 unique visitors
Oct 450
Nov 675
Dec 790
January 2008 – 990

Visitors spend on average 239 seconds on the site. And I’m being rewarded with loads of exciting writing and editing projects. The total cost? Nothing but my own time. 

Never underestimate the power of steady eddie DIY marketing and hand knitted SEO!