I read The Tipping Point and Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell back to back. The Tipping Point was written in 2,000 and is more applicable today than when it was written. Outliers is a natural sequel to The Tipping Point. If you are planning on reading Outliers, read The Tipping Point first. Both are excellent books about what it takes to succeed in your niche.

Bill Gates’ Niche

An Outlier is someone who is way ahead of anyone else. Gladwell uses case studies of a few Outliers like Bill Gates and The Beatles to make his point. What made them so special? Based on what I read, everyone today has a chance of being an Outlier in their Niche. To become an Outlier we all need a tipping point. It’s that one thing that opens the doors for us.

What Gladwell explains is that to achieve the tipping point and become an outlier requires 10,000 hours spent doing one thing. It also requires a tremendous amount of luck, good fortune or whatever you call it.

The story of Bill Gates starts when he was an eighth grade student. The mothers group at his school have a bake sale every year. They buy something for the eighth grade class with the proceeds. It just so happened that they bought a PC before they had software. To get the PC to perform required punching holes in a card, then putting the card in the PC. It started working. Gates was obviously consumed and challenged by the process. But keep in mind that he was the only one in his class who became a household name.

He kept with it until he couldn’t go any further. That was in his sophmore year in high school. It turns out that University of Washington, conveniently was across the street from high school, had the next level computer he needed. There he met Paul Allen who became his partner 4 years later.

No doubt that Gates had an extraordinary aptitude for programming and software development. However a few things lined up for him, but it was, as Gladwell explains, 10,000 hours of focused hard work on one thing that ultimately led to the tipping point in his career.

10,000 Hours and The Beatles Story

We can learn a lot from Bill Gates and The Beatles story and apply to our own niche business by understanding and mastering a few basic concepts. First is that every endeavor requires hard work, focus and efficiency. If 10,000 hours is the requirement to become an expert at one thing that leads to the tipping point in our own business, then efficiency and focus are the key ingredients. The lucky breaks come as a result.

The Beatles story of success is similar in a way to Gates achievements. The basic story, according to Gladwell, was that the Beatles got a chance to play at pubs in Germany when they were around High School age. These were small pubs, so we can assume that is wasn’t much different from the corner bar. Not very glamorous.

The story goes that they only knew 3 songs when they started. Their job was to play 8 hours a day. That’s a lot of hours to play the same 3 songs. So they started coming up with new songs. They played every day for over two years. If they played 7 days a week,  that’s about 3,000 hours per year. That means it took them 3 1/3rd years to reach their 10,000 hour mark. Of course there were a few opportune breaks that came along. The timing was right. They achieved their 10,000 hours as Rock and Roll become the hot new thing.

How You Can Reach The Tipping Point

Bill Gates had access to a PC that led to becoming an Outlier. The Beatles had access to consumers. Both capitalized on one thing by staying focused and putting in their 10,000 hours.

Today we have extraordinary technology for promoting our businesses. By learning how to use these technical tools we have a significant opportunity for our businesses. Gates and The Beatles caught the wave before anyone else. You can too.

Those who are coming into business behind us don’t have the edge we do. We’re early in online marketing. Those small businesses who develop optimized websites in their niche will be way ahead. It will be difficult for new niche businesses to capitalize in markets already dominated online by someone else.

The Niche Quest System

I have developed an online marketing system for small, local business and niche products that produces extraordinary profits. The system works! But contrary to those who claim huge profits with minimal work, my system requires commitment, focus and hard work. Any other way is pure folley.

If you have a niche business and need some guidance or ideas call me or send me a note. I can help you analyze your business and examine where you can capitalize and how to apply the system. It’s all laid out here. Start with Step 1 in the process. Each step takes about 2 minutes to read. Click here for Step 1

Introduction

This is Step 7 in the series about How To Build an Optimized Website that converts a visitor into a buyer. If you want to start at the Step 1 Click Here . Each step takes only a few minutes to read.

What Is USP?

USP is your Unique Selling Point. Now that I have finished writing the content for the Hudson Concrete website, it’s time to start thinking about overall web design.

I wrote the content featuring a summary of services on the home page, types of properties Hudson works on and a list of geographic areas serviced. When a visitor arrives on the site, they get an instant impression. Because I created all the services in bullet point format, the visitor knows exactly what the site is about.

Site color, navigation, simplicity, photos, categories, sub categories are designed to get the consumer to stick. Your site does not need to be expensive to achieve this impression. This first impression is a summary of your selling points.

Every Page Should Have Your USP

Once you grab your visitors attention, the next step is to expand on those key points. Start with bullet points, then expand into a brief paragraph on the home page. At the end of the paragraph there should be a link to another page that expands the selling points further.

Now you can offer your Unique Selling Points on a complete page. If you recall from one of our earlier steps, we laid out all our keywords before writing our content. Now is the time to create links from each page to the corresponding relevant page. Use photos, videos or galleries to support your content and create a mental image in your consumers mind.

Don’t Sell – Educate

One of of the worst things you can do is blatantly sell and tell your visitor how great you are. Educate your customer about your service or product in a factual way. This creates trust and credibilty. Educate your customer and let them sell themselves. Here is a List of Phrases To Avoid

1. We Understand – Tell what you will do and the benefits, demonstrate, don’t make a claim
2. We Believe – Your clients don’t care what you believe. Show the benefits.
3. We Hope – don’t show weakness.
4. We Would Be Honored – don’t talk about yourself.
5. We Can Provide – either you can or you can’t.
6. We Are Uniquely Qualified – says who?
7. Premier, World Class – says who? Not believable.
8. Industry Leader – credibility crusher. Not Believable.
9. Top Quality – as if there’s another kind of quality? Don’t say it.
10. Trustworthy – clients run away when they hear this.
11. Customer First – Not believable.

Would You Buy What You’re Selling?

Put yourself in your customers shoes. Would you buy what you are selling? Would you buy from you? Be educational and factual. Your customer knows you’re in business. If they are educated, then you’ve got their trust. You gave them what they wanted. Remember, your customer searched the information you provided. If you gave them what they wanted, the odds of them buying from you is high.

Click Here For Step 8

Since we’re working on building a website for a concrete polishing company, which is in the decorative concrete niche, I thought I’d provide a few more tips explaining how to create content that converts to sales. This strategy applies to every small, niche business or product.

1. What Are Your Customers Looking For? A better question might be, who are your customers? To answer that question requires knowledge of your competitive edge. Are you the low cost provider that competes on price? Or are you a high quality provider? If price is your edge, then make that point clear in your website content. If quality is your niche, then educate your customer about the benefits of your product.
2. What Is Your Niche? – Do you take any project that comes along or do you have a niche within the decorative concrete market? Explain what types of projects you work on and your geographic area of specialization. It’s important to align your target geography with your business plan.  It doesn’t make sense to drive 2 hours to do a garage floor project for $3,000.00 dollars. However if you specialize in the restaurant market, driving 2 hours to do a $20,000.00 project might.

Size 13 Shoes and Larger

I recently read about a shoe store who specializes in shoes for those with large feet, size 13 and larger. This store owner was able to capitalize on an overlooked niche market. Competition online to rank on Google for terms related to that niche was wide open.

You can apply the same strategy for your business. If you are in the decorative concrete market you might want to focus on the restaurant floor niche. Within that niche are commercial kitchens, cafeterias or any food and beverage facility. What makes you unique? Why would someone hire you? The owner of the size 13 and larger shoe store found a niche with very little online competition. You can do the same.  Think about your competitive edge. What would your target customer search for to find what you offer? How competitive is your market online?

Niche Quest Builds Local Niche Market Solutions

Our niche is building profitable online marketing solutions for real estate related businesses, contractors, manufacturers and small business owners.

We help our clients define their niche and dominate their market. Our clients get extraordinary results. They are putting their competition out of business. We don’t just build websites. We build profitable online strategies. Every day we try to improve and get better at what we do. Your business plan should be the same.

Conclusion

1. Define Your Niche
2. Define Your Geographic Focus
3. Research all relevant keywords
4. Build your website educating your customer about your unique selling point.

Getting traffic to your website is meaningless. Getting traffic to your website that converts to sales is the goal.

Click this link to read the entire tutorial starting with Step 1 or call 1-203-762-1366.

To Move on to Step 7 Click Here

If you’re just joining us and want to start at the beginning Click Here for Step 1. Each step takes about 3 minutes to read so you’re only about 12 minutes behind.

Quick Summary

We started the week by researching all the keywords relevant to a concrete polishing business in NYC. The owner wants to expand to larger projects which requires a territory from NYC to Boston. The internet is the only way to reach a mass market, whether in a tight area of just a few towns or in this case throughout 6 states.

After we completed the keyword research (4,000 terms) we laid the terms out by category inlcluding Services, Property Types and Geographic area.

Then we created 12 pages of sub categories. Then for each page we created 5 sub-sub categories. Each page is 400-500 words. Each sub sub category requires only 80-100 words on a specific feature, benefit or explanation to educate the consumer. By breaking down by sub categories it’s easier to write quality, to the point content. We can also control the use of keywords.

Writing Content

I started out writing the home page which summarized all the content throughout the site. This serves a few purposes.

1. Teaches Consumer About Site – when consumer comes to the site, they quickly know what the business is about. I used bullet points at the top. Then I expand the bullet points with a short paragraph about each topic. My goal is to capture the consumers attention, then get them to read more. Each paragraph will have a link to back pages with more information and photo galleries.
2. Teaches Search Engines About The Site – even though I’m only optimizing a few keyword phrases on the home page, I use many of the keywords I will optimize on each page on the home page. The search engines follow the links and find relevant content. This is the basis of link building which is very important for optimization which we will discuss in another post. Remember the search engines (Google) are in the business of providing quality information to their visitors. The better job we do orchestrating relevance the more we get rewarded with prime, business producing positions.

So, after laying out each page with my (Sub Sub) categories on each page I knew what I was going to write. I was able to stay exactly on task without my thoughts drifting. Each 80-100 paragraph of information had meaning, it was to the point. I was also able to control the use of keywords to appeal to the search engines.

How Long Did It Take To Write Content?

I’m a weak typist so it takes me longer than most. But following this system I was able to write 3 blog posts and 8 pages of content in 1 day. My use of time was very efficient. I tried to allow myself less than 15 minutes per 100 words. Starting at 7:00 am I was finished at 6:00 pm. A very productive day.

Once I created this system, my content writing went quicker, quality of content improved and pages were better optimized. This also ends of helping me develop an image of the site design. Today I’ll finish up content. Next week I’ll edit the content, start putting together photos and have everything ready to start site design.

Click Here For Step 6

Click Here For Step 1

Review

So far we have analyzed the business plan for Hudson Concrete and completed all the keyword research. If you recall, Hudson Concrete is based in New York City. They specialize in providing decorative concrete flooring solutions in the tri-state area. The bulk of their projects have been completed in Manhattan. They have an impressive portfolio with floor projects completed for many name brands like Martha Stewart and Calvin Klein. They have expanded into the concrete polishing market and are targeting large flooring projects like grocery stores, big box retailers and industrial buildings throughout the East Coast from Philadelphia to Boston.

Step 1- Keyword Research and Page Layout

We completed our keyword research including 4,000 relevant phrases. We broke the phrases down to basically 3 categories.

1. Services
2. Property Types
3. Geographic Area

Each of the 3 categories were then broken down to numerous sub categories. Then we created a page listing all the sub categories and placed all the most relevant phrases we are going to optimize for each page. We are going to write 15 pages. At this point we have 1 page with all the sub categories, title tags and meta descriptions. Remember we should have less than 60 characters in our title tags. That required some maneuvering and thinking about how we’re going to write each page.

Step 2- Organizing Keywords and Creating Sub Topics For Each Page

It really helps to have 2 screens to work with. On my left screen I have my page with each page category, title tags and meta description. Then I copy each and paste it to the top of a word doc on my right screen. Since I have 15 categories, I’ll have 15 pages. For example I created a page about Concrete Polishing, another about Concrete Repair, one about Industrial Floors and so on.

I set up each page with my title tags and meta description at the top of each including my home page. My plan is to create 500 words or so on each page. To stay on task and make sure the content of the page follows the topic and educates the consumer, I broke each page down to 5 – sub categories. Sort of like a table of contents for the page.

Now instead of writing 500 words ,  I write 100 words on  sub topics, 5 times. This makes it easier for a consumer to read. It makes it easier for me to write quality content. And finally, it makes it easy for me to control the use of keywords.

Step 3 – Writing Content- Building Site Content Brick by Brick

By breaking down  content by categories, sub categories and sub, sub categories, I get an overall perspective of the sites content. We’re not writing brochure content. We’re writing content to appeal to the search engines so that we get found for lots of keywords. Then we’re writing to appeal to the consumer to convert to a sale. Breaking down categories this way enables us to create valuable educational content with easy navigation for both the consumer and the search engines.

When I write website or blog content I try to write like I’m explaining something in person.  This process turns your website into a personal education. The result is a high number of consumer page views and lots of time spent on the site. This creates a relationship of trust with your potential customer. It converts to sales and puts your competition at a disadvantage.

Don’t just think, “why bother, I can just create a directory listing or purchase a pay per click ad”. If you don’t give your customer what they are looking for, they will leave your site faster than a blink. Your customers are searching for information, not just phone numbers. If they did we’d still be using the Yellow Pages.

Creating Links

Tomorrow, I’m going to be discussing links, how they work and the importance of them. I’m also going to try and complete 9 pages of content today. I’ll let you know how far I get.

Call Me – Interested in a website that produces sales? Call me at 1-203-762-1366.

Looking For Step 1? Click Here

Step 5 Click here

Step 3 – Writing Web Content That Converts to Sales

If you’re just joining us, this is step 3 in our process of building a locally optimized website for Hudson Concrete. Hudson is targeting large commercial concrete floor polishing and resurfacing with high performance coatings. They are based in New York City and are targeting the Phily, NYC and Boston corridor. The same strategy applies to all local business whether in a few towns or nationwide. Here’s the link to Step 1 if you want to start at the beginning.

Organizing Keyword Phrases

I took all my keyword phrases and laid them out in my excel spread sheet. All the phrases were organized by relevance. For example, we’re going to have a category about food related concrete floors. Consumers don’t just search for concrete floors, they search for terms that relate to their use. Keep in mind that your customer is not thinking about you. They are thinking about themselves and what they want. So, we’re going to give them want they want.

From our keyword research we know that customers search for terms in the food category like:

• commercial kitchen floor
• food floor
• restaurant floor, floors or flooring
• grocery floor
• supermarket floor
• market floor

Vehicle Floors

• car floor
• truck floor
• bus floor
• boat floor
• marine floor

Each page will have a category for the type of floor. I’ll optimize each phrase while providing educational information for each category. I have organized 11 page categories by floor type. Every business that wants to capitalize on the business the web delivers needs to look at their business this way.

There are thousands of terms that relate to floors. If you are in the mortgage business there are thousands of terms that relate to mortgages. Each business has niche terms your customer searches.  This is why keyword research is critical to your marketing and branding, whether online or off line.

Organizing Categories and Sub Categories- Serving Two Masters

Within each category, I create sub categories before starting to write my page content. This helps for a few reasons.

1. Defines What consumers want
2. Organizes keywords for optimization. Use of words follows a simple math equation.
3. Sub categories creates focus with lots of short thoughts.

This simple process helps me see a skeleton of site. Once the frame is assembled I can dress it up to serve our 2 masters.

1. Client – site visitor
2. Search Engines

Title Tags

Anyone can make a website. But creating a site that ranks high and converts to a sale is another story.  When I was laying out my keywords I had to think about optimizing each page. That starts with the title tags. Title tags are the first thing the search engines see when they crawl through a page. This gives them an idea of what the page is about. Title tags should not exceed 60 characters. Characters are letters, numbers, commas and spaces. Exceeding 60 characters is like stuffing a page with content. Google and other engines know that quality content is a reflection of focus. By limiting the amount of characters on a page we are forced to create content on a single point or limited amount of points. Google, Yahoo and Bing are in the business of delivering quality content. Do it right and you are rewarded with prime, business producing placement.

Meta Description

The second thing the search engines see is a description of what the page content is about. We use our keyword phrases in the description. Google and others are looking for relevance throughout the page. The Meta Description is an expanded version of the Title tags.

Page Content

I try and write about 500 words per page. The content is an expanded version of the title tags and meta description. It’s critical to carefully use, not overuse, the keywords. Ideally I want them used in the beginning, middle and end of my page content.

Sub Categories

Consumers want information quick. And remember, they have certain wants. Sub categories enable a consumer to get what they want from a page, avoiding what they don’t want. Short, to the point paragraphs are easier to write and easier to control use of keywords.

Profit Producing Websites

Keep in mind that customers are not searching for fancy websites. They are searching for information. Search engines search for websites that provide quality information. Our goal is to give each master what they want. That’s what gets rewarded with prime placement and high conversion to a sale.

Step 4 – Local Optimization

Tomorrow I’ll discuss how I write content with each page in mind and how they relate. I want to be able to create links that consumers and search engines can follow to learn more. I want to make it easy for the search engines and consumers to learn about each website quickly and easily. This improves optimization and increases conversion to sales.I’ll also talk about creating content that optimizes in local markets.

See you tomorrow. Step 4 – Click Here

Looking For Step 1? Click Here

Questions? Contact Us

Organizing Keywords

After I gathered all my keywords yesterday I put them in an excel spread sheet. Each general term has it’s own page with list of long tail phrases. In total I put together a list of about 3,500 terms. I’ll use these during the next year when updating the blog. For now I’m just going to use 30 phrases along with the appropriate cities and states.

For example “NYC Concrete Polishing”,  “Brooklyn Restaurant floor” or “New Jersey grocery floor”.

Content Writing

Today I’ll start writing the content for the site. Each page will have two – three keyword phrases along with the cities and states we will optimize.  Concrete Polishing is a large ticket business. By that I mean most floors are large. They typically range from 5,000 – 100,000 square feet.  That means gross pricing in the $25,000 – $500,000 range.  Capturing this market requires a broad geographic area. Though the Boston area is wide open online, I’m wondering if we want to target that area along with the NYC metro area. It might be too far.

When building a niche business online you get what you go after. Targeting more than you can handle can impede on your productivity. I’m thinking that we should target NYC, Brooklyn, New Jersey, Connecticut and Long Island. That’s a big market. If we target the Boston area as well, every time they are up in Boston, it leaves the core market open to competitors.

Business Plan Optimization

If Hudson Concrete was going to specialize in Restaurant floors we would have a different strategy. For example we might just go after NYC and various neighborhoods within NYC. Restaurant floors are usually about 2,000 – 3,000 square feet. That means floors projects of $15,000 – $30,000. A smaller, local market will be more productive than a large area.

If Hudson was targeting the garage floor market, we would target an even smaller area. Maybe just a single county in New Jersey, Connecticut or Long Island, perhaps smaller. Dominating the garage floor market may require an area of only 3-10 towns or part of a county.

It’s important to align your business with the internet the right way. The internet produces massive amounts of business. Going after too much can be as unproductive as too little business. Dominating your niche online requires focus and faith that the plan will work. If the plan isn’t working, make adjustments.

As we create the Hudson site we will discuss the business plan as it applies to internet marketing. Stay tuned and we’ll see you tomorrow after I’ve created some content. I’ll be discussing how I create educational content that converts to sales.

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Hudson Concrete Floor – Niche, Concrete Polishing and Overlays