Great recap Casey. If I could create a site over the next 18 -24 months and sell it for even half of what I loosely estimate your exit was I'd be so where I want to be. Congrats!
Casy congratulations! I've been following your journey closely. And I am also using Koala :) 2 questions. Were you hit by HCU last september or the core update a week ago? and 2. When you say tech sub niche, you mean hardware? like I don't know, wearables/printers/whatever? or is it software? Thanks again!
Thanks! And to answer your questions (1) No, none of my nearly 40 sites were hit by the September HCU (one or two had a slight downturn within 4-6 weeks, but I'd attribute that to seasonality/niche. I don't have access to this case study site's analytics anymore, so I'm not sure, but this update has had much more visible impact on traffic. While most are trending back up, I'd say about half saw some level of quick traffic drop during March core update. None received a manual penalty or anything, just lots of bouncing around SERPs. (2) Yes, wearables would be an example of the type of subniche (although even then I'd be more narrow).
@@CaseyBotticello Oh ok! Because after watching the whole video I thought your sub niche was software! I ask because I will start a blog, also in the tech niche, and I wanted to know if yours was hardware or software related. So no software! Got it. Thanks again man. All the best to you
Thanks! Not in the same exact niche (per terms of non compete agreement), but a few other ones that I’ve found over the last year or so. A few are also more broadly “technology sub niches” but some of the most promising have been some random ones that I’ve been immersing myself in. I’ve got many at various stages but may pause for March to see how everything shakes out with GCU.
Not that I’m aware of (I no longer have access to gsc for site). It definitely avoided a manual penalty as it’s indexed and it appears to still be ranking for major keywords (Ahrefs actually shows traffic going up, if that’s any indicator).
A bit of both. Mostly link building initially, but I was beginning to I g to develop a more robust email list to help diversify the site’s traffic and solicit people to opt into first party data tracking.
@@TheLukeH Yes, it did (although third party deprecation was postponed recently to at least 2025, at the time of sale, it was scheduled for end of 2024). So the buyer was (rightly) worried about the RPMs dropping once this happened. Having thousands of emails, and more specifically, users who have created authenticated first party data with Grow) was definitely a selling point. Although I don't think they used them for eCommerce, this would have been the other big opportunity.
Correct, I don't purchase links for my sites (this site was narrow in focus and attracted links slowly, but steadily). And yes, it ranked well without high DR.
Congrats on your sale! Curious to know whether using mostly AI for the content of a website was a turn-off for buyers and if it affects the sale of your website at all?
They cared about how much money it produced/how it had survived/thrived algorithm updates. I think they obviously liked the content as we discussed working together in the future!
Hello Casey, I have a question about the first 750 blog posts you published. Are they all evergreen content? Or a combination of evergreen and seasonal? Thank you.
The 750 were all pretty much intended to be evergreen, but among the posts I added after those, I did include a few seasonal posts, but even these were fairly evergreen (i.e. valentines day post that is applicable every year fairly consistently, but the traffic to that post only increases around the holiday, once per year).
Congratulations, Casey. 🏆👍 Enjoy your well-deserved money. 🤑🥳 Would you please share how you found the niche of this site? Was there a loophole that you felt and observed in SERPs, or did you see this keyword while surfing the keyword tools?
Thanks! And as to how I found the niche, it was a semi passion of mine so I’d occasionally Google related questions to this topic and it quickly became clear that there was a massive gap in the space. That’s why these special niches are hard to find-if they are detectable with a kw tool, a kw research expert can find them. But if they are related to a niche where you have an informational advantage in, you might be able to strike gold as it takes everyone else a while to even try to catchup with you.
Sir i have question. For your portfolio of 40websites, what kind of hosting services that you use? And what is the server spec to be able to handle that 40 websites. Thanks
congrats Casey! since with the recent update, what would you do if any of your site is hit? (note: I don't wish that to happen) Would be great to hear your expert opinion. Example, do you know if Google sets a marker on the site and anything you do to the site won't help recover? If that's so, is it better to start a fresh domain, port over the content and start new, or just wait out, do something to the existing site. Like how would you know what to do?
In my experience, when it comes to algorithm updates over the past year or so (including the March Core Update so far...), once your site is perceived as "unhelpful" by Google, it's very hard for a site to recover to it's previous ranking state. There still haven't been any good examples shown publicly of sites that recovered from the September HCU. I'm not saying it's impossible, but it takes an immense amount of work, and most site owners wouldn't know where to begin. This is part of why I operate a portfolio of sites. Sure, you can grow one site faster by focusing on just that site, but if that site get hits, you are basically done. You can try moving some of the content to a new domain. This does work if the content is high enough quality. You can always just wait. Google may be over-correcting in these recent updates and might roll back some of their actions (not super likely, but another possibility to consider).
thanks @@CaseyBotticello :) If you have a site that has been hit, and not recovered, would you put your time more in other channels to drive traffic to your same site?
From your opinion having multiple sites do you think social media matters? I heard having profiles on social media helps google see you’re a real person but does it really matter if you have a good niche and quality content?
This is a really good question (and something I’ve tried to figure out for years). The short answer is no, you do not necessarily need social media profiles to back up your blog presence. These signals do seem to help (especially in more competitive niches). But if you stick to a hyper specific niche that is relatively underserved, you can still not attach your name to your site and rank quite well.
Thanks! And likewise! Yeah I’ve seen the carnage…it’s brutal! None of my sites have been hit with a manual penalty (yet 🤞) but this will be a long month at this rate waiting for updates. Most of my sites haven’t seen huge swings in terms of traffic-so I’m guessing the actual algorithmic update is coming soon.
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
Great recap Casey. If I could create a site over the next 18 -24 months and sell it for even half of what I loosely estimate your exit was I'd be so where I want to be. Congrats!
You can do it!
Have watched both videos very motivating... congrats!
Casy congratulations! I've been following your journey closely. And I am also using Koala :) 2 questions. Were you hit by HCU last september or the core update a week ago? and 2. When you say tech sub niche, you mean hardware? like I don't know, wearables/printers/whatever? or is it software? Thanks again!
Thanks! And to answer your questions (1) No, none of my nearly 40 sites were hit by the September HCU (one or two had a slight downturn within 4-6 weeks, but I'd attribute that to seasonality/niche. I don't have access to this case study site's analytics anymore, so I'm not sure, but this update has had much more visible impact on traffic. While most are trending back up, I'd say about half saw some level of quick traffic drop during March core update. None received a manual penalty or anything, just lots of bouncing around SERPs. (2) Yes, wearables would be an example of the type of subniche (although even then I'd be more narrow).
@@CaseyBotticello Oh ok! Because after watching the whole video I thought your sub niche was software! I ask because I will start a blog, also in the tech niche, and I wanted to know if yours was hardware or software related. So no software! Got it. Thanks again man. All the best to you
What a ride. Well done!
Yes it was!
Dude! Congrats!! It's been fun watching this experiment. Will you be starting over in the same niche with another new site?
Thanks! Not in the same exact niche (per terms of non compete agreement), but a few other ones that I’ve found over the last year or so. A few are also more broadly “technology sub niches” but some of the most promising have been some random ones that I’ve been immersing myself in. I’ve got many at various stages but may pause for March to see how everything shakes out with GCU.
Congrats Casey! Was the site affected by the March Update?
Not that I’m aware of (I no longer have access to gsc for site). It definitely avoided a manual penalty as it’s indexed and it appears to still be ranking for major keywords (Ahrefs actually shows traffic going up, if that’s any indicator).
You mentioned using some lead magnets. Were these for organic backlinks or email list building?
A bit of both. Mostly link building initially, but I was beginning to I g to develop a more robust email list to help diversify the site’s traffic and solicit people to opt into first party data tracking.
@@CaseyBotticello Thanks for the response! No specifics, but did email list factor into site valuation?
@@TheLukeH Yes, it did (although third party deprecation was postponed recently to at least 2025, at the time of sale, it was scheduled for end of 2024). So the buyer was (rightly) worried about the RPMs dropping once this happened. Having thousands of emails, and more specifically, users who have created authenticated first party data with Grow) was definitely a selling point. Although I don't think they used them for eCommerce, this would have been the other big opportunity.
You mentioned the total cost of the site, and there was no backlinks purchased at all? Site ranked well with low DR authority ?
Correct, I don't purchase links for my sites (this site was narrow in focus and attracted links slowly, but steadily). And yes, it ranked well without high DR.
Congrats on your sale! Curious to know whether using mostly AI for the content of a website was a turn-off for buyers and if it affects the sale of your website at all?
They cared about how much money it produced/how it had survived/thrived algorithm updates. I think they obviously liked the content as we discussed working together in the future!
Hello Casey, I have a question about the first 750 blog posts you published. Are they all evergreen content? Or a combination of evergreen and seasonal? Thank you.
The 750 were all pretty much intended to be evergreen, but among the posts I added after those, I did include a few seasonal posts, but even these were fairly evergreen (i.e. valentines day post that is applicable every year fairly consistently, but the traffic to that post only increases around the holiday, once per year).
Congratulations, Casey. 🏆👍 Enjoy your well-deserved money. 🤑🥳 Would you please share how you found the niche of this site? Was there a loophole that you felt and observed in SERPs, or did you see this keyword while surfing the keyword tools?
Thanks! And as to how I found the niche, it was a semi passion of mine so I’d occasionally Google related questions to this topic and it quickly became clear that there was a massive gap in the space. That’s why these special niches are hard to find-if they are detectable with a kw tool, a kw research expert can find them. But if they are related to a niche where you have an informational advantage in, you might be able to strike gold as it takes everyone else a while to even try to catchup with you.
Thank you very much for all of your generous know-how sharing.. Best wishes.. 👋 @@CaseyBotticello
What niche are the website? I am curious to know the Website 2 niche
Technology sub niche
Sir i have question. For your portfolio of 40websites, what kind of hosting services that you use? And what is the server spec to be able to handle that 40 websites. Thanks
For almost all my sites that contain some basic level of content, I use Kinsta:
bloggingguide.com/kinsta-review/
I use a custom plan
congrats Casey! since with the recent update, what would you do if any of your site is hit? (note: I don't wish that to happen) Would be great to hear your expert opinion. Example, do you know if Google sets a marker on the site and anything you do to the site won't help recover? If that's so, is it better to start a fresh domain, port over the content and start new, or just wait out, do something to the existing site. Like how would you know what to do?
In my experience, when it comes to algorithm updates over the past year or so (including the March Core Update so far...), once your site is perceived as "unhelpful" by Google, it's very hard for a site to recover to it's previous ranking state. There still haven't been any good examples shown publicly of sites that recovered from the September HCU. I'm not saying it's impossible, but it takes an immense amount of work, and most site owners wouldn't know where to begin. This is part of why I operate a portfolio of sites. Sure, you can grow one site faster by focusing on just that site, but if that site get hits, you are basically done. You can try moving some of the content to a new domain. This does work if the content is high enough quality. You can always just wait. Google may be over-correcting in these recent updates and might roll back some of their actions (not super likely, but another possibility to consider).
thanks @@CaseyBotticello :) If you have a site that has been hit, and not recovered, would you put your time more in other channels to drive traffic to your same site?
@@marilyn-woNo, I'd probably pause any work on the impacted site.
What’s the average post length on a site like this?
Average is ~1100 words. Some longer, shorter posts are very image heavy.
Thank you!@@CaseyBotticello
From your opinion having multiple sites do you think social media matters? I heard having profiles on social media helps google see you’re a real person but does it really matter if you have a good niche and quality content?
This is a really good question (and something I’ve tried to figure out for years). The short answer is no, you do not necessarily need social media profiles to back up your blog presence. These signals do seem to help (especially in more competitive niches). But if you stick to a hyper specific niche that is relatively underserved, you can still not attach your name to your site and rank quite well.
Casey i hope your site is safe from manual penalty they are demolishing everything
Thanks! And likewise! Yeah I’ve seen the carnage…it’s brutal! None of my sites have been hit with a manual penalty (yet 🤞) but this will be a long month at this rate waiting for updates. Most of my sites haven’t seen huge swings in terms of traffic-so I’m guessing the actual algorithmic update is coming soon.
(slow clap)
🪄✨