One big site or several little ones?

GamblingJoe

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This has probably been asked before, but what the heck. One big site, or several little ones?

What are the reasons for and against?
 

byebyebaby

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Against, a whole lot of little sites take up a lot more work than 1 big one, I think at least?
Against, big websites, lot of pages, content, updated regularly, will get better ranking and more traffic. Little websites get ranked lower (I tink).
For, You can be really specific and use real small niches for smaller websites. Which will get the players that you want and have less competition.

I am no expert, but that is what I think. And haven't seen that question before.... ;-0
 

roey

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Go for 1 main site that the majority of time is used for, but also put out afew smaller sites when or if you have time. You are quite new to this it seems so don't over reach. While having multiple sites sounds like a good idea, if you cant keep up with them you will inevitably and unintentionally kill them all and your passion for the game.
 

slotplayer

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Maintenance and other considerations aside, imo the bigger the site the better. Its always all about the numbers.

Consider a small site that generates 20K visitors a month and the max revenue it may generate vs. a bigger site that gets 200K visitors a month and the max revenue it may generate. Suddenly Google does one of is crazy updates and both sites lose 80% of their traffic.

The small site now gets 4K visitors a month and the big site gets 40k visitors. Will the reduction in revenue going from 20K to 4K vs. 200K to 40K cover your living expenses?
 

Online18Casino

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I have several medium size sites... It has worked well for me, but it has its pros and cons.

Cons: A LOT more work, and I can't help but wonder if I had spent all my time on just one authority site if it would have been a monster. You can never truly have a "top name/premium" site if you stretch your resources/time to thin.

Pros: If one site takes a major hit in the serps, your other sites may be able to save you.. I think all of us who have been around for a while, have seen good income followed by a change in the serps and a drop in that income. Having multiple sites can soften that blow if one goes down but another is left standing.

My advice would be, maybe make two sites, on completely different subjects and content.. Work on them both if you have an abundance of time, and see where you end up.. (one will most likely out preform more then the other, but if the dominate one ever falls... You have another one to keep working on).

That would be my advice to myself if I had to start over. But not more then two sites to start... I like building sites and kinda over did it lol.
 

LandofOz

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A few big sites and several small niche sites would be the way to go. But that depends on how much time you have and how hard you are willing to work. Marketing them and keeping them updated are the real challenges.
 
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slotplayer

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Pros: If one site takes a major hit in the serps, your other sites may be able to save you.. I think all of us who have been around for a while, have seen good income followed by a change in the serps and a drop in that income. Having multiple sites can soften that blow if one goes down but another is left standing.

It may depend on how the SEO is done, many times webmasters SEO their sites using the same learned techniques and if Google doesn't like it anymore, it could end up harming them all.
 

AussieDave

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A few big sites and several small niche sites would be the way to go. But that depends on how much time you have and how hard you are willing to work. Marketing them and keeping them updated are the real challenges.

It may depend on how the SEO is done, many times webmasters SEO their sites using the same learned techniques and if Google doesn't like it anymore, it could end up harming them all.

And that's the million dollar question. What may work now might not work in 6 months time!

As I've stated many times before, the online gaming verticle is a strange beast when compared to other industries.

EG - I have a mainstream site, which is going through a complete overhaul. Currently the home page, is a holder page with a paragraph about who we are, where we are and what we do. That single page, has stayed in spot #5 (out of 10mil+ results) for the past 6 months with a few highly competitive keywords and phrases. It hasn't budged. Could I do the same thing for one of my affiliate sites, hell no! That tells me right there, the dynamics which influence this page's rankings by Google are totally different to what my affiliate sites are being ranked by.

These days I think one really does needs to weight up the pros and cons. Either way it's a lot of work.
 

GamblingJoe

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My thinking was more towards one site and let it grow. It's certainly easier with updates etc. and the general consensus here seems at least one large one. Thanks for all of your replies :)
 

NDG

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It really depends on how much time that you actually have to maintain the sites. Spreading yourself too thin, and you will
end up with a bunch of sites that aren't able to achieve anything because you weren't able to commit enough time to them.
 

Guard Dog

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It really depends on how much time that you actually have to maintain the sites. Spreading yourself too thin, and you will
end up with a bunch of sites that aren't able to achieve anything
because you weren't able to commit enough time to them.

Hey - I'm really tired of you guys talking about me :) lol.

I did exactly this.... I created about 20 sites. Devoted time in 'streaks' to each one. The only upside for me was figuring out which one converted best for it's originally designed keywords. I could have done that for a mega site, though. Gotta remember, though, during my time domain names were important (very) and I ranked well right off the bat based upon them. So - there was a difference in that respect.

Today - I would concentrate on a single domain, but I would also focus on a single topic. Gaming, in general, is tough to rank for everything. Doing poker, sports, bingo, craps, roulette, slots, horse racing, binaries, blah, blah, blah just waters down your site. Concentrate on the ones you have an affinity for and some drive to talk about. It will make your life easier.
 

baldidiot

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There are pros and cons to both methods - putting all your eggs in one basket increases your risk, but then again if you're doing the same thing on all your sites you'll have the same problem anyway (which is why you should take different approaches if you have more than one site).

Google seems to be favouring larger sites more and more these days, so at the moment I'd lean towards doing one big site if that's all the time you had. But things change quickly and who knows - in 6 months the serps could be dominated by mini sites again...

On the other hand, smaller niche sites can do very well, both from a ranking and conversion perspective, you just need to put a decent amount of effort in (eg: update it regularly, have detailed information about the niche not found anywhere else and so on... not just throw up a 10 page mini site).
 

i-man

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For a new affiliate it is best you work on 1 site and when the revenue start coming in you can build more sites or buy sites that are already earning revenue.
 

AussieDave

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The operative word here is "time". Trying to maintain a decent site is hard work. Multiply that by even 3 or 5 sites, these days, unless you have help... if your doing all the coding, content, the whole 9 yards yourself, eventually you burn out. And take it from me, when that happens, all your hard work slides down the tube eventually. If it wasn't for years of player signups, carrying me... well you get the picture. If I had my time again, I'd work one site and turn that into a mega site. I'm sure sites like casinocity.com etc etc were not hit badly with the Google alogs because of their sheer size.
 

KasinoKing

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Totally agree with all the above posts in this thread - TIME is your biggest enemy: Better to commit all your time to making one very good site than spread it making several poor ones.
I had a lot more available time when I started my sites (pre-kids! :rolleyes:) and ended up making too many (about 6). I soon found it a real struggle to keep them all up-to-date and very hard to motivate myself to work on the less popular ones.

KK
 

Online18Casino

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Totally agree with all the above posts in this thread - TIME is your biggest enemy: Better to commit all your time to making one very good site than spread it making several poor ones.
I had a lot more available time when I started my sites (pre-kids! :rolleyes:) and ended up making too many (about 6). I soon found it a real struggle to keep them all up-to-date and very hard to motivate myself to work on the less popular ones.

KK
I couldn't have said it better... I didn't even think about how much my life has changed since I first started. I started with 1 kid and ended up with four lol now time is much harder to come by! When I do have some free time its all about choices now, do I work, sleep or exercise? I try to do a balance of all three, but its not like it used to be.
 

musty

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The biggest pro for 1 big site (from the SEO point of view) is the fact that you will concentrate all the efforts in to one site and it will grow quicker and bigger. When you have a big site, you have authority. And when you have authority, you are less exposed to Google updates. And also, when you have authority, most of the long tail keywords will start ranking without any link building done for them.
 

lalalaenhund

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I would not just have all my eggs in one basket in this industry if SEO is your #1 traffic source - it's not just an update that can sink you, but a competitor too. However, if you don't care about SEO, then definitely go for a big site and make it as good as possible.
 
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