The Keys to Building a Successful Site

Have you been procrastinating from getting your online business started because you can’t figure out what kind of site to start? It can be helpful to take a look at some relatively simple sites that work because of a relevant idea coupled with great execution. Really all it is about is creating something that can help people solve a specific problem in their lives (in the examples below, the problems would be: what to make for dinner, how to keep your house clean, and how to spend wisely) and doing it in a way that will make them want to come back day after day for your particular encouragement and advice. Here are three of our favorites:

SmittenKitchen.com: SmittenKitchen is a cooking blog, and the three-legged stool of its success is the compelling voice of its author, Deb Perelman, the consistently high quality of its recipes, and the beautiful photographs that go along with the dishes. Notice the difference between a huge recipe site like Epicurious.com or Allrecipes.com: People keep coming back because it has three important things that those sites don’t (can’t really, based on the way they’re set up) offer. And it solves a problem that a human being needs to solves around three times a day: what am I going to eat?

FlyLady.net: Raise your hand if you have trouble keeping your house / apartment / room / area clean. Now try to count on your fingers how many times you’ve sworn you would change and turn over a new leaf and keep things picked up. FlyLady.net is a successful site built around the idea that in order to change the orderliness of your house, you need to change little things that you do on a daily basis, and you need to get and stay motivated by taking daily baby steps and not being too hard on yourself. The method is genius, the community is encouraging, and in short the whole thing (including FlyLady’s business plan) works.

DaveRamsey.com: Here is another problem that is nearly universal at some point or another: how to manage your money and get out of debt and stay there. This is another problem that can be solved by setting up some systems and guidelines for your life that the site outlines. (Notably also with baby steps.) And no doubt the site is successful because of the success of Dave Ramsey himself, a compelling figure who got out of debt himself and has built an empire helping others do the same.

So there you have it, some food for thought on what kind of site to create and some ideas for how to go about it. Make sure your site will fill a need, do it in a compelling way, and more importantly, that it works!