Questions + Need advice and criticism on my newest EPN site

Scattered

Scattered

Pickle you Kumquat
Aug 24, 2009
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I've worked with a few people on building out their phpbay sites. I got semi familiar with how phpbay worked and decided to get my own license and get some sites created for myself.

I started thinking about niches that sell a high percentage of all listings, and gift cards instantly popped into my head. I built out this site over the last couple of weeks, just a few hours a day.

What I know I need to do:
*Edit my FavIcon, Title, Description, Etc
*Disclose somewhere that listings are from ebay and that clicking a listing will take you to ebay.
*Create a database of articles related to gift cards, gift ideas, how to save with buying gift cards on ebay, etc
*Develop a solid marketing strategy for this holiday season.
Some ideas I have so far are:
- Facebook group/page
- Press releases
- Paid blog posts on shopping and "save money" blogshttp://giftcarding.net
--- I posted this same exact thing on the PHPbay forums and I have not got a lot of responses.

I'd like to know not only what you think of the site, but ways to improve it.
I included my marketing strategy to be **built upon** so if any of you have any more ideas, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Further, I have a question about article marketing:
Should I put articles on Ezine (and related sites) and link to **article or main pages** of my site??

And:
Would you suggest setting up something like AWebber for a page like, "Special Offer, Get gift cards starting as low as $1!"

Then have users subscribe and get access?

How would I set the page with cards starting at $1 to only be viewable by users subscribing through Aweber?

Any other comments and suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

The site: Gift Cards

:thumbsup:
 


With EPN, there are 2 ways to win

1 - blast thousands of pages with hundreds of listing each and hope google doesn't ban you

2 - Keyword target and optimize certain pages (ie.. your home page)
 
The site looks good but you have to get rid of listings like these
0a32f883-8b38-4d09-9246-11c4b632a1e6_m.jpg
 
Your idea has potential, but your page titles suck. If you've got the money, I might suggest you do some domain purchasing to really corner the market.
 
To answer a couple of your questions, here's the code that shows you where your favicon is located.

<link rel="shortcut icon" type="image/x-png" href="http://giftcarding.net/wp-content/themes/Journalist/favicon.png" />
Click to expand...
Find that image, open it in an image editor. Make the changes you want and upload it back to the same location. Keep the name the same. Bingo, you've got it changed. Or just create a 16x16 png image. Upload and replace the current favicon.png file. Either way your set.

For your title, description etc, install the All in one SEO plugin. Just do a search from your plugin dashboard, you'll find it. It will do a lot of the work for you. Everyone uses that plug in, find it.

Find a privacy policy generator on Google and just create a new one for your site. Copy and paste it to a new page and you're set. You can add in verbage about ebay products or whatever you want. I always say something like
"the products listed on this site are individual products listed by individual ebay sellers. This site takes no responsibility for the accuracy of the products listed and is not responsible for any issues including payment, shipping or returns that might result from the purchase of any of the listed items. The items listed on this site are for informational purposes only. Any questions or concerns about the products should be taken up with the original seller."
Click to expand...

Something like that is sufficient.
 
Scattered said:
Should I put articles on Ezine (and related sites) and link to **article or main pages** of my site??
Click to expand...

I don't think they will approve articles with links to pages with a bunch of ebay listings (or other affiliate ads). They want you to link to a "resource" or some nonsense like that.

Also, what I've found works very well is along with having all those text links to the different brands on the right, maybe have like 9-12 clickable logos for the more popular companies right there on the front page. It helps a ton with bounce rate, in my experience.
 
Thanks for the feedback.
As for the statement informing the visitors listings are from ebay, clicking one will take them to ebay, etc. I added it to the footer.

As for Ezine articles and that mess. I was planning on just having the article link to an article that is either the same, or that contains info about the submitted article. I'm not going to link straight to pages with listings on them.

Erect- Thanks for the advice, working on additional domains

David -I'm going to work on not displaying those types of listings. Thanks
 
turbolapp said:
Ways to improve it with google or with epn?
Click to expand...
Aesthetically, with google, or with epn.
I've been going back and forth between visually displaying and keeping the eBay stuff low key. Your message you sent me makes a lot of sense.

I updated the page titles for most of the popular locations, put in descriptions, home page title, and keywords on each page. Still have some to add this to, but it is about done.

I'm working finding logos for these popular locations and creating a table to put below the search bar on the main page.

Thanks for all the input so far
 
I was taking a look at some of the auctions that are showing on the site. Am I missing something, or are these idiots on ebay actually bidding $135 for a $100 gift card? Do they live so far out in bum fuck Egypt that they can't just roll on down the the Home Depot and pick up a $100 gift card for say, oh I don't know, A HUNDRED DOLLARS! Even if you have to pay $7 in tax on the gift card..who buys gift cards to lose money? What the shit is that all about?

http://cgi.ebay.com/100-amazon-gift...5QQcmdZViewItemQQssPageNameZRSS:B:SRCH:US:101
http://cgi.ebay.com/500-costco-cash...6QQcmdZViewItemQQssPageNameZRSS:B:SRCH:US:101 <- This has a buy it now for $550 WTF
http://cgi.ebay.com/100-american-ex...6QQcmdZViewItemQQssPageNameZRSS:B:SRCH:US:101
 
efeezy,
I noticed some of the auctions have cash-back options.
cbks.gif

I seen this posted on the phpbay forums
 
^^ I guess that would be the only reason to pay more than face value for these cards. Good idea for an EPN site, don't get me wrong, I'm just trying to figure out eBayers, that's all.
 
I went ahead and made a logo table for the 30 popular locations on the site. I have it on the main page, and I'm going to insert it on the "popular locations" page as well.

Question:
What do you think about still listing the popular locations in the side bar?

Question: If I remove the popular locations from the sidebar, I will have no text links pointing to these location's pages. How much will that effect on page seo? I know I can still incorporate interlinking within articles I still need to write.
 
I just edited the favicon.png file to reflect my site. Uploaded the image, cleared my cache (all history for that matter) and I can't get the thing to show up for me. I keep getting the default favicon that came with the theme.

Can anyone confirm which favicon is showing? Thanks
 
Looks like it worked. There's a blue and grey GC favicon showing on my browser.
 
I've tried clearing the cache, and everything else browser related. Nothing is getting rid of the default. Any ideas?

Thanks for the confirmation efeezy
 
Scattered said:
Question: If I remove the popular locations from the sidebar, I will have no text links pointing to these location's pages. How much will that effect on page seo? I know I can still incorporate interlinking within articles I still need to write.
Click to expand...

It's generally a good idea to give your visitors more than one way to get to the most important parts of your site. However, I don't think removing the popular location text links should hurt your on-page SEO since you have the proper alt text tags in the image links.

Scattered said:
I've tried clearing the cache, and everything else browser related. Nothing is getting rid of the default. Any ideas?
Click to expand...

Try restarting your browser or using a different one.
 
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