Preparing Your Child For Exams
It started a few months ago when Ryan Spaulding, producer of the site Smashing Life noticed some odd things happening to his previous blog postings. Then he noticed that this very strange thing started happening to his recent postings as well. What do all these post have in common? They started disappearing from his site, one right after another. One moment they were there and the next "poof" they were gone.
Ryan checked with other bloggers in his niche and found that most of them had the same problem. Who was the mysterious force behind the disappearing web content? The answer to that question would be Google. Now before you call Google a bunch of foul names that mostly contain four letters and vow to stop using all their products, let me tell you what was behind these actions and why Ryan's experience is an important lesson for your new internet business.
These sites had something in common, they are all in the music niche. But why is Google deleting post on these certain Blogger ran sites? According to a site called Techdirt, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) sends Google lists of URLs they believe to contain infringing materials, and Google then responds. So it appears that music's big brother scrolls the internet and reports violators to whomever is hosting the site in question, in this case that would be Google. Now let me put out a disclaimer here. I have no opinion either way on the subject of if this was okay for the RIAA to do, or Google, or if Ryan and his fellow bloggers are in the right. That is not the point of this article. This article is only from the view of a business and nothing more or nothing less.
As you begin your internet based business from home, one of your first task is to decide what your niche is going to be. In what area will your website or blog be focused on. Some people choose to either focus on whatever niche is making the big bucks at the time and some people choose to start their internet new business based on what they are passionate about. Either way you must do the research on your niche and stay involved in it. I have said it before, but it bears repeating, know your niche! Know the area of your niche that make the most money and know the areas of your niche that can stop you from making that money and always keep a close eye on both. In the above case some of these sites have been flat out closed or at the very least some of their music and content has been removed. What would you do if you woke up tomorrow and your site was gone? Your content gone. Your traffic gone. Your followers and advertisers all gone. This is what happened to some of them and can easily happen in a questionable niche.