Note: This article was updated in February, 2013 and I’ve added a screenshot of the traffic from Jan-Feb, 2013. Traffic stats are below. Also see the updated article here.
I couldn’t wait to write this post because the results I’m about to show you probably go against many of your opinions about search engine optimization today.
If you’ve been following me closely, you already know I’m not a fan of aggressive backlink building.
I’ve always found it to be a tedious task that leads to short term results for the most part.
Having said that, I’m not against SEO and focusing on the right kind of backlink building.
For example, growing your brand and building relationships by writing guest posts on high quality, relevant blogs or any kind of natural link building that abides by Google’s guidelines is fine.
I just personally don’t believe in spending loads of time chasing backlinks.
As a result, a lot of people have criticized my stance on this, stating that I never had to focus on it much because some of my sites are mature and have an advantage.
While having an early start played a tremendous role in my success, I am still finding that today, quality content in the right niche still works for SEO.
I can’t write a post like this without mentioning how risky it is to rely completely on search engine optimization — especially today. So as you read through this, please understand that SEO should only be one part of your traffic plan.
My Little Experiment
In July, 2011 I created a new WordPress authority niche website as an experiment to see how far a website could get today by just writing content and doing absolutely no backlink building whatsoever.
To be honest, I didn’t expect the site to do well and I will reveal the traffic results below.
Some of you are not going to like this part, but I made the decision not to reveal the site to anyone (at least not yet) and my name or any other identifying details (Adsense ID, company name, etc.) are not associated with the website or domain records.
Although, I am using my picture because I just don’t like faceless websites. 😉
Why So Anonymous?
First of all, I don’t want any mentions/links on my sites to skew the results. Second, I am getting tired of seeing my content scraped, copied and plastered all over the place.
Of course this is not going to completely prevent that from happening, but it will cut down a lot of it.
Being transparent has its advantages and I have no regrets because it builds credibility and a loyal following. However, there are obvious disadvantages, and for this experiment I have chosen to keep it hush-hush. 😉
Pat Flynn recently wrote about this same issue on his blog where he decided not to reveal one of his newer websites after so many people tried to duplicate one of his experimental websites. I completely understand where he’s coming from. So I decided to take a leaf out of his book and keep this one quiet — especially while I experiment to keep the results from being skewed.
Traffic Reports
Even though I won’t reveal the site, I will at least share some statistics you may find interesting. Here is what the traffic looked like for the past month…
Here’s an update from February, 2013. Traffic is still increasing gradually. I’ve added roughly 20 pages since this post was originally published (6 months ago).
This is not a huge increase by any means, but it’s not bad considering how little time I spend on this site.
For the record, this screenshot was taken from the WordPress.com Stats plugin. That’s what I use to easily access my traffic stats right from the WordPress admin panel.
More Things to Note
– Even though I am not actively/manually building backlinks, the site is earning them naturally through other blogs who link to various articles. So I’m not saying you don’t need backlinks. I’m just saying you don’t have to chase them. Slow, natural and steady is what Google loves.
– The site has about 120 pages and posts combined, and I have no real publishing schedule/pattern. I spend about 2-3 hours on the site per month. Seriously.
– Most of the traffic is from Google, but it also receives quite a few visits from Facebook. Of course, I cannot see the actual referring page on Facebook in my reports (I hate that!), but it’s probably from people sharing the content on their walls. I do not have a Facebook business page for the site.
– I didn’t do much number crunching with keyword research. Most of the search engine traffic is from a variety of longtail phrases instead of competitive keywords.
– The site is not overly optimized. In other words, I don’t go overboard with keyword repetition and I made sure to vary my anchor text (text inside hyperlinks) when linking internally.
– Bing and Yahoo are also drawing more traffic than usual, which I found quite interesting. Perhaps it has to do with the niche and the audience demographic preferring Bing over Google? I have no way of knowing for sure.
– Once again, I’ve taken the tutorial route with my approach to this website. As you know, this has worked so well in the past, and I love teaching. So I continue to use that style as opposed to just posting generic information and re-reporting facts.
– I’ve chosen another niche where I can use my own personal life experience with the subject to educate and inform.
– So far the site has escaped all Panda and Penguin updates.
– I did manually submit to Google and Bing/Yahoo and also created sitemaps for each engine.
– I’m not using AdSense (it’s not a good niche for CPC ads at all) but I am selling sponsor ads and monetizing with affiliate programs.
Backlinks?
As I’ve already mentioned, I have just focused on writing content instead of searching for backlinks — which is what I normally do. But what is most surprising to me is the Google traffic I’ve received compared to the minimal number of backlinks I’ve earned.
Right now, there are only a handful of sites linking in according to Google Webmaster Tools, and a couple of sites that are just scraping my RSS feed and displaying my posts.
Why Does Google Love The Site?
Could the mild success and traffic gains be a result of the penalties other sites have incurred from unnatural linking, etc?
I’m not sure.
I haven’t spent too much time observing what my competitors are doing. The traffic growth has been very gradual but steady, and I didn’t see any major jumps in traffic with any algorithm updates.
My main goal was to see how a website would perform in Google today without doing any manual link building.
Google seems to be less concerned about the quantity of your backlinks and more interested in the quality, diversification and how natural your backlink patterns are.
After all, the Penguin update really decreased the SEO influence of many types of backlinks.
To Sum it Up…
Don’t get me wrong. The moral of they story here is not to just focus on SEO to build a business. I was just trying to make a point that you can still receive good traffic from Google without obsessing over backlinks and just focusing on quality content.
There’s nothing wrong with targeting the engines for traffic. I mean… you have to start somewhere, right? As I mentioned, you just need a plan to diversify beyond SEO if you want longevity.
As I continue to emphasize, my overall business is not SEO dependent thanks to my forum, multiple YouTube channels, residual income, social media (especially Facebook), my email list, offline consulting (occasionally) etc. I’ve diversified my income and traffic sources to give myself a great deal of stability.
I hope you are planning to do the same.
Also, finding the right niche and angle is key too. Yes, the Net is incredibly saturated with websites, but a lot of the content out here is poor quality and created with minimal effort.
I don’t exactly buy the “net-is-too-saturated” claim as a reason for failure. This experiment definitely proves that.
So the door is still wide open for high quality, useful websites. The angle you take is what will set you apart and get you going in the right direction.
Never underestimate the power of establishing your unique position in a well-defined niche!
Check out the update on this site’s traffic here.
Hi Lisa, it’s great you got much more traffic from google without backlinks and it’s all about your writing skill. and i like your some small tips which i mostly ignore in my sites.
Hi Lisa,
You know what, I have been reading your posts for quite some time already. I am already a fan here. I am just new to the blogosphere.
I dare to comment on this post because this is what I have been doing on my other website, not my self-named website. Its an assorted website though but yeah I am not fond of extreme backlinking after the google updates.
I have to admit I was earning good on google adsense on my niche websites but after google updates those websites gone to nowhere.
Thats actually the reason why I bought a new domain and started to blog on just any stuff I like. I am not building tons and tons of backlinks for it but I am glad I see some cents rolling into my google adsense account.
God Bless Lisa!
nothing works for me without backlinking
Great article, but depressing that your experiment gets 100x the traffic mine gets, after 2 years and 192 article. A pox on you Google.
Awesome work Lisa! Your experiment looks good! Well done and keep up the good work. Your writings are great.
Lisa, what an informative and interesting thread. It just goes to show that it is a good idea not to get too obsessed with Google SEO and focus on also diversifying marketing and business efforts outside of SEO.
I recently bought your WP Starter Book. I’m half way through it. Great Job! You have already helped me to understand better the need for balance between dynamic and static pages. A big thank you!
Hey Jude! Thanks so much for your support and glad my book was able to shed some light. 🙂
I have to agree with you in many respects. SEO and content should go together to maintain the efforts built up by the SEO. Overall, just having good content is both fulfilling and does the job to a great extent already. I’m an SEO guy by the way.
Thank you so much for writing this article! In my niche (wedding industry), getting backlinks from the top wedding websites can be very expensive. This year, I moved away from the temptation to sponsor advertorials, banner ads, and giveaways because of my recent budgetary constraints. I also gave up my SEO experts and surprisingly, I’m still getting decent views. But what I need to do now is to create more share worthy content especially now that Facebook has the promote button.
Hi Lisa, I have come across your website before, I’m sure you’ve done an article on SBI. Any way, lately I’ve been all wound up and agitated about only have one back link. I have searched the net recently for easy ways to build links but there are so many sharks that just want your money. You have inspired me to carry on creating quality content and forget trying to hard about those back links. Love ya work gal.
Hi Liza, No wonder why you have many readers and followers, you did have good articles around here that readers can learn more about.
Those who hates link building will gonna love this experiment. I mean, to read the whole post to just post one comment on it.
after reading your text, to me only explains one thing, google is getting smarter. I mean people that have a blog or a website that really work on it… will have their credits, then there’s the ones that are more interested in thousands of backlinks that gets a bit UN-natural is just the way i think i guess… plus i think google especially google kind of makes a “profile” on the blogger itself…the ones that are successful will always be successful …and the ones that drop domains, that end up quitting aren’t… sometimes it makes me thing this way… what do you think?
Hi Lisa! How long does it takes to reach your 100K Monthly page views? Thanks.
Hey! I’m just curious about something you’ve said in this post: how come you don’t have a Facebook Fan Page for this site? Everyone goes crazy about the social community, how come you don’t?
The whole point of the experiment was to see if I could still build traffic the old fashioned way. I may, of course, do social media later. I just wanted to focus on content for the sake of the experiment and all the naysayers who say you MUST use social media and build backlinks manually.
Hey, Lisa! Now that you’ve explained to me, I find your experiment great! Few people put accent on the content anymore, which is sad. Most of bloggers check Google Trends, they write something fast and then start promoting the article on social media.
That will never be me. I would rather talk about something that I’m more interested in where I can show my experience than to only write about something just because it’s trending. It’s always easier for me to write about things that I have more experience with.
But by writing original content is already a good method of SEO. I am still on learning Mode Lisa.Trying to improve my website without hurting it in any way. Awesome post by the way.
oh and you are not talking about your Natural hair journey site are you?
No, that site is not anonymous and I’ve mentioned it here. Although that site is doing well too with no backlink building.
This is an interesting experiment Lisa.
It’s also important that you created articles without repeating keywords for SEO purposes.
Going after long tail keywords or getting found by long tail keywords is definitely one of the best ways to get organic traffic.
I do have a question though, how many posts do you do each week/month? Thanks!
Yes, very true. I did not do any keyword stuffing over over the same phrase. As I said in the article, it has 100 posts/pages so if you divide that by 13 months that’s about 7 new pieces of content per month.
you wrote posts/pages… so that doesn’t mean you have 100 pages?
A combination of both. I don’t know the split between the two. I was using the word pages as posts and pages.
That is quite refreshing and inspiring results, thanks for sharing.
I’ve noticed that google seems to grab my posts and rank them high within minutes of posting them up. I have very few if any backlinks and have been boggled by these results. My blog/business is in a highly competative industry. My past blogs, years ago, i recall spending weeks gaining backlinks and very little to show for it and now, with very little seo effort/thought im ranking rather well with many longtails. Again thanks for sharing your results. Very inspiring.
Hey Lisa.
This is so amazing and awe inspiring.
I am totally loving this post. I don’t even know what words to describe how this article makes me feel.
Hey Lisa,
It’s my first time here (I actually landed here through your post about Affiliate Disclaimers). This is a great experiment. I really hate backlinking and have spent years writing for revenue sharing sites while refusing to backlink my articles. After the last few updates, my revenue sharing traffic has gone down and I am moving on to making my own sites.
This is very encouraging for blogging and niche site building without all the crappy linking so many think is a must.
I did have one question…how does one come across a topic that has blog posts, but no full sites? That sounds like a great way to take advantage of a hole waiting to be filled, but doesn’t seem like an easy thing to find. 😛
Thanks again!
Hi Danielle,
It wasn’t that I was actively searching for a site with few full sites. It just happened to be the case with the topic I was interested in writing about. When I was analyzing why this particular site was performing so well that was one of the reasons I came up with. So it wasn’t that I actively searched for such a topic. That part was all luck because I was going to do the site regardless.
So instead of starting with research, I started with my own interests. The topic just happened to be less saturated.
Just like I’m not into backlink building, I’m also not into doing much research before doing a site. Not saying that’s a good thing, just being very honest. If I like the topic and have something to share/teach I’m going to go for it. I just try to use the techniques I’ve learned with this site (user engagement, knowing my visitor’s key issues, etc.) and hope my site will get the attention of others.
Hope that makes sense.
Lisa,
Thanks for taking the time to comment back. I figured luck probably had a lot to do with it. While I am still a tad jealous, I can definitely say congratulations and keep up the good work. If the quality is as good as around here, there’s no doubt it will just keep growing!
Danelle
I am doing SEO + SMO however not getting so much traffic. I do not know the reason for it.
Hello Nena,
SEO is only one part of marketing.
remember, internet marketing is all about building relationships. so, focus your energies to help people in your community and you will start seeing a penetration. hope that helps.
Hello Lisa,
I’ve been a warrior since 2003….seen a lot and this article, is really close to my heart..
I’ve honestly believed in the fundamentals of marketing more than depending on one source of traffic like SEO
I’ve written a personal email to you..not sure if you’ve read it or not…but i truly believe that it is time for people to realize the importance of having more human interaction than the google machine dependency …just an opinion.
and thanks for this wonderful goldmine of information…real genius…
What a refreshing story in these days of doom and gloom about how you have to be a big brand to succeed.
It’s been so long since I launched a new site, the thought of doing so again now was quite daunting, but after reading this I feel much more optimistic.
One question Lisa, did you get your very first traffic without any incoming links? I seem to remember that ‘back in the day’, Google wouldn’t even index a site unless it had an incoming link or two. Has that changed do you think?
Thanks again for such an encouraging article, both for the newbies and us old (jaded 😉 hands.
No, I had some links from other bloggers who had mentioned my site, but these were gained naturally — meaning I did not participate in a link exchange or linking scheme. I do think you need *some* links. I’m not saying you shouldn’t desire quality links, I’m just emphasizing that I did not focus on link building specifically.
That makes sense, thanks Lisa.
That’s very well said, we often chase SEO practices and ignore the basics of website building and the importance of content. Back-links are important but not above the content of the site.
Wow, that’s great. Congrats. Thanks for this article.
I also noticed that it is possible to get a great amount of traffic from Google with the help of content even though your site does not have many links.
I can also confirm that in my cases the niche was about something very searched for. I didn’t make a lot of money with ads because there were no advertisers for that niche.
Perhaps this is the main reason it was so easy to rank in the first place. Where there are no advertisers there is little competition too.
Also, finding these kind of niches with 0 competition that can generate huge traffic is very hard.
Julius,
I think Google has quietly changed up. You see, they ranked websites and blogs higher in SERP’s not long ago, based on content & backlinks. Today, it seems as if Google is indexing pages faster in the search results pages, regardless of the backlinks. For now, I think they are looking for more content and not too concerned with backlinks to deep pages. Then again, I could be wrong. No one knows for sure 🙂
I’m actually noticing this too with a lot of niches.
I definitely enjoy what im reading right now, Yes its true, i believe in your concept of SEO and right or quality content. Sometimes, if you got the best content search engine will definitely give you traffic even without any backlinks. Why? Because it has a sense of reading the content and could help the search more in line of the readers. I mean, the content itself is searcheable.
What you do when you build your site really is a kind of microbranding. The angle you take establishes your brand. People often choose between similar products based on the brand message. For example, bottled water is bottled water. But if your environmentally conscious you might choose the brand that uses recycled containers. Or you might like the particular location one brand obtains its water. That’s why they tell you all those things on the bottle: brand message. You can probably take information that is readily avaailable and present it in a personal, witty, or particularly clear way and still find a following. I visit this site because I like Lisa’s delivery and her personal experience of making a living online. People can replicate the information here but they cannot replicate the 2createawebsite brand without cloning Lisa. Showing yourself is a very accessible way of branding your content because you’re inherently unique. Humans are much more apt to remember people than abstract URLs etc. If you don’t do that you still have to work hard to establish a voice and a style of content that is uniquely you. Understanding the importance of branding was a “aha moment” for me. So it seems as if Lisa found another good niche and took an angle nobody else though of. It’s very encouraging that even in the mature web and without any blackhat SEO a site that offers a different take can still do well!
Very well put and thank you so much for the kind words.
Lisa,
you have such an awesome way of making this sound very simple to the web audience. In addition, DrewryNewsNetwork really appreciates your humble and down-to-earth likable attitude, in how you successfully relate to others. Thank you for just being you, Lisa. And, keep up the good work on the content creation. By the way, are you using Dragon Naturally Speaking to create content on your blogs? 🙂
100,000 Monthly Page Views with No Backlink Building is really amazing! thanks for your sharing!
I think you are right. What is most original about you, what is most unique to your own personality and character, when translated through your blog or website is most likely to be a hit with other people. Then they will engage and then, maybe, hopefully, you will make some money too!
very encouraging post Lisa.I think we know have to focus on other methods besides link building.
Hi Lisa, Cheers to a Great Post. Can touch more about the ‘saturated net’ and how to choose a niche? I am currently working on a fashion based website right now, I jumped into it and have tried seo and writing content which works well together. Thanks Again.
Hi Kay
I always approach my niche selection by fulfilling a need or solving a problem that is related to that topic. Problem-solving/help sites generate a sense of loyalty because you are helping someone and it’s a better way to build that connection.
Content really is king. I had one page on one blog that for some reason was the perfect content in Google’s eyes and boy did it drive traffic. Too bad it wasn’t paying traffic!
I also agree with you Lisa. After recent Penguin update, one thing has become very clear. Content have to super quality to get better ranking. Good quality backlinks can help but not more than content.
I have seen a blogger blog page having PR2 within a few days after publishing which was built for web 2.0 link building purpose. Later I understood, it the quality content which have made this blog ranking so fast.
It need lot of effort ? can a single person perform all the above stated task ?
I always enjoy reading your article Lisa. Your take on a popular topic like this just help a new blogger see things from a fresh perspective. Keep up the good work!
This proves that the search engines are already looking for high quality content. You don’t have to try to trick the system.
I am having some interesting results as well it’s funny how much work can be done trying to rank for a keyword when some posts rank #1 organically.
Seems to me to be more about TIMING and TITLE than anything else.
What did you learn that was not what you expected going in? With your experience.
I have also created a blog on the lists of top 10s and hope, I will be able to drive more page views using your tips. Thanks for the informative post.
I wonder how much more traffic you would have been able to get with backlinking on top. Maybe next year you should start a blog with backlinking to compare.
Take it easy.
Hi Lisa,
Very White Hat – clean and proper. Congrats on ethics and on providing value without over-gaming the search engines.
That’s really the way it should be for the most part – more quality content gets better traffic.
Still, I do think page rank should count a little as long as a backlink is from a relevant site and/or page (not that you would disagree :)).
I think that guest posting is a good way to get those links along with value-added forum posting and blog commenting with links back to the site.
I don’t see any reason to do any backlinking beyond that and much of it either no longer counts or counts against a site – especially if it’s not a relevant backlink.
I like to see people such as yourself rank the clean way.
Congrats once again! You’re setting a great example. Like your writing and your personality.
Erik
couldn’t agree with you more
your findings are extremely precious
i always believed my site can survive without links but never dared to stop collecting ones
Nice experiment Lisa, I think this might suit me now seeing as all my previous backlink building methods seem to be obsolete since the Google updates earlier this year.
Its quite fasinating how you managed to get traffic from search engines with concentrating too much on SEO. This does prove that what matters is content and not SEO.
What a great experiment! Do you promote this site on social media at all or do you just write and that is it?
Nope. Only content. Imagine if I had spent the time to really do some social media, huh?
Hi Lisa, Did you write your content for the new blog/site with SEO in mind? meaning did you focus on key words heavily and drawn out posts, or did you just write for the “humans”? lol
I always write for humans. Some posts are longer, some are short. My main focus was problem-solving and help. These kinds of sites are the best to create because they build loyalty.
I completely believe you as I have seen after Panda and penguin update..NIche sites are performing better..Though I don’t have as success as yours..but few of my niche sites with 3-4 blog posts are getting around 300-400 visits a day..which is still good…as Traffic for target Keywords are less…
The key is consistency and maintaining the quality… I’m sure you must have taken care of overall on site SEO ….
Great Post!
July 2011 – August 2012, thats a long time. Was it a lengthy process or did you see results straight off the bat?
Hi Jerry
I think it’s a matter of perspective because I don’t feel it was long at all…. especially since I spent very little time working on the site compared to my others. From what I’ve been hearing, many people would love to have that traffic after one year.
Interesting post, I wonder how much more traffic you would have been able to get with backlinking on top. Maybe next year you should start a blog with backlinking to compare.
Take it easy.
Thanks for the great post Lisa. I have a new blog that I’m working on and I’m trying to figure out how to get more traffic. One of the things people keep saying is to get more backlinks but there must be other ways. Your post is very encouraging that maybe getting more backlinks isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.