Website targeting can determine the amount and quality of traffic you get. Image: nostri-imago/Flickr/CC-BY

When you’re deciding to set up your own website, one of your first and biggest considerations should be the content you plan to put on your website. There are two major types of website content to consider, both of which have benefits and drawbacks. General interest websites have content on a wide variety of topics, while niche websites target more specific topic areas. Either way, the kind of information you put on your website will have a definite effect on the traffic you bring in.

Why targeting is important

Everything that is a part of your website – from the URL to the design and content – can be affected by the topics you choose. Search engines index and categorize your site on the basis of the keywords it finds in your site. When the keywords match throughout your website, it is easier for search engines to categorize your site correctly – a basic component of search engine optimization. Better SEO makes it easier for people who are looking for websites like yours to find your site.

Creating a general interest website

General interest websites are usually very broad sites (usually blogs) that cover a wide variety of topics. These blogs can be the easiest to maintain, because you can easily post and discuss just about anything on this type of website. Traffic to general interest websites may take longer to build, but can grow very large. The benefit of a general interest website is that you can run just about any type of advertisement on your website in any manner. Feel like writing about your favorite product? You can. Feel like writing about the latest financial news? You can do that too. General interest websites serve as great information hubs. General clickthrough rates on general interest websites tend to be lower, since the people who come to your website aren’t necessarily looking to click on an advertisement. News websites and personal blogs tend to fall into the category of general interest, as do “home page” style websites like MSN.com and Yahoo.com.

Creating niche websites

With so many hundreds of millions of websites on the web, creating a niche website can be your quickest route to building valuable traffic. A niche website focuses on one topic, keyword or area of interest. These websites may not get as much traffic as a general interest website, but the people who do find the website are more likely to take action on the advertisements or affiliate offers that you put on the website. There are two major ways to decide on the niche that you want to target with your website.

Personal interest niche websites

First, you can choose a niche that you are very interested in and will be able to easily write about on a regular basis. The topic could be just about anything — home building, experiences with insurance, researching Bigfoot, even your love of celebrity news. If you are truly passionate about your idea or topic, then keeping fresh and interesting content on your website should be easy. You can choose to run affiliate advertisements that have a topical connection to your website, which would increase the likelihood they will get clicks. You can also choose to run affiliate offers as pure advertisements. Either way, personal interest niche websites are likely to bring in traffic because they target one very specific topic – the essence of  longtail keyword marketing.

Keyword niche websites

Websites targeted to specific keywords, or keyword niche websites, are the easiest type of website to make affiliate commissions with. These are the websites that integrate the keyword of your affiliate offer from bottom to top. These websites can be more difficult to maintain, because finding and integrating fresh, relevant content can be more difficult. Identify an affiliate offer that you would like to target, find the keywords that will send interested parties to that offer, and start there.

Once you have chosen what type of website you would like to build, you can move forward on building your affiliate commissions with a search engine optimized website. If you are building a general website, be sure to make it the type of site that you, yourself would love to visit. If you have chosen a niche website, try to build the keywords for your website in from top to bottom – everywhere from the URL you choose to the content that you put onto the website.