5 Successful Sites Analyzed: How Did They Do It!?

The video analyzes five successful websites and discusses how they achieved their success.

The video is a podcast episode where the hosts analyze five successful websites and discuss how they achieved their success. They examine the design, content, and monetization strategies of each site, and provide insights and lessons that can be learned from their successes. The first site they analyze is moneytothemasses.com, a UK-based personal finance site that has achieved success despite its relatively low domain rating. They discuss the site's clean design, range of topics covered, and well-monetized affiliate links and tools. They also mention the site's own product, 80 20 investor, which provides investment advice to users.

• The video analyzes five successful websites and discusses how they achieved their success.
• The hosts will show examples of websites that are doing well in 2023.
• They will show both white hat and black hat methods used by these websites.
• The audience is encouraged to subscribe and like the video if they enjoy case study episodes.
• The hosts also offer free training on autohackertraining.com for those interested in starting their own authority site.
• There has been a lot of volatility in the SERP since early December 2022.
• The hosts want to show real examples of websites that are crushing it in 2023.
• MoneytotheMasses.com is a personal finance site with a UK focus.
• The site has affiliate links for financial products and its own product called 80 20 Investor.
• The site's content is presented in a clear and organized manner, with a simple and clean design.
• The monthly updated video for best credit cards UK is a low friction way to create freshness on the site and helps with rankings.
• The website generates 2.2k views from SEO and has a not very successful social media presence.

5 Successful Sites Analyzed: How Did They Do It!? - YouTube

Introduction

• The video analyzes five successful websites and discusses how they achieved their success.
• The hosts will show examples of websites that are doing well in 2023.
• They will show both white hat and black hat methods used by these websites.
• The audience is encouraged to subscribe and like the video if they enjoy case study episodes.
• The hosts also offer free training on autohackertraining.com for those interested in starting their own authority site.

Why Analyze Successful Websites?

• There has been a lot of volatility in the SERP since early December 2022.
• Big sites have been wiped out while others are doing really well.
• The hosts want to show real examples of websites that are crushing it in 2023.
• They will use ahrefs for traffic data, but acknowledge that these tools are not 100% accurate.
• They will comment on big traffic swings to have more accurate information.

MoneytotheMasses.com

• MoneytotheMasses.com is a personal finance site with a UK focus.
• It is a DR-54 site, which is low for a successful finance site.
• Despite this, the site is doing really well and competes with bigger sites.
• The site has a clean and simple design that inspires trust.
• It covers a range of personal finance topics and has tools and calculators for each of them.

5 Successful Sites Analyzed: How Did They Do It!? - YouTube

How MoneytotheMasses.com Monetizes

• The site has affiliate links for financial products.
• It also has its own product called 80 20 Investor, which gives investment advice.
• The site is well-monetized and has a good balance between content and monetization.
• The hosts discuss the importance of having a good balance between content and monetization.
• They also discuss the importance of having a product that complements the site's content.

Site Overview

• The site offers investment advice for different niches.
• It is a non-managed portfolio, so users have to buy the recommended stocks themselves.
• The site has received a lot of press coverage in the UK.
• It ranks highly for competitive keywords in its niche.
• The site has two categories of content: info content and commercial content.

Info Content

• The site's info content is presented in a clear and easy-to-understand manner.
• It uses a traditional approach to presenting information, with few images and longer paragraphs.
• The site has made specific YouTube videos for each of its top posts.
• This may contribute to time on page and help with rankings.
• The site's info content covers topics such as interest rate predictions and house prices.

Commercial Content

• The site's commercial content includes reviews and comparisons of financial products.
• It uses a plugin that prevents users from selecting text or right-clicking on the page.
• This hurts the user experience and is not recommended.
• The site has made YouTube videos for some of its commercial content.
• The videos are essentially a summary of the written content.

Site Design and User Experience

• The site has a simple and clean design.
• It is easy to navigate and find information.
• The site's content is presented in a clear and organized manner.
• The use of plugins that prevent users from selecting text or right-clicking is not recommended.
• The site's YouTube videos may contribute to time on page and help with rankings.

Monthly Updated Video

• The website has a monthly updated video for best credit cards UK.
• The video is basically the same every month.
• The recommendations don't change every month.
• The video helps to retain people and increase time on page.
• The video generates 2.2k views and most of the users come from people landing on that page.

Low Friction Way to Create Freshness

• The monthly updated video is a low friction way to create freshness on the site.
• The site also updates the article every month.
• The site has a very clean and simple design.
• There are no fancy designed product box or tables.
• The simplicity adds authenticity and inspires trust.

Successful Ranking

• The website ranks number two for best credit cards UK.
• The website has lots of affiliate links to credit cards.
• The website generates a decent amount of money.
• The website is punching above its weight.
• The monthly updated video is one of the main differentiating factors.

Analysis of SEO and Social Media

• The website generates 2.2k views from SEO.
• The website has a not very successful social media presence.
• The website is one of the main money makers.
• The website knows that it won't be here if it doesn't have everything.
• The website is doing the monthly updated video to retain people and increase time on page.

Competitor Analysis and Organic Promotion

• The website focuses on money-saving and personal finance in the UK.
• The design is similar to the leading Personal Finance website in the UK, indicating competitor analysis.
• The website uses plain text links and widgets to feel more organic and genuine.
• The UK audience may be more suspicious of promotions, so the website aims to be more restrained.
• The website has excellent links from UK newspapers and forums, indicating successful organic promotion.

Building a Personal Brand and Persona

• The founder of the website is becoming a personality and expert in the industry.
• Journalists are looking to him as a topical expert, and he has appeared on several podcasts.
• The website has a lot of forum links, indicating that people are engaging with the content and sharing it.
• Organic referrals to the website build brand signals for Google and indicate that the website will do well.
• The website has no ads, making it more shareable and increasing engagement signals.

The Cost of Ads on Growth

• Placing ads on a website can harm growth in subtle ways, such as reducing shareability and engagement signals.
• The cost of ads on growth is often not talked about in debates about monetizing a website.
• The website discussed in the video has no ads, making it more shareable and increasing engagement signals.
• Ready traffic is not the main source of traffic for the website, but the data it feeds back to recommendation engines is valuable.
• The overall success of the website is due to its focus on organic promotion and building a personal brand.

Google Discover and Engagement Signals

• Google Discover works based on Android Chrome page views and engagement data.
• Emailing articles to a list can increase engagement signals and lead to more traffic from Google Discover.
• UGC where people spontaneously refer to content is a sign that a website will do well.
• The website discussed in the video has simple, clear information that genuinely helps people in difficult situations.
• The absence of ads on the website makes it more shareable and increases engagement signals.

Monetization Strategies

• Turn off all monetization on some pages in exchange for higher engagement.
• Minimize ads and pop-ups to make the site feel like a valuable resource.
• Return monetization on later when the traffic is stable and lower.
• 80/20 Investor thing is a monetization strategy that may not align with the best interest of all customers.
• Full.com makes millions and hundreds of millions of revenue.

Comparison Engine

• Every category has its own comparison engine.
• The mortgage Best Buy table is a standout feature.
• The site's simplicity in finding a mortgage is a unique selling point.
• Only four pieces of information are needed to get instant results.
• Competitors often require more data points, making the process more time-consuming and annoying.

Email List

• The site does not capture emails aggressively enough.
• The email opt-in is weak and only in the footer.
• A mid-content widget that captures emails would be beneficial.
• Offering a relevant lead magnet would increase email opt-ins.
• A weak email opt-in means weak sales of the product.

Credibility vs. Sales

• The site does a good job of being credible but has nothing else to sell besides credit card offers.
• The day they lose their ranking for the credit card keyword, their revenue will be cut in half.
• The site's weakness is its lack of sales strategies.
• The 80/20 Investor thing may not align with the best interest of all customers.
• The site's email list is weak, leading to weak sales of the product.

Site 1: Financial Samurai

• The site gets a lot of traffic and goodwill from people, but could monetize better.
• The site does a fantastic job in branding and establishing itself as an authority in the space through its content and podcast.
• The site is active on YouTube and has a quirky style.
• The sign-up form needs improvement.
• The site could easily 10x its revenue with a good product offering, strong email strategy, and ads strategy.

Site 2: WikiHow

• The site is doing all the right things but doesn't make as much money as it should.
• The site could 10x its revenue with a good product offering, strong email strategy, and ads strategy.
• The site has a lot of potential and is on an upward trajectory.
• The hardest part is being credible and finding your style, which the site has done well.
• The site needs to work on capturing news today and then product sometime this year to monetize better.

Site 3: Lettering Daily

• The site is a calligraphy site that gets 164,000 traffic.
• The site is a good example of what a good authority site should be in 2023.
• The site has a good design and builds an email list with a lead magnet.
• The site is involved in the industry and not just SEO articles.
• The site runs like a brand and not just an SEO play.
• The site could 10x its revenue with a good product offering, strong email strategy, and ads strategy.

Site 4: The Spruce Eats

• The site is a food and recipe site that gets 3.5 million traffic.
• The site has a good design and is easy to navigate.
• The site has a strong email strategy and monetizes well with ads and affiliate marketing.
• The site has a lot of potential for growth in the future.
• The site could improve its branding and establish itself as an authority in the space.

SEO vs. Other Platforms

• Google grows steadily through updates, not astronomical rates.
• Ups and downs are normal, like the stock market.
• Established sites with resources should do it all, but for starting out, division of resources is important.
• For fast growth, focus on SEO, but for building a brand long-term, try more platforms earlier.
• There are ways to create social content within SEO content to save money.

Calligraphy Fonts Example

• The calligraphy fonts example is a utility piece of content with 72 fonts for Photoshop and Procreate.
• It has 15,000 traffic and ranks number one for best calligraphy font.
• The value is in going straight to the point and allowing people to find what they need quickly.
• The piece is categorized with subfonts and divided into free and paid options.
• It allows users to find exactly what they want without wasting time.

Google's Answer to AI Search

• Google has made featured snippets bigger and added a blue highlight to the best matching part of the snippet.
• This is an answer to AI search, which is slow and takes 20-25 seconds to get an answer.
• People expect to get exactly what they want in less than a second.
• Breaking out the content with jump links is a cool way to do this.
• Jump links should happen in every content, and table of contents is the lazy way to do it.

Commercial Content on Best Calligraphy Pens

• The commercial content on best calligraphy pens is around the affiliate keyword but not in a traditional format.
• It is a review of the top 10 pens with a comparison chart.
• The value is in the comparison chart, which allows users to compare the pens side by side.
• The piece is also optimized for SEO with a clear title tag and meta description.
• The content is well-organized with subheadings and bullet points.

Analysis of a Successful Website

• The website ranks number one for "best calligraphy pen".
• The website has custom images showing different types of pens and the lines they make.
• The website has a section on which pen is best for beginners.
• The website's imagery makes it feel hands-on and engaging.
• The website's design is visually appealing and works well on social media.

Link Building and Search Traffic

• The website has collected 95 linking root domains because of its cool content.
• The number two website is a classic Amazon product table with nothing special.
• The website's popularity and links make it rank higher despite breaking the mold.
• The website's top linked URLs are its images, which can be an opportunity for link building.
• The website makes money from affiliate marketing and ads.

Social Media and Community-Driven Content

• The website uses its traffic to grow its social media presence.
• The website embeds its pins and Instagram posts inside blog posts.
• The website does interviews with calligraphers and people who have clients.
• The website creates content that is community-driven, not just SEO-driven.
• The website's brand name is searched for by people.

Monetization and Future Prospects

• The website is poorly monetized despite its cool content and popularity.
• The website has potential for more monetization through affiliate marketing and ads.
• The website's future prospects include building its brand and community-driven content.
• The website's potential for link building through its images is an opportunity for growth.
• The website's success shows that breaking the mold can still lead to search traffic and links.

Site 1: Calligraphy Site

• The site has a lot of potential for e-commerce.
• The site has done all the right things but hasn't figured out how to make bankable money.
• The site has an email list and a lead magnet, but it needs to sell stuff to people.
• The site owner needs to create a calligraphy course and explore e-commerce to make real good money.
• The revenue could be 20 to 50 times more if the site owner creates a course compared to growing the YouTube channel.

Site 2: Bird Watching HQ

• The site has half a million monthly visitors and makes around $300,000 to $400,000 per year.
• The site's design is okay, but it shows that you don't need a professionally designed website to make a lot of money.
• The site owner is a bird watching expert and passionate about the niche.
• The site has a YouTube channel with 90,000 subscribers, and they do live streams of bird nests and feeding areas.
• The site has over 5,000 pages of content, and they have structured it by state and bird species.

Site 3: The Points Guy

• The site is a travel rewards site that helps people maximize their points and miles.
• The site has a lot of content, including reviews of credit cards, airlines, and hotels.
• The site has a team of writers who are experts in the travel industry.
• The site makes money through affiliate marketing and sponsored content.
• The site has a strong social media presence and a YouTube channel with over 100,000 subscribers.

Site 4: The Penny Hoarder

• The site is a personal finance site that helps people save money and make money.
• The site has a lot of content, including articles on budgeting, saving, and making money.
• The site makes money through affiliate marketing, sponsored content, and advertising.
• The site has a strong social media presence and a YouTube channel with over 200,000 subscribers.
• The site has a team of writers who are experts in personal finance.

Content Strategy

• The website covers a wide range of animals, including reptiles, mammals, insects, and plants.
• There is a lot of duplicate content between pages, which may not be great for SEO.
• However, from a user perspective, the information is valuable, especially for locals.
• The website has comments enabled, which are policed well and add local content.
• The website has a lot of content, and the plan is to keep publishing more.

Keyword Strategy

• Google allows duplicate content for local businesses with different locations.
• The website ranks for location-specific keywords for animals like snakes and dolphins.
• The website has articles on how to attract different types of birds to your yard.
• The website follows a structured template for different states, birds, or locations.
• The website has decent content, but the layout could be better.

User Experience

• The typography and layout of the website could be improved.
• The website's target audience is likely older bird watchers, so the bolding and font size may work for them.
• The website has a lot of valuable information for locals and users interested in birds and other animals.
• The website has half a million visits per month, indicating that it is successful despite its layout.
• The website's content is unique, even if there is duplicate content between pages.

Overall Assessment

• The website's content strategy is successful in providing valuable information to users.
• The website's keyword strategy is successful in ranking for location-specific keywords.
• The website's user experience could be improved, but it still attracts a lot of visitors.
• The website's success may be due to its unique content and structured template for different states, birds, or locations.
• The website's duplicate content may not be great for SEO, but it still provides value to users.

Site Analysis: Introduction

• The video analyzes five successful websites and discusses how they achieved their success.

Site Analysis: Site 1

• The site has a lot of vertical white space, which is not perfect but not as bad.
• The site has a lot of links from edu websites, Timeout, Pinterest, and non-English Wikipedias.
• The site is well-referenced building.
• The site is not doing any manual link building.
• The site's monetization comes from ads, affiliate, and Ecom.

Site Analysis: Site 1 (Continued)

• The site is using Ad Thrive and Genius as a link manager.
• The site is using Genius's Geo redirect rather than Amazon's.
• The site is using "View Today's Price" as the CTA on all of the buttons.
• The site is a passionate and enthusiastic hobbyist who created an excellent site.
• The site needs to professionalize and optimize a few things to be in a solid position for the future.

Site Analysis: Site 1 (Future Prospects)

• The site is more at risk than some of the other sites of being treated less favorably in future algo updates.
• The site needs to take some time to professionalize and optimize a few things to be in a solid position for the future.
• The site has a strong community, and there is a missed opportunity to create some kind of bird spotting reporting maps.
• The site's Ecom store is linked to the BWHQ store on Amazon.
• The site needs a redesign and site audit to check for duplicate content.

Guitar Lobby: Creating High Engagement Content

• Guitar Lobby has 235,000 monthly traffic, which is decent.
• The site is legit, with a guitar teacher and other musicians as writers.
• The site creates high engagement content, such as the 70 easy acoustic guitar songs for beginners.
• The content format is a YouTube playlist with a short description of the lesson.
• The site uses random videos from YouTube, making it a collection of media for the query.
• The site has a modeling section, so it's not losing on the link battles.

17 Best Mini Guitar Amps: Tone of Voice and Writing Style

• The site uses multiple retailers' links, which is recommended by Google's product review guidelines.
• The site uses YouTube videos for each product, making it scannable by making the table with the specs for each product.
• The site's tone of voice and writing style make it stand out.
• The reviews have lots of EE80 baked in, giving a value of judgment.
• The site gives a downside from the writer's perspective, giving weight to the opinion.
• The site's product reviews are descriptive of the features, but with a little bit of weight behind them.

Other Successful Sites Analyzed

• The video analyzes five successful websites and discusses how they achieved their success.
• The sites analyzed are Guitar Lobby, The Spruce Eats, The Balance, The Spruce Crafts, and The Spruce Pets.
• The video discusses the importance of creating high-quality content, using keywords, and building backlinks.
• The video also emphasizes the importance of user experience, mobile optimization, and social media presence.
• The video concludes that successful sites have a clear purpose, a strong brand, and a focus on the user.

The Spruce Eats: Creating a Comprehensive Recipe Site

• The Spruce Eats is a comprehensive recipe site with over 30,000 recipes.
• The site has a clear purpose, which is to provide users with easy-to-follow recipes.
• The site uses keywords effectively, with a focus on long-tail keywords.
• The site has a strong brand, with a focus on high-quality images and videos.
• The site has a mobile-optimized design, making it easy to use on any device.
• The site has a strong social media presence, with over 1 million followers on Facebook.

Site structure and content

• Readers are obsessed with the table of content or overall structure and don't actually read the words.
• Putting expertise in content with semantic sentence structures gives it a lot of weight.
• A small site with lots of content and a bare-bones structure can do well with this approach.
• Links are often from Wikipedia and cheap, but the content is what stands out.
• Site makes money through classic affiliate reviews and ads.

Keyword and video strategy

• Site uses a cool keyword/money angle with musician names and gear lists.
• People searching for gear lists are looking to buy the same equipment, making it a monetizable keyword.
• Site uses lots of YouTube videos related to their content, picking decent videos instead of just any video.
• Effort is needed to find good videos, but there are now Chrome extensions that allow you to summarize YouTube videos based on the transcript.
• Keyword strategy and video use are two main takeaways from this site.

Missed opportunities

• Site has expertise but doesn't collect emails or build a community.
• Site could trade a percentage of people looking to learn for some money through a membership site.
• Product plus community thing works well for music learning in particular.
• Site has the traffic, expertise, and format of content that works with YouTube videos, but misses the opportunity to monetize it.
• Site deserves a rebranding and serious investment to become a 10x opportunity.

Conclusion

• Site structure and content, keyword and video strategy, and missed opportunities are all important factors in the success of a website.
• Investing in these areas can turn a small site with lots of content into a successful one.

Site 1: Soyouwanna.com

• The site was founded in 1999 and was one of the first how-to sites on the internet.
• The site's success is attributed to its focus on providing clear and concise instructions for a wide range of topics.
• The site's content is written in a conversational tone, making it easy for readers to understand and follow.
• The site's design is simple and easy to navigate, with a focus on the content.
• The site's success has led to it being acquired by HowStuffWorks.com in 2007.

Site 2: TheKitchn.com

• The site was founded in 2005 and focuses on food and cooking.
• The site's success is attributed to its focus on providing high-quality content, including recipes, cooking tips, and product reviews.
• The site's content is written by a team of experienced food writers and chefs.
• The site's design is clean and modern, with a focus on high-quality images.
• The site's success has led to it being acquired by Apartment Therapy in 2012.

Site 3: SoWinery.net

• The site was originally a winery site until 2016 when it was repurposed as an affiliate site for woodworking tools and resources.
• The site's success is attributed to its high-quality content and impressive branding.
• The site's design is reminiscent of a product company, which adds to its legitimacy.
• The site's founder, Robert Johnson, has a limited online presence, leading to speculation about the authenticity of the site's employees.
• The site's content includes stolen images and projects from other sites.

Site 4: TheWirecutter.com

• The site was founded in 2011 and focuses on providing in-depth product reviews and recommendations.
• The site's success is attributed to its focus on providing unbiased and thorough reviews, as well as its easy-to-use interface.
• The site's content is written by a team of experienced writers and researchers who thoroughly test each product.
• The site's design is clean and simple, with a focus on the content and easy navigation.
• The site's success has led to it being acquired by The New York Times in 2016.

Google Images and Paid Links

• Google may read content in images but not count it as duplicate content.
• A page with images containing text can still get a lot of traffic.
• Google Lens can read the text on images.
• The page has a lot of links, including paid links.
• It is unclear why Google Images is being used in this way.

Cheap Riding Lawnmowers

• The page ranks number one for "cheapest riding lawnmower."
• The page is missing a comparison table on top.
• The page is updated regularly.
• The main call to action is to check the price.
• Other links are hidden behind a tiny toggle at the bottom left of the box.

Paid Link Insertions

• There are paid link insertions on the page.
• The links have rich anchor text and are not relevant to the page content.
• Despite Google's link spam penalties, the paid links are working well.
• The page is monetized through affiliate links.
• The user images and toggles for CRO are interesting features.

Future Prospects

• The page's content is not helpful and may be stealing content from other sites.
• The page's info is not great for those interested in woodworking.
• The page's comment section is not helpful.
• The page's future prospects are uncertain.
• The page's monetization strategy is not unique.

Analysis of Successful Websites

• A woodworking site that breaks all the rules and has the most growth of any site discussed in the podcast.
• Google's helpful content updates and product review updates have supposedly destroyed sites, but this woodworking site is still successful.
• The shortcomings of Google's current systems are highlighted by the success of this site.
• Building brands and long-term businesses is more exciting, but the success of this site cannot be denied.
• Both sides of the coin are valid and can be learned from.
• The toggles and image features on the legit site are intriguing and worth testing.

Watch the video on YouTube:
5 Successful Sites Analyzed: How Did They Do It!? - YouTube