Feb
7

Do You Go After The Big Fish Or Lots Of Small Fish?

Posted in Internet

The other day, I was talking to a webmaster friend about working on a new joint project together. While brainstorming for ideas, a few different routes were investigated. Should we make one, unique website, which dominates its respective niche and churns out money, or create hundreds of small, easy-to-setup throwaway sites which collectively make a good deal of cash? How about make a large network of arcade gaming sites, publicize them on a massive scale (by pouring thousands into Adsense and other advertising programs), monetize them, then kick back and reap the return? Sounds easy enough.

Small fish.

Personally, I find that a balance of large and small sites is the perfect portfolio. It’s much better to keep your eggs split into many different baskets, especially online. In a virtual world where your money-making machines are intangible, and consist only of thousands of lines of code stored in a server somewhere far away from your home, there’s no telling what can go wrong. Server outage, DDoS attack, site hacking, script corruption, crazy man with a gun raiding your datacenter: they all can ruin your day. With large, thoughtful sites set as your mainincome generators” and your small, pre-scripted sites set up as “backup generators“, you’ll be sure to have a steady flow of money coming in everyday of the week.

Owning large websites can have its benefits. For one, they look much better on your portfolio. When company’s are interviewing you for a new job, they’d much someone who was the chief editor, lead designer, and founder of IGN.com then someone who uploaded a bunch of pre-made arcade templates to a server and pressed the magic “GO” button on the install script. These are two totally opposite extremes, but it gets the point across.

They’re also more brand-able. A large website consists of a site which has a vast following of users. You can easily leave an image in user’s heads when they visit; they’ll remember what your unique website’s domain name is called, but they won’t remember what ‘the arcade site’s name that their friend yelled to them from the other side of the computer classroom’ is. Not to mention that more brand-ability means more advertisers. Advertisers love associating their product/service with a web property that’s known to lead its respective niche; brand-ability means more money for you!

Everyday I see tons of new webmasters make this decision. Do they want to be ingenious and rock the Internet with the latest idea? Kevin Rose of Digg.com did that. Mark Zuckerberg of FaceBook.com did that. John Chow of JohnChow.com did that. Or do they want to be the “lame ducks” of the Internet generation: feed off the larger sites, attract users through black hat SEO techniques, and copy the money making techniques of thousands of other Internet developers?

Which path will you follow to your success?

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8 Responses to "Do You Go After The Big Fish Or Lots Of Small Fish?"

  1. Obviously diversifying your portfolio in any situation, from the stock market to eating habits is a very smart move. In this case, however, I am inclined to disagree on one small viewpoint - how much starting capital you get.

    Initially, with small capital it seems much more intuitive to start out small, and have many so-called “throw-away” sites that collectively rake in a decent amount of money. This is similar to, let’s say, buying 10-year government bonds. Relatively lower risk, more-or-less assured minor profit.

    If you’ve got the big bucks though, you’ve almost got to flaunt it in today’s cut-throat media society. Your smaller sites will probably eventually get swallowed up in the collective crush of the internet, and unless a large, central hub is created to, as you say, “leave an image” a la Facebook, YouTube (with enough start-up capital attained, or a high-risk high-reward venture with limited assets) you may see your profits dwindling as the Mark Zuckerbergs of the world snap up the consumers and traffic.

    So you are very correct in your statement that balancing large and small, as long as one understands the risks and rewards of owning both. Image is everything.

    By Eddy    7 Feb, 2008 at 07:32 pm
  2. Good stuff, and yes, Eddy has a point… For the majority of people out there, money is an option, so they can’t immediately start a big-hit site right off the bat. Start small, and see how it goes from there.

    By Saam    7 Feb, 2008 at 07:43 pm
  3. Eddy:

    Thanks for your comment. You have a good point. Capital does and should make a difference on what kind and scale of project you plan to take on.

    However, even some of my biggest hits were started with as low as a few hundred dollars. Heck, they’re not on FaceBook’s level, but they did produce XX,XXX - XXX,XXX uniques a day for quite a while.

    If you genuinely have a good idea, usually you can find away to get away with building it, even given a lack of funds. Most VC investments are actually more of a morale booster than an actual necessity for a new project’s development (ya don’t really need a few million to make ANY kind of website).

    But in the end it all comes down to the amount of effort you pour into a project. You want to make money, you’ll make it. May take a year’s worth of sleepless nights, but you’ll reach the stars one way or another.

    Saam:

    Thanks for your comment as well. Please read my above response to Eddy. : )

    By Robert Afnani    7 Feb, 2008 at 08:03 pm
  4. […] Curt Monash wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptOr do they want to be the “lame ducks” of the Internet generation: feed off the larger sites, attract users through black hat SEO techniques, and copy the money making techniques of thousands of other Internet developers? […]

  5. […] unknown wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptWith large, thoughtful sites set as your main “income generators” and your small, pre-scripted sites set up as “backup generators“, you’ll be sure to have a steady flow of money coming in everyday of the week. … […]

    By Do You Go After The Big Fish Or Lots Of Small Fish?    7 Feb, 2008 at 10:54 pm
  6. Whatever it will be, I can guarantee it will be successful. I know both of your hearts are into it.

    =]

    By Adam    7 Feb, 2008 at 11:19 pm
  7. Wow, I’ve loved reading your blog so far, great stuff Robert! I cant wait to see what you two can whip up, I’m sure whatever it is you both have the determination and skills to make it big. Keep us posted!

    By Dan    8 Feb, 2008 at 01:09 am
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    By Michelle Wong    9 Feb, 2008 at 07:42 pm