Cycling/Running website
Many runners and cyclists are obsessive about their sport, in their home town they have a number of routes worked out, that for them are tried and tested, about the right distance and difficulty for their desired workout and of course they start and end at a convenient point.
I used to run a lot when I lived in the UK, but when I travelled and eventually when I moved abroad I found it hard to get into the swing of running again. Of course eventually I got back into it, mainly through finding people to run with and learning their routes.
Many hotels now have a chart showing running routes and approximate distance in the room, which proves the level of interest that is out there. The idea here is to take that concept further and include difficulty and distance, and maybe a forum where people can talk about their sport, track personal best times, discuss injuries etc.
It is not immediately obvious that I am talking about a business here as opposed
to just a nice blog or runners fan type site. Remember that on the internet “Content
is King”, if you can draw sufficient traffic to your site then there
are any ways to monetarise it.
You can sell advertising or use “Adsense” or similar programs to
generate income.
You may be able to charge for premium content,
Provide a section for buying and selling and charge a small fee for the privilege.
You can sell T-shirts and mugs and key rings,
Promote running shoes or cycling accessories if you get big enough,
You could even sell a nicely packaged set of maps with the routes marked on
and a key for important features such as hills.
If you spend some time on the internet you will discover that there are in fact many ways to make money from a successful site, the key is building the user base.
There is a lot of information about search engine optimisation (SEO) on the internet, and you should read it. Much of it is out of date now, but given that you want anyone to who searches on <running routes “your town”> to find the website this will be important, it is also key that you are to be a local based site as trying to get to the top of Google’s list of sites containing the word Running will put you in direct competition with the likes of Nike.
So let’s assume you get as far as setting up the site and optimising for SEO techniques. Let’s also assume that you have great content, a technically sound forum and some nice graphics. Your users will jut come right?
Wrong.
After you optimise for SEO we recommend the following ways of marketing your
site: -
Get the word out
Join running/cycling clubs
Advertise in traditional offline media
Use link swapping programs
Send out Press Releases
Use local forums and running/related forums
Write to other similar site owners
Read, read, read
As with many small businesses; start by telling your friends, family and colleagues what you are doing. Everyone has a friend, relative, or colleague who runs or cycles and you want them to hear about your site, check it out and ideally tell their friends, relatives etc about the site. Unfortunately the myth about viral marketing is that this is enough, it is not but it is a good start.
Joining several clubs that have members who will enjoy your site is important, it takes the first part of your marketing campaign up by several levels and it gives you an important sources of amusing anecdotes, new routes, related gossip and of course access to race day calendars etc. etc, In other words you not only get to tell the interested users about your site face to face, you get to learn from them and build your content further.
Advertising in traditional media can be surprisingly effective. You don’t need to build an ongoing stream of visitors by advertising constantly but handing out flyers at the shopping mall, or taking out a few weeks worth of ads in the local newspaper will generate traffic that you would not normally find. Those who are interested will keep coming back to your site, hopefully book mark it and tell their friends about it.
Link swapping programs such as www.instantbuzz.com are a great way to get he word out there. Only people interested in your site will come and visit but you will definitely build traffic because of the reach of these programs.
There are a number of free press release programs on the internet. You simply sign up and release a press release with a headline such as “Birmingham runners now have an important new resource”, write about your site the services it offers and send it out. You can find these sites by searching on Google but have a look at www.i-newswire.com to get an idea.
Forums are the online equivalent of joining the running or cycling club. You will find internet users who are in your area and interested in your content. Have a chat, ask for their help, talk about favourite routes etc. get them engaged enough to look at your website. You don’t need to mention it directly, simply put the web address in your signature block.
Search on running or cycling and look at the top 10 sites. If they look like they could relate to your site and its content then write to them and ask them to look at your site. Tell them that you have already linked to them and tell them which page to look on. Ask if this is ok, and then ask whether they would be good enough to link to you. They key to this is that a lot of traffic will be going to their sites and seeing your link. These are people interested in your subject matter and many may become active users of your forum.
Read everything you can online about finding new users. Use Tell a Friend buttons on your site and keep pushing. It takes time to build traffic but it is surprising how fact you can get a stream of repeat users. Ultimately you want to be at the top of the search engines for when someone like me keys in <running routes in “your town”>
It will require a lot of research to do this thoroughly even for just one town. If you run or cycle yourself you will understand that this requires you get out and try the routes that you are recommending. That way you can grade the difficulty, mention key obstacles such as the killer hill, or the stream that you have to cross on foot.
Being the internet, and being local you should be able to get this level of information from your ultimate user base. Get on local forums and ask people where they run, describe a couple of your favourite routes and try to get others to do the same. Naturally ask their permission and credit them with the route description and you will also have found a loyal user, and someone who is likely to recommend your site to other runners or cyclists.
This approach may allow you to tackle more than one city eventually, but there is a lot of work in building a presence in just one city, so be careful not to do too much initially.
You need to keep your content fresh so that people have a reason to come back. You will have to keep working at this if you want your customers to be loyal, keep visiting and ultimately buy things from you.
The opportunity to monetarise this kind of site is vast but you need to be careful not to overdo it. If your site just looks like one big advert you will turn users off. Focus on the content and build your money streams over time.
This is one of those ideas were you get to make money from something you love. It will work for a number of other sports such as rock climbing, hiking, canoing etc.