Whats the secret to a popular website?

[VetTechJess]

I have come to the conclusion that ONE of the many secrets to a popular website is content variety of different sorts. What I mean is different content variety of different ranks of popularity. In other words, Variety.

Variety, variety, variety...

As of now I have redone my website (again) and have it as now a wordpress theme and a blog with a couple articles. I want to add more variety of content, so I need your help as well as to more suggestions in addition to the things I thought of and put here. Well here are my suggestions for my own website, in no particular order...

1. My Life As A Vet Tech Student Blog

2. Veterinary Articles

3. Pet Question and Answer Section

4. Pet Home Video Section (that I post on youtube and vettechjess.com, as well as some pet related videos pasted from youtube.com [you know, high popularity etc..])

5. Homemade animal and veterinary themed Myspace Layouts. (I figured why not incorporate my niche with THE most searched word out there...) [I also theorize ppl may come to my website looking for myspace layouts, but may also be attracted to the other content...kinda win/win/riding the coattails thingy]*

6. Homemade animal and veterinary themed desktop wallpaper (why not?)*

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Thats all I can think of right off the top of my head. Can you please look at my website and suggest more categories?! THANKS!!


*I intend on hand painting my own myspace layout designs, thus making them truely unique...

[Angela]

Jess, you can have all the variety of a see's candy store, and no one's going to be read your site if it's not engaging. I would focus much more on having engaging content -- stuff that pulls people in, and less on giving them a vast array of unengaging stuff to (not) choose from.

You might want to start with rewriting your main page so that it's more dynamic. For instance,

I have organized the categories as best as I could. Simply click the corresponding category or use the search button in order to get your desired Article(s) of information.

...you can take that whole thing out. It would be more engaging if, rather than all the "I will answer" and "I will post" and "I will go over the daily ins and outs" and "I will go over the daily cases", you wrote about what difference you are committed to making in the lives of your readers and their pets. Make it more about your readers and what's possible for them. I would also try to minimize the use of exclamation points, and certainly never more than one per sentence. You're an exclamation junkie!

I love the little doggie -- that's the kind of thing that is very engaging. Maybe you could post more adorable animal pictures? And the "Ten Rules" caught my eye, too. It would be great to see more headlines that invite the reader in.

One more thing... are you allowed to take photos of the patients? It would be fun to see you take animals from haggard to healthy -- to see their little smiling faces after you get through patching them up!

[laciemn1]

Originally Posted by VetTechJess

I have come to the conclusion that ONE of the many secrets to a popular website is content variety of different sorts. What I mean is different content variety of different ranks of popularity. In other words, Variety.

Variety, variety, variety...

As of now I have redone my website (again) and have it as now a wordpress theme and a blog with a couple articles. I want to add more variety of content, so I need your help as well as to more suggestions in addition to the things I thought of and put here. Well here are my suggestions for my own website, in no particular order...

1. My Life As A Vet Tech Student Blog

2. Veterinary Articles

3. Pet Question and Answer Section

4. Pet Home Video Section (that I post on youtube and vettechjess.com, as well as some pet related videos pasted from youtube.com [you know, high popularity etc..])

5. Homemade animal and veterinary themed Myspace Layouts. (I figured why not incorporate my niche with THE most searched word out there...) [I also theorize ppl may come to my website looking for myspace layouts, but may also be attracted to the other content...kinda win/win/riding the coattails thingy]*

6. Homemade animal and veterinary themed desktop wallpaper (why not?)*

-------------------------------------------------

Thats all I can think of right off the top of my head. Can you please look at my website and suggest more categories?! THANKS!!


*I intend on hand painting my own myspace layout designs, thus making them truely unique...

I think one of the most important things to do with websites, make sure it is USER FRIENDLY! Easy to navigate, not too many harsh colors or graphics in the way of doing business...

Ok, it looks pretty good. I'm reading the 10 ways not to choose a pet..maybe along with the bold and underline, a bigger font for the list items?
I would personally like it better things of a higher importance were placed on top of the categories. Like you have cats, dogs, ferrets, then your life as a vet student. Maybe reorder it as your life as a vet student, dogs, cats, ferrets.

And the welcome screen is a little plain. I don't like the whole ***Welcome!*** thing. Maybe put a graphic or something on the welcome page..or just a little something to spice it up since it is your first impression.

[VetTechJess]

Originally Posted by laciemn1

I think one of the most important things to do with websites, make sure it is USER FRIENDLY! Easy to navigate, not too many harsh colors or graphics in the way of doing business...

Ok, it looks pretty good. I'm reading the 10 ways not to choose a pet..maybe along with the bold and underline, a bigger font for the list items?
I would personally like it better things of a higher importance were placed on top of the categories. Like you have cats, dogs, ferrets, then your life as a vet student. Maybe reorder it as your life as a vet student, dogs, cats, ferrets.

And the welcome screen is a little plain. I don't like the whole ***Welcome!*** thing. Maybe put a graphic or something on the welcome page..or just a little something to spice it up since it is your first impression.

any suggestions for graphics?

I would love to be able to control the order of the categories...Ive been trying to figure out how to do it thru wordpress for days...any ideas on how to work on that?

I wish I worked in a veterinary clinic. I wrote the blog acting as if I do work in a veterinary clinic because I figure maybe...JUST MAYBE, I can actually attract a veterinary job for myself.

[VetTechJess]

Originally Posted by Angela

You might want to start with rewriting your main page so that it's more dynamic.

I know. I can be a little of an exclamation junkie at times...

That being said, any suggestions in rewriting my welcome site? (if you could rewrite a page of what you think would be attracting to viewers, it would help...I will give you credit for it!)

[Angela]

Well, you have your own personality and you want that to come through, and you want your main page writing to "match up" with what you write elsewhere on the site, so I think it would be a good idea for you to do your own writing (maybe just have someone edit for grammar and spelling).

Why don't you try first writing what YOU would be excited to find in a website like yours, what you would want to get out of it specifically, what would stop you in your tracks and do a happy dance if you found it on the web? Then turn that around and write about that -- that's what you are providing (in the present tense; no more "I will's"). What do you think?

[VetTechJess]

Originally Posted by Angela

Well, you have your own personality and you want that to come through, and you want your main page writing to "match up" with what you write elsewhere on the site, so I think it would be a good idea for you to do your own writing (maybe just have someone edit for grammar and spelling).

Why don't you try first writing what YOU would be excited to find in a website like yours, what you would want to get out of it specifically, what would stop you in your tracks and do a happy dance if you found it on the web? Then turn that around and write about that -- that's what you are providing (in the present tense; no more "I will's"). What do you think?

thats just it though....I don't have any idea right at the moment what I would be excited about seeing in my website...I DO know it has to be about animals though. animals and the veterinary field....but other than that my mind is just totally blank when it comes to ideas...

Any Advice?

[ixmatus]

I know I might be a bit late on this thread and simply wanted to second Angela's thoughts regarding content; but, I also wanted to say that this is certainly the best looking incarnation of your site yet.

[Brutha]

Use a normal font. The one with spaces between the reader make it more difficult to read your website.

[Saidin]

I'd say you're well on your way to having a popular website. The thing you really need to do is keep adding new things. Visitors that are interested in what you have to offer, will only come back if they find something every so often.

I would change 'variety, variety, variety' to:

Value, value, value

Just keep growing your site and adding value and your site will become almost exponentially more popular.

Good luck with your site.

[4Mind4Life]

The secret is good content, and incentive for visitors to return.

[CBlokland]

I just write about stuff that I find interesting. And it seems to be working. My most popular post is about Yoda, NLP and Derren Brown.