Site Build It! $100 Spring Special (Blog)

[Savage]

Use this thread to discuss the following entry from Steve Pavlina's blog:

Site Build It! $100 Spring Special

[Matthew Blom]

Dear Steve,

You mentioned that you personally wouldn't use site build it. I'm wondering if you could say more about why. Would it not handle what the traffic you have? Are there features missing? Does it not have the growth potential you need?

I'm seriously considering signing up, but my interests are similar to yours and I see myself headed in that direction more than one, single focused niche like I see in so many of the examples given.

Could you share a comment about this?

And thank you for sharing this resource with us. It does seem quite valuable.

[Savage]

I don't use SBI because I don't need it. I already developed the knowledge, skills, and suite of tools to create a profitable online business, but it took many years. If I were starting from scratch today, I'd use SBI in a heartbeat. I'm not starting from scratch though.

[Toine]

Not sure you should have an "ad" as your "opening" blog post. There is nothing wrong with it, but it just doesn't "feel" right, especially since it has been up there for quite a while. One about chess would still be better! In my opinion that is.

[Savage]

This week I'll be getting back into more regular blogging. I sent my completed book off to the publisher yesterday (they still have to do the content/copyright edits on it though), so I have more capacity to write other things. I should have time to do a newsletter this week too.

[Dan.Linehan]

Congrats on finishing the book, Steve!

[Toine]

Alright. Great! That's a good enough reason for me. Good luck with the next stage of getting your book on the shelves in the stores and people's homes!

[Gene]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

This week I'll be getting back into more regular blogging. I sent my completed book off to the publisher yesterday (they still have to do the content/copyright edits on it though), so I have more capacity to write other things. I should have time to do a newsletter this week too.

Congratulations on getting the book to the publisher. Now that you have finished that and have taken a deep breath what is your next project?

[Savage]

Originally Posted by Gene

Congratulations on getting the book to the publisher. Now that you have finished that and have taken a deep breath what is your next project?

The book will still be on my plate for a while, since I'll need to do more revising after the publisher's edit. That could require several more weeks of back and forth until we get the final master done.

But for now I want to get back into blogging and attend to a number of personal projects, such as figuring out what kind of diet I should try next after my January raw experiment didn't quite turn out the way I'd hoped.

[DavidDavidDavid]

Hey, Matt:

SBI! is a great service, but marketing is marketing, and you got to watch out for marketing hype.

For example, their much vaunted affiliate program, while very generous indeed, does have the stipulation that lifetime earnings from your referrals do not actually get you continued commissions **unless** you keep bringing in new customers! That is, you get *credited* for previous referrals' re-subscriptions, but will not actually be cut a check unless you continue to bring in new customers. Now it's still a very cool affiliate program, but not the hustle-then-heaven affair it may appear to be at first.

Another thing is that Web 2.0 features are lacking from a basic SBI! subscription. You cannot do blogs or have your own forums without a hundred dollar upgrade, and then you have to host those blogs or forums on another web-host, for technical reasons unique to the SBI! model of web-hosting, which typically means almost another hundred dollars a year.

Last thing I can think of is that though they advertise examples of web businesses dealing in hard goods, their expertise is almost entirely in marketing and network marketing, so if you're looking to get into selling other things online besides e-books and affiliate stuff, well, they're significantly lacking in that regard (though in the private forums you can get feedback from subscribers who do deal in hard goods anyway).

Now I love SBI! -- else I would've "cashed out" on their 30-day 100% money-back guarantee already -- and I believe in SBI! but unfortunately marketing hype will be marketing hype so I urge you to try it out for yourself, since there's no risk at all, because it's important that you form your own impressions. If there's one thing SBI! has taught me (somewhat unintentionally), it's that a businessman must develop his own instincts. In this age of "free google," we may have forgotten how to "hunt"....

[DavidDavidDavid]

Originally Posted by DavidDavidDavid

Hey, Matt:

Another thing is that Web 2.0 features are lacking from a basic SBI! subscription. You cannot do blogs or have your own forums without a hundred dollar upgrade, and then you have to host those blogs or forums on another web-host, for technical reasons unique to the SBI! model of web-hosting, which typically means almost another hundred dollars a year.

Just to clarify:

The "InfinIt!" module, which is included in the subscription, allows you to do blogs and forums, but you need to host them elsewhere, which will generally run about ninety-six dollars a year.

The "Content 2" module, which isn't a part of the subscription package (though there's a free trial available), provides social networking features like visitor-uploaded video to your site, but that's another ninety-nine dollars per annum.