I announced plans for my niche site experiment about 4.5 months ago.
Niche site experiments and case studies are all the rage these days but I wanted to take a different angle and focus primarily on GatsbyJS/static speed, and personalized content.
In other words, no cookie-cutter Wordpress niche sites with 2000 word generic articles riddled with affiliate links.
My goal is to create an arsenal of authority niche sites on a superior blogging platform optimized to the hilt for speed and SEO.
GatsbyJS + Netlify.
Zero cost other than time.
So today I want to share a very brief overview of the main properties I’ve either created or purchased in the last few months (I’ve left a few out since they’re not quite “deployment ready” yet).
In another 3-6 months, I’ll disclose the websites and hopefully have some better revenue/traffic stats to share.
Note: I’ll disclose the details by email first, so make sure to subscribe (choose ‘Entrepreneur/Blogging’ as your interest).
Site 1: Alternative health niche
CMS: GatsbyJS
Amazon earnings so far: $12.40
Adsense: $0.66
This is a very specific and low competition niche.
I created this blog from scratch several months ago when I realized nobody was blogging on this topic (surprisingly). Thus far, I’ve only published 12 long and detailed posts.
I’d say in the last few weeks especially, this blog has started to show a promising trend.
Some of the posts I’d written weren’t performing well but have now jumped to top spot and are bringing in steady traffic (with some natural backlinks coming from health sites).
I haven’t done much of anything in terms of monetization yet - just a few Amazon links and Adsense a few weeks ago.
There are some very high-ticket items to promote here so I plan to spend some time increasing content and selling strategy.
Site 2: Medical niche
CMS: GatsbyJS (migrated from Wordpress and saw gains)
Amazon earnings: $33.27 (actually higher than this since I was using the wrong tracking ID for a while)
Adsense: $206.48
ClickBank: $95.65
I created this one a few years ago but sat on it doing nothing until a few months ago.
It’s an ultra-specific medical niche topic that I personally suffer from (nothing serious).
But it’s common enough that people want answers.
I’m able to write this blog from personal experience and share actual tips from my own discoveries (so this is not a fake medical site).
Everything’s written in first person and genuine.
This one has only been monetized for a few months now but is bringing in consistently ~$1 a day in Adsense and occasional Amazon sales. I made a few sales through ClickBank but stopped because I didn’t feel right sending people to a shitty CB product.
It gets steady traffic but suffered a minor hit during a recent Google algorithm update.
I’ve considered selling this one since it’s definitely worth something but there’s possibility there for growth so not sure.
This one also generated a pretty impressive social media following on its own.
Site 3: General info niche (not sure how to categorize it tbh)
CMS: GatsbyJS (migrated from Wordpress and saw gains)
I don’t know how to categorize this niche so I’ll just call it an ‘info niche’.
This was bought on a whim from Flippa for low cost (basically a dead blog). It was a guy’s personal blog for about 9 years - design was horrendous but it was getting decent traffic and had a strong backlink profile.
So I took it and redesigned it, optimized over 130 blog posts this guy had written and now it’s getting upward trending traffic on extremely competitive keywords (info queries), including featured snippets.
The only issue with this site is that it’s almost impossible to monetize other than ads.
I’ll probably make back my initial investment through ads and then resell it.
Site 4: Home and Gardens niche
CMS: Wordpress (migrated from an old PHP CMS)
A very recent purchase and a snap decision buy.
This site had been around for over a decade and was previously part of a media blogging network so it has backlinks from all major news sites (e.g. FOX, MSNBC).
There are hundreds of written blog posts on it on various home and gardens topics.
I redesigned it and went through every article to optimize and modernize the content with new images (what a job that was).
Kept it on Wordpress for now since I’ll likely resell it to an aspiring mom blogger.
It’s too early to know if my efforts will pay off after all the optimization and redesign. I’ll update you in 3-6 months on this buy.
Site 5: Parenthood niche
CMS: Wordpress
Another brand new buy.
This is another personal blog (mommy blog) that’s been around for almost a decade. Very good backlink profile but average traffic since the posts have never been optimized.
I acquired it, removed all the Wordpress bloat, cleaned up the database and will now optimize the existing posts for SEO.
I’ll update you soon on this one.
Site 6: Language learning niche (general)
CMS: GatsbyJS (migrated from Wordpress and saw gains)
This is a niche I already dominate as a leading authority on my main blog (The Mezzofanti Guild).
I saw this one year old blog selling for a low amount and it had good traffic so I snapped it up. I don’t really have a need for it and certainly don’t want to compete with my own main site.
So right now I’ll just use the traffic it gets to direct more readers to MG.
Site 7: Language learning niche (specific)
CMS: GatsbyJS (migrated from an old static site)
Another language learning blog - this time a specific language.
This was one of those rare precious finds where I basically said, “shut up and take my money”. 🙂
It’s a 12 year old site with incredible rankings and earning potential on a major language.
I plan to use this one to launch a new language-specific product early next year independent of my main site, The Mezzofanti Guild.
Site 8: Food/Diet niche
CMS: GatsbyJS
A diet fad that’s currently trending upward with very few actual blogs on the subject.
This one’s been off to a slow start on my part (no numbers yet).
I designed and deployed this blog but have yet to invest any serious time into content creation to get it moving.
Hoping to churn out a few dozen solid blog posts over the coming holidays.
Site 9: Technology niche
CMS: Jekyll
Amazon revenue to date: $98.05
Adsense: $7.88
This blog is in a very specific, low competition tech niche (they do exist).
Traffic has remained fairly steady and it makes the occasional sale.
I feel like this site has the potential to explode in revenue if I were to consistently create more content and focus on promoting high-ticket items.
I’ve found this to be hands down the niche with the highest engagement but also the most scrutinized by readers.
If you’re planning on getting into a tech niche of any kind, be ready for the critics.
Like the medical niche site, this one suffered a minor SEO drop after a recent algo update.
Site 10: Alternative health product niche
CMS: GatsbyJS (migrated from Wordpress and saw gains)
Amazon: $1.04
I bought this niche site on a whim actually through Flippa and it’s genuinely surprised me.
Of all the niche sites here, this is the only one I genuinely have zero interest in or expectations of. It’s focused on a specific product type that is low-ticket but has quite a lot of competition already.
Yet this site is rising in rank for many keywords and sits in the top 3-4 results.
I purchased it with a few dozen articles already written and simply redesigned the site.
To be honest, this one might have been a poor choice given that all the items it recommends (review posts and so on) are very low ticket, low commission items (meaning it will take a while to make back what I paid for it).
I need to spend time strategizing on this one to see what works.
If nothing else, I might slap some ads on it to make back my initial investment and resell the newly designed blog to someone who loves the product.
Site 11: SEO/Blogging niche
CMS: GatsbyJS
This is another one that I’ve completely designed but have yet to invest time into a content strategy.
It’s one of the most saturated niches out there and to be honest, I may end up scrapping it before it begins since most of my SEO/Blogging content is here on DonovanNagel.com.
Seems silly to be writing about the same thing in two places.
The site has a unique angle that no other SEO marketer has considered (to my knowledge) but I may end up just using my own personal blog for it instead.
I’ll update you on this one soon.
What I’ve learned so far about creating niche sites
I’ve learned so much about this entire process over the past few months.
I already shared my advice for buying on Flippa.
But I think the bigger lesson for me is that it really gets hard - perhaps impossible - to do each site well when you have so many.
What this entire process is showing me is that you’re better off running one or two authority sites and pouring your heart and soul into them, than to have 10+ sites with very limited time for each.
I’ve paid content writers for a few of the sites mentioned above but even the editing process and promotion of the bought content is tough to do on a tight schedule when it’s just me.
The Income School guys by comparison are at least able to work together as a team to cover more ground.
So I’m going to run these as best I can but ultimately with resalability in mind for most of them (so I can get back to focusing on my main authority niche).
I’ll share updates soon by email.
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