This is a little bit different in terms of case studies as I’ll just be taking a snap shot of the work done in one day and showing the growth over a year.
I bought a scratch lottery ticket while on a road trip with my family. It’s called set for life (Win $1,000 per week for 25 years) and I realized that I’ve already hit the ‘dream’ that this ticket offers people. I’ve hit ‘freedom’ levels of money with my passive income streams, but since becoming a dad, my websites have really taken a backseat to other needs (which are rewarding in their own right <3). I dabble in them now and then, updating here and there, occasionally writing an article – however, there hasn’t been a concerted/consistent push because I’m not great at carving out my own time. I work best in large blocks and I know that about myself.
On my way back from that trip to Vancouver Island with my wife and family, I realized I’m not going to get where I want to be financially without getting back to the grind in a more consistent manner…but does it really need to be a daily grind?
So I asked myself what would be the best way for me to work that would allow me to get the most done with the least impact to my day.
The Answer (At least for me)A One Day Content Sprint – 20 Hours
My family is heading out for a day of back-to-school shopping (except it’s actually for pre-school and maybe calling it first-time-at school shopping would be more apt) on September 2nd. Me? I’ll be starting my day at 5 AM and ending it at 1 AM. This will give me 20 hours straight mind-numbing and distraction-free hours to focus on some content I’ve had on the back burner for a while. I’m turning my phone alerts off, no family, no friends, no e-mails. I will be focussing purely on building/updating evergreen content until my eyes bleed and what’s left of my brain starts dripping out my ears.
My goal is to let the content marinate for one year and to earn more than $16.67/day from the combined income of all the articles I push out on this day at the end of that year. With a little bit of SEO voodoo finance, this works out to $1000 per hour because if I were to sell the website for a 40X multiplier of my monthly earnings, the math would equal 16.67(daily earnings)*30(days in a month)*40(monthly earnings multiplier)=$20,000.The Content
I’ve found two verticals within content niches that fit websites I currently own.
Content Vertical 1
Why does my (noun) (verb) (adjective)?
This is the main content vertical that I will be focussing on, it’s a series of 15 posts that all start with the exact same 5 words, only changing the adjective on the end. I’m going to call it “The (verb) series” and it will be basic text/image posts unified with a beautifully crafted parent page, I’ll use global blocks to tie everything together. While each page can use some similar content, it will be mostly related to the overarching theme and 90%+ of the content on each page will be unique to that topic.
I think I can succeed in this vertical because every website that touches upon this topic only answers 1 or 2 of these questions. If I answer all 15 on a relevant website Google will give me topical authority and allow me to outrank everyone else.
Size: 15 Posts (+1 Pillar) ranging from 800-1500 words. I think this will be a large task in itself to accomplish but I’m hoping that once I get rolling I’ll be able to bang out the last half real quick and still have time for my second content vertical.
Website: This will be going on a newer website to (hopefully) show that anyone can do this.
Domain Authority: 3
Backlinks: 4 Follow 9 No Follow
This website gets between 50-150 views a day currently and is growing at a rate of about 10% per week. Looking at the volume on these keywords I’m hoping to get between 500-1000 views per day on this content alone by the end of the year.
Quality: I’m not trying to set the world on fire with this content, however it will be above the standard of what it is competing against.
Projected RPM: $12
Projected Page Views: 750/ day
Projected Daily Income September 2023: $9
Projected Value: $9*30*40= $10800Content Vertical 2
How (adjective) is the (noun) in (location)?
This will be my secondary content vertical, I might not have time for it, but I would love to be able to get around to it. I’ve already laid out the outline for this topic, and it’s currently getting approximately 50 hits a day. However, I know I can turbo-charge it to make it one of my highest-performing posts.
It is quite similar to Content Vertical 1 in how it is a central topic with sub-posts and I could break it into 50 (hint for location) different posts, but I want to see if it can succeed as a mega post. I’ll provide an overview at the top of the page for the shortest, longest, and most interesting of these (nouns). Then a quick overview of each (location) that is navigable from a table of contents. I prefer to do it this way because I’ll get many more ad impressions than if I just had a 100 word post on each of these. My ads mostly show below the fold which isn’t conducive to shorter articles. Additionally, with this layout some users will read the entire article, which will give my a higher RPM. As for intent, I think the overview will provide a more complete answer to each user’s question which Google will appreciate.
The competition for this topic seems wide open as the front page has a #1 result that doesn’t answer the question properly, a quora result at #8, and a couple of other results that deliver questionable answers. The basic keyword volume is 20k for the original term “How (adjective) is the (noun)”, which is fantastic in itself, but the related terms balloon this bad boy up to 200k+ when all the locations are considered. It’s definitely an underserved niche.
This one will just be a grind with some light research, but hopefully a welcome respite from the other articles I’ll be writing. I estimate it will be about 6500 words when complete (currently sitting at 2000).
Website: This will be on a DA 50ish website in a YMYL niche.
Backlinks: ~1000 Follow ~800 No Follow
This website gets between 3-8k views a day and is growing at a rate of about 10% per month. Looking at the volume on these keywords, I’m hoping to get around 800+ views per day on this single post by the end of the year.
Projected RPM: $20
Projected Page Views: 800
Projected Daily Income September 2023: $16
Projected Value: $16*30*40= $19200
It’s a tall order 15*1200(Content Vertical 1 18000 words)+4500 words (Content Vertical 2)= 22500 words. Roughly a thousand words an hour for a day. I will consider it a success if I can have a daily income of $16.67 off these articles after one year. However, I think that I could easily hit $25 or more.
Would you work an entire day straight for $20,000?
If I can hit my goals with this content sprint and successfully add $16.67 additional revenue to my passive income streams per day, I’ll be adding in $500 per month. I’ll only need to do it 100 times to successfully pay the mortgage on that dream home I linked to earlier (actually affording it and putting bookshelves in the lambo garage might take a little bit longer though).
Hopefully, I can convince my wife it’s worthwhile…and even if I fail at least I tried.