Many start-up website owners experience a long period of quiet before their websites start to produce results. Are you prepared for the months of work with little return or even feedback?

We hear about the big success stories, the Facebooks of this world, and we get excited. With the internet there are

opportunities to be an overnight success. OVERNIGHT!  But these are the exceptions rather than the rule. Although it is possible for anyone with passion and hard work to get a successful website business running, the reality is that most web business owners who have success will have a journey more tortoise-like than hare.

Overnight success is usually attributed to either:

1. Large budgets for marketing & PR
2. Expertise and experience
3. Access to plenty of capital for strategy and production
4. Perfect placement (the right product/service, at the right time) that spreads virally.

The vast majority of website owners and website start-ups find themselves lacking with options 1,2 and 3 and are hoping that their idea fits into option 4; that their idea is so great that it will sell itself.

And don’t get me wrong, this can happen. But for the most part, this does not happen!

Most websites take time, persistence, work and a learning curve of trial and error to get to a point where it bears fruit and this is where many hopeful website owners suffer.

A more likely future…

If you are not one of the lucky overnight success stories, don’t despair! There is still plenty of lovely juicy hope and the possibility of huge mind blowing success for your website. But here is the thing; you need to be persistent and be prepared to nurture it, grow it and market it even when it feels like very little is happening. It also helps if you maintain a strategy of constant learning and testing.

For most people the chances of your websites success will directly relate to:

• the consistency and quality of your content
• your ability to engage your visitors and convert them into subscribers
• how persistent you are in marketing and networking your website
• your understanding of how to generate revenue from your website.

These points will give you the foundation for a website that creates a community, gives value, generates revenue and opens doors. As you grow your website’s value and the size of your community, so too will grow exciting opportunities that you didn’t consider, as well of course as the ones you were aiming for.

If you are considering a website with little experience and capital, my advice to you is not to compare and measure your website against the hyped up miracle stories. Your website, like any other business, has the same opportunities to develop and grow into something exciting and successful, but it is OK and likely to be a slow achiever!

If you already have a website and you are experiencing a lull before the results start to kick in, give yourself a regular four point review for:

1. the consistency of your content
2. your incentive for converting visitors into subscribers
3. your regular passionate marketing
4. a strong revenue generation strategy.

If you have all of these things, then take a deep breath and carry on!

Happy Hunting!

Serena Star Leonard

P.S. Please share your website story (and include the link!) did your expectations match your results?