Things you need to know before getting or using a free website.

Many new internet marketers believe that it is quick and easy to make lots of money on the internet. Personally, I think the main reason for this perception is all the get rich quick scams being advertised online.

Note: When I refer to a free website in this article I am typically referring to established affiliate websites, websites being sold on auction sites such as eBay and so-called cookie cutter websites. I am not referring to companies offering free hosting and website builder services. 
 
I just did a quick search on Google for the keyword terms “Make Money Online” and got 140 million (yes, million!) results. The paid adverts are listed on the right of the page. This is what the first three say: (I am not expressing an opinion on the specific adverts)

⇒ Google Adwords Advertisement No. 1
Make Money Online Now, $ 600 - $ 700+ Every Night, 100% Proven & Fully Guaranteed

⇒ Google Adwords Arvertisement No. 2
A Millionaire’s Secret, Learn How I Made A Million Dollars On The Internet Doing Nothing

⇒ Google Adwords Advertisement No. 3
Make Autoprofits Online, $70,148.31 in 2 weeks, Let me shoe you how, Begin Today!
 
It is no wonder people think it is easy to make money online!

Sometimes when something seems too good to the true it simply is too good to be true…
 
You may ask what this has to do with a free website? Everything.
 

Let’s consider eBay for a moment. Doing a search on eBay for the term “Website” gave me an amazing 4681 results. I can buy a website on eBay starting at only $ 0.01. (O.K. it costs something but I consider it to be a free website).

Some of these websites have thousands of pages and the sellers will give you many examples of just how much money you can make selling pre-loaded ebooks, etc.

Other eBay website sellers will tell you how much money you can make displaying Google Adsense on your site. They will even set up everything for you. (You will often be expected to host your site with them for a monthly fee – This is how they make their money)
 
For a new internet marketer just starting out these offers often seem irresistible. Too good to be true? Generally, the answer is yes...
 
What these companies do is use so-called Cookie Cutter websites – They use a standard template and simply plug-in your information. Some will give you an affiliate website with a domain name such as abc.com/susan where “abc” is the domain name of the company and “susan” is your affiliate user name. Others will give you the option of choosing your own domain name.

Why do search engines not like a free website?

There are mainly two reasons, namely:

1. Duplicate Content

All search engines, especially Google, hate duplicate content. Search engines strive to provide visitors with useful and unique content that will give them what they are looking for.
 
Sites with duplicate content will either not be indexed or will only appear very far down in the search engine results for a specific keyword or keywords. So far down that you may never receive any visitors. You will lose out on a very valuable source of free traffic.
 
2. Not Search Engine Friendly

Even if your free website happens to be unique (as probable as the earth being flat) chances are that it will not be search engine friendly, i.e. not properly optimized. Once again, you should consider yourself lucky if you get indexed and don’t expect any free traffic to be sent your way.

What about PPC Advertising?
 
O.K. You have heard about PPC (Pay-Per-Click) programs such as Google Adwords where you can advertise your site and only pay Google once someone clicks on your link. You have found the solution? Right? No…
 


Google is very clear on their policy regarding affiliate websites:

"We allow affiliates to use AdWords advertising. Please note that we'll only display one ad per search query for advertisers sharing the same top-level domain in the display URL. This means that if you're an affiliate advertiser, your ad may not show for a query because another affiliate or the website that runs the affiliate program also has ads using the same (or a similar) domain in the display URL. Also, your site should not mirror (be similar or nearly identical in appearance to) your parent company's or another advertiser's site".

You can get full details on Google's quality guidelines by clicking on the following link: https://adwords.google.com/select/guidelines.html 

Bottom line? If your free website is similar in appearance to another advertiser's site and if you bid on the same keywords, Google will most probably not allow your advertisement. 

If you bid on keywords that nobody else (with the same or similar website) is bidding on your add will probably be accepted. However, chances are very good that by the time you get your site all the good keywords have already been taken and you are left scratching the bottom of the barrel.

There are many ways to make money online. However, most successful internet marketers will agree that receiving free traffic from the search engines and using Google Adwords are probably two of the very best ways of building an internet based home business.



I consider free websites as the number one reason why people think it is easy to make money online and also it the number one reason why people don't make any money and complain that they have been scammed.