Do I need to hire?

[kylabarton]

hi everyone!

Still working with my developer to get my fitness site up and running. So far he has made it look great. I have a few questions though....

First off he has set up a forum for me and I am not sure if I need to hire someone to write a few dozen posts. If so, where can I do this without spending a crazy amount of money?

Also, should I do the same thing for a blog? Do I even need a blog? I am not a great writer so I am starting to get a little nervous. I know SOO much about my niche, fitness and nutrition, but i am afraid my bad writing skills are gonna turn people away once I get started.

Another question is that I would like to be able to give my members some good tracking profiles. Where they can record diet and exercise (food, calories, weights, reps, body weight, etc) Anyone know of a good tool to integrate into the site? I like what they supply on fatsecret.com with the database of foods and everything. I also like bodybuilding.com and how they have the "bodyspace' profile. Where can I find some of these to give to my members?

Thanks for all the support! I really just want to do this right and make it a good site that people can trust and rely on.

 

[djbaxter]

If you are just starting, I would seriously rethink having a forum right away. If that is going to be anything other than a ghost town, expect to put in many many hours reading and responding to posts and monitoring the forum for spam. It is NOT for the fainthearted, I can assure you.

A blog, on the other hand, is a good idea, not the least because new blog content is picked up rapidly by search engines and you can use the blog to reference your main site. You do NOT need to post every day and the posts need not be lengthy.

 

[kylabarton]

Ok thank you! I wanted my site to be somewhat like bodybuilding.com. What then would be the best way to attract people to my site other than blogging and affiliate marketing, I have a few workout builders and nutrient calculators ..... here is the link for the homepage. If anyone has a few suggestions I would really appreciate it. It hasnt been launched yet.

The Official Home Page

 

[Sweet Tooth No. 3]

With regards to having a blog or forum, I agree with Minstrel 100%.

I checked out your page because I too am interested in health and workout related topics.

I am not an expert on landing pages (I'm working on it), but I can give you some feedback from a consumer point of view. And that's what your readers will be, consumers.

When I landed on the page, I wasn't sure what to do next. Should I watch the YouTube vid? You have other tools you are integrating into your site. But there were so many links (in small font), I wasn't sure what to do next.

If I was surfing, this might cause me to bounce away.

You have an "advertise with us" link under the header. This is not something your visitors will be interested in. I usually see those links in the footer. And if someone really wants to advertise with you, they will hunt you down like a dog

Also links for "international" "photographers," not sure what those mean. It appears your best links are in the sidebar.

What do you want people to do when they get to your site? What do you think they would be most interested in? People surfing the net have short attention spans.

I would take 4 or 5 of your most important links, and then put them in the nav under the header (or maybe in the content). Make the nav much larger from top to bottom, and use larger font. Since you are passionate about your niche, you should be able to find what is most appealing to them.

And look at the body building.com page you have below yours. They offer only a few options for users. I think you should add your opt in form in the sidebar, or further up the page in the content. But that depends on what your main goal is with site. You could also add affiliate ads under the nav.

Once again, this is just input from a consumer. I'm not an expert on landing pages. And I'm not sure you want a critique on your site. But basically, I am your customer.

 

[jcorkern]

And after following the above directions from Sweet Tooth No. 3 & minstrel, you may want to hook up to webmaster tools and use their split tester ( Google Website Optimizer is free ) or if you are not code savy, you could use a service like visual website optimizer, you can just do a search for it.

This takes the guesswork out of making it right. It is a must if you want to do it right.

 

[kylabarton]

awesome1 I will do just that. Thanks!