Free Site School: Part 6 of 7

The Picture Pages

The picture pages are what the surfers really want to see. By this stage, they've bypassed our very best adverts and made it to the freebies. OK, so we've got enough bandwidth to cover this, but the chances of this surfer now becoming a cash-paying customer are dwindling. That said, EVERY part of an adult site has to do it's part. Even if there's a slim chance that we can still get his or her ass of to a sponsor, we've got to go for it.

The picture pages are simple pages - but there's still some interesting points we need to think about...

On pages or not?

One of the big questions these days is, should you put pictures on HTML pages, or just link to the JPGs? Here's an example of what I mean:

1) Go to http://www.classy-boobs.com/lesbian-love/gallery-1.html

2) Click the thumb in the top left of the page. This links to the pic ON AN HTML PAGE.

3) Go back and click the one to the right of it. This links to the JPG.

The only reason that you wouldn't want to link to the pic on an html page would be to get listed somewhere that listed that as a requirement in the rules. (Some places don't like pics on HTML pages). Wherever possible, always put the pics on HTML pages - it lets you do MUCH more... as we'll see today!

Naming them...

What you call your picture pages is totally up to you. The BEST thing that you could do would be to name them each something like, "free-fetish-pics.html" - all relative to the niche you're working in. This would help a little if you were going to be shooting for some serious search engine traffic. Having said that, this method of naming is VERY laborious - and you'd have to link to each of these pages by going through the gallery pages and putting the correct name in there.

The easiest and most common method of naming pic pages is calling them 01.html up to 24.html - or however many pictures you have.

Picture SIZES

At this stage, there's 2 things to think about.

1) The FILE size of the pictures on a free site.

2) The WIDTH and HEIGHT of the pictures on a free site.

With both, each picture will vary slightly.

As a guide, for the finished file size, aim for between 20kb and 40kb.

For the width and height, make the longest side around 450 pixels.

This isn't a strict thing, and no-one's going to track you down and shoot you if you've got a picture that's 41kb or 451 pixels wide. Just remember - larger pics = larger bandwidth bill at the end of the month.

QUICK TIP: Tables as borders!

Here's something that I use a lot of the time. If you want to add a nice 3D border around a picture - just use a table. Set the cellpadding to 0, the cellspacing to the same, and the border to around 5 pixels.

EXAMPLE:

http://www.classy-boobs.com/lesbian-love/03.html

Looks pretty cool huh? And remember - it will load INSTANTLY!

Another useful tip is not to add the sizes in to the picture's width and height. This means that in Internet Explorer - the picture will start off as a tiny spot on the page, rather than the full size place-holder that would appear if you'd specified the html width and height in the image source tag. This means that whatever you have under the picture (like an AD!) will initially start out at the TOP of the picture pages - in the first viewable screen.

EXAMPLE:

http://www.classy-boobs.com/lesbian-love/04.html

Another cool thing about this is that you'll not have to add in EVERY image's individual width and height in the image source tag if you use this site as a template in the future. This is one of the most time consuming tasks in building new sites. So for free sites, FORGET the image width and height on the html page.

Pic pages as DOORWAY pages...

Don't think to much of a picture page as JUST that. I mean this is a webpage - a REAL important content page on your site. Who says that this page can't get ranked in the top ten for one of your important phrases? The only limitation or RULE here is that you have to put a picture on it. Other than that - the sky's the limit. You could add in everything else that you would have put on a good doorway page for the search engines. Optimize this page fully if search engine traffic is your goal. Think of this page as a PART and an INDIVIDUAL too.

FACT: Picture pages, if made correctly, can get traffic and make sales!

Basic SEO

Even if you're not going to be doing a lot of search engine optimization on each of the picture pages (which IS admittedly very time consuming) then don't forget to at least do the basics:

• Good TITLE tag.

• Strong H1 tag

• MAYBE a little body text?

• Be focused and pick ONE phrase...

Remember that you're going to get through a LOT of picture pages so you can get super-focused here and pick really obscure phrases. While it wouldn't be worth building a whole site for such phrases, it IS worth adding 'em to the pic pages.

Ads...

The simplest (and one of the most effective methods) of adding ads to the pic pages is with a nice fat TEXT link above and below the picture.

http://www.classy-boobs.com/lesbian-love/05.html

Here's an example:

http://www.classy-boobs.com/lesbian-love/05.html

It's nice and simple - just a big, juicy text link under and above the picture... Let your imagination run wild, check out the tour for more text links, and start typin'. It shouldn't take too long to write out 50 or so text links. If you get stuck or bored - double up. Chances are that no surfer will look at ALL your pic pages anyways - so they don't all HAVE to be different...

Other tips and ideas...

• Test links - pic pages are NOTORIOUS for broken links. Upload and check them all.

• Get a good BATCH image compressor. You're going to have to compress lots of pics.

• Use CHEEKY link wherever you can like:

"MORE"

"NEXT"

"MORE FORM THIS SEQUENCE"

"MORE OF THIS GIRL..."

... remember that this surfer is not responding to kind link - use some of these and some WAY more dirty ones, wherever you can from here on in...

• Put the pic on the left of the page (using tables) and a nice odd-shaped banner on the left.

• Do the same but with a HUGE text ad.

• Remember the same logic as the rest of the site - WAKE the surfer up.

• If it's not a link list type site, then make the PIC itself link to a sponsor.

• Stuck for an ad, or some SE text? Describe what's happening in the picture!

OK, we've only got one part left in FREE SITE SCHOOL, and that's tomorrow morning. We'll be looking at some more free site tips, and other important ideas, as well as reviewing the free site as a whole!!!

TOM ^"^

Til Death Do Us Part

And another week in the adult industry begins! Hope your summer is going well and you're not getting too sunburned. You are getting outside once in a while aren't you?

Last week the Bush administration was handed a defeat in an election year no less. The much discussed Gay Marriage Ban was defeated and it is doubtful that it will rear it's ugly head again in the near future. Before we go bashing the congress people who voted for the bill, we have to remember that they were in many cases not voting their own conscience but rather that of their constituents. Gay marriage is something that seems to stick in the throat of much of America.

Here in the adult world we tend to be more tolerant. After all if we were ultra conservative we wouldn't be in this industry. But the adult industry also reflects the other world view. There are still many adult webmasters who snicker at gay pics, make rude comments about the actors or who just stay away from the content all together.

Now as a porn gopher I have no problem with the folks who find a particular fetish or niche not to their taste. In fact I have a lot of respect for the webmasters who have lines that they won't cross. But there are three things that bug me about reactins to gays in this industry.

First is the straight webmaster who tries to market a gay site without having ANY clue what he's talking about. I've even seen sponsor tours that were so obviously written by a straight guy that I couldn't imagine any gay man buying into the site. If laziness or homophobia prevent someone from learning enough about the niche to market it to the people who actually want to buy the site then there is no good reason to attempt to build sites and tours in that niche.

The second thing that bugs me is gay bashing. Whether it's in a chat room, on a show floor, or in the text for a site it's so out of place in our industry. Dont' we have enough people bashing US? Why should we go after an entire segment of our own webmasters? That's not only rude and judgemental but just plain stupid!

The third thing that bugs me - is why are Lesbians a great market and gay is "icky"? I mean come on! Most lesbian sites and tours are for straight guys! They have little or nothing for a true lesbian couple! But the webmaster reaction to gays is often way different than the reaction to "lesbians".

I know I'm ranting but I can't understand how allowing gay marriage is a "threat to our national security, a threat to the very essence of our country and our family values" as one senator put it. Come on - I can't see a bunch of gay people coming to my door and forcing me to have sex with them at gun point! As I recall most forced sex is done by hetero males, at least according to the crime statistics.

Maybe they'll force me to go to their wedding and pony up the money for a nice set of steak knives or small kitchen appliances. But even that isn't a threat to my life or the U.S. I jsut can't figure out what it is I'm missing here. Two people of the same sex want to get married to enjoy the security, insurance and tax benefits their hetero brothers and sisters share and this is a national security issue.

IMO we all have much better uses of our time and talents than bashing gays or trying to legislate them away. But Im just a lowly porn rodent who lives in a cool burrow, not a lofty Congressperson who lives on Capital Hill so what do I know? LMAO

See ya next week!

Rent For Apartment

A business man met a beautiful girl and asked her to spend the night with him for $500. And she did. Before he left in the morning,he told her that he did not have any cash with him, but that he would have his secretary write a check and mail it to her, calling the payment "RENT FOR APARTMENT." On the way to the office, he regretted what he had done, realizing that the whole event was not worth the price. So he had his secretary send a check for $250 and enclosed a note:

Dear Madam: Enclosed find a check in the amount of $250 for rent of your apartment. I am not sending the amount agreed upon because when I rented the apartment I was under the impression that:
(1) it had never been occupied;
(2) that there was plenty of heat;
(3) that it was small enough to make me cozy and at home.

Last night, however, I found out that it had been previously occupied, that there wasn't any heat, and that it was entirely too large.

Upon receipt of the note, the girl immediately returned the check for $250 with the following note:

Dear Sir, First of all, I cannot understand how you expect a beautiful apartment to remain unoccupied indefinitely.

As for the heat, there is plenty of it if you know how to turn it on. Regarding the space, the apartment is indeed of regular size, but if you don't have enough furniture to fill it, please don't blame the landlord.

Lawrence G. Walters, Esquire is a partner with the law firm of Weston, Garrou & DeWitt, with offices in Orlando, Los Angeles and San Diego. Mr. Walters represents clients involved in all aspects of adult media. The firm handles First Amendment cases nationwide, and has been involved in much of the significant Free Speech litigation before the United States Supreme Court over the last 40 years. All statements made in the above article are matters of opinion only, and should not be considered legal advice. Please consult your own attorney on specific legal matters. You can reach Lawrence Walters at Larry@LawrenceWalters.com, www.FirstAmendment.com or AOL Screen Name: “Webattorney.”

Niche Focus: Sub Niches

In some of my previous articles, I spoke about various niches. I explained what a niche is, and then proceeded to talk about individual niches as a whole.

This article focuses specifically on sub niches. Especially when choosing your niche, the understanding of sub niches is quite important.

A sub niche is rather much what it sounds like: a smaller niche within a larger one. For example, say the large niche is BDSM but you want to narrow it down to just FemDom. FemDom is then considered to be a sub niche.

Sub niches come in all shapes and sizes. What is considered a sub niche by some may well be considered a main niche by others who further break it down. There can, (and often are), sub niches to a sub niche. By breaking down the sub niche, we can get micro niches, which are tiny niches that appeal to a small number of people, however, micro niche surfers are often tremendously loyal to a site once they find it.

How can one make a sub niche work for a site? Build around the idea that surfers are more interested in the sub niche than in the larger niche. This is usually true, and it often annoys surfers to no end to find the usual stuff seen in the larger niche on their sub niche site of choice.

For example, should you decide to build and maintain a site focused around FemDom, then do not throw in everyday bondage or threesome dungeon pictures. That’s not what your surfers are after when they look through your site. Keep the content completely FemDom. Don’t push other BDSM stuff in your site, (exception: a toy store would be a good idea in a site like this, especially if you have stuff from the “Domme” herself), and make sure you can readily provide fresh stuff on a weekly or bi-weekly basis.

What happens if your sub niche begins to go stale? Break it down again. There are sub niches in sub niches, remember? Find another sub niche and slowly bump it in your regular stuff. An example of this would be breaking down your FemDom sub niche to find that a humiliation scene is a real draw to your surfers. Start sliding some humiliation scenes in your members’ area and see how well your surfers respond.

Targeting an audience using a sub niche is not really difficult at all. Most of your surfers actually want to see sub niche content, and will actively search it out. You could build an all BDSM site, but your surfers might treat it like a Wal-Mart and find annoyance instead of pleasure. Target your surfer by breaking your niche down and building a site for his enjoyment.

Finding sub niche content can be the most difficult issue you could run into, because most of it will have to be either custom done or thoroughly exclusive. You see, this sort of content can be seen all over the internet, albeit usually on large niche sites. If you want to pull in your surfers, you’re going to have to get content that not only hasn’t been seen everywhere, but also piques the interest of your surfer in such a manner that he doesn’t want to leave.

Many reputable content providers will have no problem with doing custom shoots for you if you’re willing to pay the price. It’s going to be expensive to get started, that’s for sure. Custom shoots can cost upwards of thousands of dollars. However, once you get your shots and your video, you can use these exclusively and reap the cost in sign ups.

If you’re thinking about a sub niche site, I wish you the best of luck. It can be a pain to get it all together and online, but once it’s there and you know where to get your traffic, you’re on your way.

Take care of yourselves.
Tala

Adult Copywriting Crash Course

I guess one of the things that we get into a lot here on the board is about writing 'text links'. You've probably read about the virtues of writing good text ads instead of or as well as using regular graphic ads. When you type some text onto a webpage it's your way of talking to the surfer and of selling to them 'face to face'. And when it comes to writing ads, one word can make the difference between making a number of sales - or being left with a swollen bandwidth bill.

There's probably very few of us here who have had any kind of formal training in 'copywriting' (writing ads) but it's something that most of us end up doing as adult webmasters. The more you learn about copywriting and the better you get - the more your sales will benefit. But there's a lot to this part of the business! Let's not forget there are people employed in both this business and others who write ads full time. It's an art and a skill on it's own - so it's worth investing some time learning about it.

A universal skill...

Copywriting is one of those skills (like graphics, image editing, FTP) that transcends the different areas you can work in with this business. Whether you're going the TGP route, link list sites - you name it! Copywriting is a skill that's essential to making it on the web. If you look at TGPs, or link lists - you'll see sites that, successfully or not, are writing their own adverts. It becomes CRUCIAL to use the advertising space on these sites and pages effectively because you're very limited as to how many ads you can put on there. If you're only allowed one or two ads per page - they have to be VERY well crafted.

When you've written an ad - READ it yourself. Put your surfer's hat on and be brutally honest. Would this make YOU think about getting out the credit card out? If not - get back to the tour and find something there that IS worth paying for.

Three essential parts to good ads...

There's really three major sections to good porn text ads. If any one of them is WEAK - then you'll hit problems.

1) The headline

Your EYE-grabber!

When you get a newspaper - do you start with the first word and then read to the back cover? Or (like me) do you have a flick through and check out the HEADLINES? Well porn surfers are a bit like that - only they're in more of a hurry because they're fueled by LUST! I've used the likened a horny surfer to a speeding train before, where you have to put something seriously impressive in their way to get them to stop and take a look. Well this is where your headline comes in. The headline draws them in to what you have to say.

Give them a good reason to read further - and be BOLD AS HELL!

More help on writing headlines can be found here:
Writing Porn Headlines That Sell

2) The Body

The TEASE!

This comes just after the headline and should build on what you said in that first area. It should be related, very intriguing and build on your MAJOR REASON why they should check out the tour / maybe buy something. (More help on this at the end of this article...)

Imagine you're trying to sell ice to Eskimos. That you're dealing with the worst case scenario surfers - ones that have a credit card but it's got dust on it because it's pulled out so rarely. But also remember that you've got the best product in the world (believe it!). Always imagine you're selling to a 'tough crowd'.

3) Your 'Call to action'

With any advert that you write as an adult webmaster, it's really important to actually GET them to a sponsor (or other money maker) at some point. That's the whole point of an ad. The call to action is a copywriting term to mean the part where you get them to a sponsor.

Here's a great article on that:
Your Call to Action

You better think of a REALLY good reason for them to enter this site (which has been built up in each part of the ad...) Surfers rarely want to spend money in my opinion - you have to convince 'em it's worth doing.

Two copywriting no-no's...
Related Article

This is an article which, although it only covers a small part of copywriting, includes two VERY common mistakes in writing adult-related ads. After I read this I realized that I was making these errors in a number of my ads. Read it and think about some of your ads. Obviously this is not an adult article - but it's still 100% relevant. The principles in both worlds are exactly the same.

Take your time with writing ads - they're very important. Remember that the ads are what pay the bills. Get the adverts on your free site or TGP gallery right above all else.

Making your advertising personal...

There's a lot of approaches you can take with writing ads as I mentioned in this article - Writing your own ads under 'Some angles to take...' One of the best ones is to just talk to the surfer as if you're a surfer yourself and you've found something that's really great that you want to share. As Snoops said, 'talk to the surfer - he's the guy down the road...' The article above (on the first page) has some good general tips on writing text ads, some things to avoid, but largely talks more about getting personal with your surfers...

Here's a good article on that...
Making Your Advertising Personal

You've spent some time building up some killer ads and got something that could work (or maybe you've tested and found that DEFINITELY works...) Why not look into using some SSI to put those ads across a number of future sites? It's not efficient to write a lesbian ad EVERY TIME you make a lesbian site.

More resources and articles:

Adult Copywriting: Web Copy in Need of Direction

"Effective copywriting involves communicating with your target market in the most clear, concise, and creative manner possible. Good copy conveys personality through your writing and establishes a relationship with your visitor that will coax him into remaining at your Website."

Adult Advertizing Ideas Sheet

Writing adult pages

How to Get More Signups With Headlines

Writing niche ads

Report #6: 8 Simple Copywriting Tips

How to format text ads

Get wild, get crazy - and get talking to your surfers. It's a far more productive way to make sales...

If you have any questions, stop by Tom's Newbie Booster Board and ask away.

Tom