Imagine this: building an income-generating website in your spare time . . .
A review of SoloBuildIt!
The work-from-anywhere business building system
SoloBuildIt! (SBI!) is the tool I've been using since 2005 to create new-terra-natural-food.com. It's a powerful and very popular e-business building system that includes domain name registration, web-hosting, web page templates, keyword search tools, a very strong user forum, and detailed step-by-step instructions to building a website that generates income.
I found the business-building information provided by SBI! to be as useful as the technology. When I began my first website (a non-SBI! site) I knew just about nothing about e-commerce and getting 'traffic'.
The web host I used provided me some web page templates and basic instructions to get a web page coded and loaded. I did build a site, but it was pretty dismal; I had no clue as to how a page should be built so it could monetize i.e. create income. I barely understood the concept was possible!
I gave up on the whole idea after a while; building a website just didn't seem worth the effort if there was no payback. Then a few years ago I decided to try again.
I researched some web hosting companies, and found SBI! They claimed to provide not just a software application but also an entire training course and system for creating e-commerce websites.
You can read some of my experience with SBI! then come back to this section to get a detailed look at the 'whole package' that SBI! provides. Let's get started!
You start your SoloBuildIt! experience by reading or viewing their step-by-step Action Guide, which breaks down the the tasks you need to do day by day until your site is launched.
The Action Guide is provided in both text and video versions, and is the 'course textbook' on learning to build a successful online business. During days 1 to 5 of the Guide, you are given the training you need to figure out exactly the 'who', what' and 'how' of selling from your website.
You will identify your e-commerce 'niche' and then learn how to 'brainstorm' content for that niche. This is the C-T-P-M (Content-Traffic-PREsell-Monetize) process that is fundamental to success with SBI!
Now this made sense to me because (elsewhere on my site) I preach my own process of small business success, which is: do Planning, then Marketing, then Management, then Production, in that order. So the SBI! model was compatible with what I already knew worked!
SBI! provides a complete suite of tools including a brainstorming tool as well as keyword research tools. Brainstorm It! will help you generate your keyword list. You’ll investigate keyword supply, demand, and potential profitability. You’ll work through their structured process to pick a topic that both interests you and can generate decent income.
The Master Keyword List generated by the Brainstorm It! tool is e-commerce intelligence central; the tool finds and stores content, images, competitor site info, Google bid prices and more.
All of your site building research is stored in one place, and the results can be exported to a spreadsheet for further analysis. This is the most powerful and comprehensive keyword and monetization tool I have found.
When your initial research is done following Day 5 of the Action Guide, you can begin actually creating your site. Domain name registration and web hosting for a full year are included in the SiteBuildIt! package. The Action Guide explains in detail how to research and select a good domain name for your site.
Once your domain name is chosen, you get access to SBI! Site Central. This is where you will access all the tools and capabilities provided by SoloBuildIt!
Building your site is easy with SiteBuildIt! Step 1 is selecting a look and feel for your website, from the extensive templates provided. You also have the option to customize your look and feel at this point or later on.
You can customize the 'theme' of your site by changing the color, the background images, the fonts, the sizes, and the alignment.
One the design and layout is set, you can start adding content to your site. You can choose to upload your own HTML pages, or use their BlockBuilder to create a website in the browser itself (no HTML, FTP or other technical knowledge required).
Like most people, I chose to use the BlockBuilder. The process is very easy to follow, you just complete some dialog boxes to add titles, page descriptions, keywords, headlines and text or graphical content.
The graphic above is from my actual new-terra-natural-food.com home page. Once you've built your home page, you carry on in the same fashion to add other pages, following the 3-tier structure provided by SBI!.
Site Central also provides access to a number of other tools and resources that support the Content-Traffic-PRESell-Monetize process. Again every tool is accessible using simple dialogue boxes.
Here's a list of some of the tools and capabilities included with your SBI! subscription:
p.s It's OK if you don't know what some of those things are; I learned the talk and the technology as I worked my way through the Action Guide.
Conclusion and Recommendation
SBI! provides a lot of value, especially for the 'newbie'. It provides all the tools and training necessary build a website that works, without having to be a technical expert.
Having said that, is SBI! for everyone? Probably not. If you have already built a working (i.e. income-generating) website, and are comfortable with HTML tools and web design software, you probably don't need all the things SBI! provides. There are cheaper solutions if all you are after is web hosting.
But if what you want is to get all the pieces of the e-commerce puzzle in one place, I don't know of a better solution that SiteBuildIt!
March 2020: SBI! is currently offering a special introductory price.
And, they offer a 90-day guarantee, so you can try it risk-free.
From time to time I recommend books and software on this site that I believe will be of value to my readers. I only recommend products I actually own and use myself. And I only recommend the best I can find in that particular category of product.
If you follow my recommendation and buy one of these products through the link on my site, I receive a small commission from the originator of the product. This is one way I create income to maintain and improve this site, and keep reviewing genuinely useful products. Hopefully, you will agree this is 'win-win-win' for you, me, and the people who create these great products.
