TESTIMONIAL:

"What I have learned and done, SBI! was the catalyst, the support if you will, the chance, the opportunity. It's knowing what I know that kept me trying, it was SBI! that led me down a right road of possibilities. I think my staff might say the same" ;-)"
-- Richard Cannon from WebsiteDesign
Builders.com

Brainstorm It!

(Keyword research)

Brainstorm It!, to my mind, is one of the major reasons that SBI! sites succeed. It's a keyword research tool that combines proprietary search data (owned by Sitesell) with leading keyword research tool, Wordtracker.

Brainstorm It! generates keywords from your chosen seed word, and is able to generate more and more keywords from a variety of lateral searches derived from Google. (And much more.)

And it delivers supply and demand figures for those keywords that quickly show you what your chances of success are for ranking highly on search engines like Google.

Brainstorm ItI! is Fantastic tool, and worth the price of SBI! alone, if you ask me. (Wordtracker currently costs $329 and SBI! costs $299 or $29 per month.)

By the way, using Brainstorm It! (together with the SBI! Action Guide) allows you to discover what your website will be about. Very exciting. (You can see how I came to create a self-help site using Brainstorm It! in my own SBI! diary.)

Click to see larger screenshot!

Search It!

This is an invaluable AND powerful research tool.

If you're looking for content ideas...

If you're looking for link-partners...

If you're looking for affiliate opportunities...

The Search It! tool lets you do all of that and a lot more.

Form Build It! is SBI's spam-free way of allowing people to contact you, via a contact form.

And there's no need for you to scour the web for a spam-free Perl/CGI form - you just use Form Build It!

It comes with thank you pages, gotcha images, autoresponder messages... And is easy to add to your site, just follow a series of instructions. (So if none of this means anything to you, don't worry - it will all be explained in the SBI! Action Guide!)

As I said, Form Build It! can be used as an autoresponder software (a bit like Aweber or GetResponse), but only in a limited way. You can only send an email course containing up to 7 messages - which is okay, I suppose, but not if your email sequence is 10 emails. So this is one of the weaknesses of SBI! to my mind!

Having said all that, I do use Form Build It! as an autoresponder for my free self confidence course at SelfHelpCollective.com!

And, as a contact form - spam-free contact form - then Form Build It! is excellent!

Analyze It!

(Search Engine Optimisation)

Once you've built your page - either via Block Builder, or via your favourite program (e.g. Dreamweaver like I do) - The Analyze It! module makes sure your page is search engine optimised.

The on-page SEO-criteria are quite simple - off-page factors like inbound links are recognised as being more important, these days - concentrating on page title, meta tags, keyword density and a few other factors.

However, Analyze It! is still a useful and effective tool. And I always check my pages with Analyze It! before I upload them.

Link Fix It!

Imagine getting an email whenever one of the links on your site doesn't work!

(Either you've put the wrong link in (to your site, or to somebody else's site) or the site you're linking to is no longer online.)

Well, that's what Link Fix It! does - automatically. So as soon as a bad link is found, you're sent an email notifying you of this fact.

And I can't tell you how great this automatic link-checking tool is. And experienced website owners will understand the time-saving power, I'm sure, whereas beginners will simply benefit (again) from SBI's tools without "needing to know how".

This tool really is invaluable. I hate to overuse this word, but Link Fix It! is invaluable.

Traffic Stats

Click-thru Analysis

Search Ranker

Search Submission

To be honest, I don't pay that much attention to these tools. I do check traffic stats - a simplified version of AWStats (free with most web hosts) - on a daily basis.

I probably should use click-thru analysis - where people are clicking from/to, but I just rely on already-owned version of Statcounter for this functionality.

Search Submission is a great automatic tool that submits your pages to the major search engines. This is no spam-submission tool, and search spiders are constantly monitored to see whether pages have been visited or not first.

And Search Ranker gives you a quick view of how well (or not) your individual pages are doing on each of the major search engines.

The fact I don't use these tools properly says more about me than these tools. Alas.

Value Exchange

(Free for anyone to use - see below)

Value Exchange is a link exchange program that works; i.e. without bombarding people with stupid spammy and untargeted emails.

It's open to SBI! sites AND non-SBI! sites, and is a great way of finding other sites to swap links with (swap 'value' with)

And getting inbound links to your site is now more important than ever.

So Value Exchange is another invaluable tool, and that's why I recommend that existing site owners sign-up to it, whether they buy a subscription to SBI! or not...

(Join Value Exchange here!*)

RSS/Blog It!

This module automatically creates an RSS feed - useful for news readers like Google - about updates to your site, or new pages that you've added.

You can see an example of this module working on my self help website blog page.

I created the top of this blog page, and SBI! generates the 10 (in this case) latest site updates and the RSS feed that goes with it. Nifty.

XML Sitemap Generation

This is another fantastic tool that automatically creates an XML sitemap.

Google loves these things. And you have to do nothing other than let Google know the name of it. SBI! generates it for you, and continues doing so even when you add new pages.

This is a useful, use-it-once-and-forget-it-tool.

Content 2.0

C2 enables you to Web-2.0-enable your site. That is, "it enables visitors to create content for you, for free, because they want to!"

This is the holy grail of so-called 'user-generated content' that I'm talking about, that all the most highly visited websites - Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Yahoo! Answers, YouTube, Google (yes, even Google!) - rely on.

With C2, though, you get to filter what gets added to your site! Think of it as user-generated-content without the 'gossip'!

In essence, Content 2.0 (or C2 as it's referred to) is a powerful way to leverage your content-building efforts, and to attract even more traffic to your site!

NOTE: C2 used to costs extra! (It used to cost an extra $99 per year.) But now C2 is free!

In my own case, though, , I always envisaged using C2 (when I bought my subscription of SBI! in 2008 and came up with the site concept of the 'collective') - I always wanted to encourage people to share their wisdom, and C2 lets me do that automatically.

I will have more to say about C2 as I get more familiar with how best to use this powerful SBI! module. I would just say that there is a bit of a learning curve to getting C2 to work, but SiteSell (the company that owns SBI!) keep on making C2 better and better...

C2 is an outstanding one-of-its-kind tool, and it comes free with your subscription of SBI!!

(Learn more about
the power of Content 2.0 here!*)

SBI Forums

The private SBI! forums are invaluable.

They're filled with helpful fellow SBI users all willing to help you if you're finding something difficult.

The forums are grouped according to the 10-day approach you'll find in the SBI! Action Guide.

It's also a positive source of help and ideas to do with any aspect of building a successful online business.

The philosophy behind the forum: pay it forward! Meaning if you get help, then give it back.

My one criticism of the SBI! forums is that they can be a little 'evangelical' at times. For me, anyway. But it's definitely the most positive and helpful online forum I've ever used. As I said, invaluable.

(Learn more about the SBI! forums
and the other SBI! Tools here!*)

Web Hosting

Obviously, your SBI! site comes with web hosting included. And I could tell you all about the bandwidth, the uptime, the email addresses, etc. etc.that are promised with the hosting - but basically your site is successfully hosted at SBI!. That's all you need to know.

All the tools listed on this page are what's really important. That and the Action Guide. SBI! is not a traditional web host - your success matters!

If you'd like to know more about webhosting and SBI! click this link!

This tool allows for point and click site building. It's why beginners who know nothing about HTML or creating web pages can still build successful websites.

I've never used this tool. For me it's too clunky, and far less powerful and effective than building your pages yourself. But it's a great way to begin!

SBI! comes with many 2-column and 3-column templates with a 'look and feel' to suit most types of website.

I have not used any of these templates (and will not) as I prefer to design my own templates using Dreamweaver.

NEW! A whole load of CSS-stylesheet enabled and very swish-looking HTML templates have recently been added to SBI!. And they all integrate into the way SBI! works.

Click to see larger screenshot!

I may well use one of these templates for my next SBI! Site.

(Learn more about these templates
and all of the other SBI! Tools here!*)

This is SBI's newsletter publishing tool. It comes with a spamcheck tool (via Spamassassin) and gives you open rate stats.

I decided to stick with my existing newsletter tool - Aweber - rather than use Ezine Build It!. Not sure why, now, apart from I was already using Aweber when I bought my subscription to SBI!.

And, Aweber is a better email marketing solution than SBI!, but it does cost as much as SBI! (If you have more than 500 subscribers, anyway.).

(Learn more about Ezine Build It!
and all of the other SBI! Tools here!*)

I have not used this 'tool' yet, but I understand the idea behind it: identify site monetization ideas.

Obviously, I shall be using this tool very soon.

There's other stuff that SBI! offers - access to regular blogging, for example via a module called Infin It! - but I don't want to bog you down with too much info.

(Learn more about the 'other stuff'
in the vast collection of SBI! Tools here!*)

NO FTP

You cannot upload your web pages, en masse, using FTP

That's right, you can't use FTP - instead, you have to upload your pages one at a time (though Quick Reupload It! does allow you to upload 20 or so pages at a time).

This is how SBI! works. It's how many of the tools mentioned above are enabled. No FTP.

And this will either bother you or it won't. It might be more important 'how' you do something, rather than 'what' you achieve doing it a different way. I don't know - only you can answer this question! :-)

NO CGI-BIN

NO PHP

(YES to JavaScript!)

You also do not get access to CGI-Bin

If you particularly want to run a certain Perl/CGI program (or PHP) program then you can't. Sorry. (Well you can, but you have to use a module called Infin It! which basically allows you to host a subdomain elsewhere.)

Most of your programming requirements are met by SBI's proprietary tools - e.g. web forms, newsletter software.

And you can upload JavaScript.

But if you really must use a particular program then SBI! is not for you.

But then I politely ask you this question again: is 'how' more important than 'what'? (It isn't to me... :-) )

Value Exchange

(Free to use now)

"Value Exchange is a link exchange program without the spam."

This superior link exchange program is open to SBI! sites and non-SBI! sites, and is a great way of finding other sites to swap links with.

I recommend that all site owners register with Value Exchange, as it's a great way to generate a few targeted inbound links to your site.

Click here to register with Value Exchange*