Viralogy

Contact: Will [at] killeraces.com
Twitter: @WiseBread
Websites: http://www.wisebread.com/

Why you should watch this interview

Will has done an amazing job as the Marketing Director at Wise Bread.  His blog has reached over a million pageviews per month, and is generating some significant revenue.  He’s not stopping there; he has about 4 other blog projects that he’s working on that he plans to make big as well.

Will walks you from the conception of the idea, to how he successfully marketed the site.  You can use each and every strategy he used to build a successful blog of your own.

Will is a great guy so if you ever need any advice about blogging, monetization, or community building, just reach out to Will and he will be more than happy to help out.  Enjoy!

Conversation Breakdown

How and why did you guys create WiseBread.com?

Killer Aces was started in December of 2006.  Will was a Lawyer making a 6 figure income that had no idea how to budget or control his spending.  Will couldn’t find a personal finance blog that he could really connect with, so he reached out to his friends Greg and Linh  and together they created the Wise Bread blog.

When did you guys decide to bring in other writers besides the original three founders?

Will immediately hired writers for the blog.  He feels that if you have multiple writers that can focus just on the writing, then he can focus on the marketing and the other members on the team can focus on what they do best.  This creates a terrific division of labor that makes everyone super effective.

What methods did you use to drive traffic to the site at the very beginning?

Will loves using Digg, Stumble, and Reddit.  He would use them even if he wasn’t the Lead Marketer for Wise Bread.  Because of this Will developed an excellent community on social bookmarks which helped get Wise Bread posts to the front page of the major social bookmarking sites.  Once he got a few stories on the front page, it wasn’t long until this became a natural occurence.

How were you able to be a full-time lawyer and work on Wise Bread at the same time?

Will stayed at his Lawyer position full-time for about a year and half.  Once he reached the year and a half mark, he was able to become full-time at Wise Bread and devote all of his time and energy to it.

The great thing about his Lawyer position was that he was reviewing marketing strategies for companies which allowed him to develop some crucial marketing strategies of his own for Wise Bread.

How much traffic do you need before you can start generating money with your blog?

Traffic is not what’s important; the most important factor of a blog is now engagement.  Companies need to focus on the types of reader a blog has, the level of engagement and community, and how much the readers respect the blogger.  These are the truly important metrics that tell the quality of the blogger.

What is your ultimate goal?

Will’s goal is to make personal finance fully accessible to everyone.  He has been doing an amazing job with Wise Bread and I know that he will reach his goal.