Pros and Cons of Managing Multiple Websites (+ A Free Summit Invite!)

One question that often repeats itself on forums is – how many sites should I have? Should I stick with a single site and put my efforts into that one baby, or maybe two sites? How about three, four… twenty?

Let’s talk about that.

I’m here to share my experience of managing a portfolio of (dare I say it out loud) 24 websites. And yes, it’s SCARY sometimes.

By the way, if you’re finding the idea of managing multiple sites daunting (or exciting!), I’ve got something that you won’t want to miss.

I’ll be speaking at the Niche Site Summit on October 24 & 25, sharing tips on large-scale site management. The best part? It’s FREE and packed with expert advice.

More on that later, but first, let’s dive into why a multi-site portfolio can be a double-edged sword.

The Cons 👎

Let’s start with the negatives. No shortage of items for this section of the list!

Team & Overhead

With more sites, you’ll need a bigger machine. Translation: It ain’t cheap.

This goes beyond more salaries to a growing number of employees. You see, as you scale, there’s actually more overhead involved.

Of course, the same can be true when you manage a single site, but in the case of multiple sites, there’s the added headache of structuring your organization in an effective way and setting up multiple processes across the portfolio.

I’m grateful for my COO‘s contribution to that aspect, but if you don’t have one, expect a lot of work in that department. Actually, expect it even if you do have a COO. Many decisions remain mine to make.

Complexity Overload

Some sites are very similar. In fact, up until a year ago, most of our sites were the same: Simple SEO machines focused on publishing a large number of longtail articles every month. In a way, it didn’t really matter if we were publishing to a single site or to 20.

Things are different now. On a mission to diversify traffic sources and build a moat against competitors (human or silicone-based), we now work on generating traffic from Facebook, Pinterest, mailing lists, and yes, Google.

And here’s the thing. This is where strategies have to be customized for each site. No more one-size-fits-all.

Spreading Too Thin

Even when outsourcing and delegating most of the site growth and maintenance tasks, each site still takes up some of my time directly.

Granted, smaller passive sites may only require attention during “planting time,” but even they can occasionally need some TLC, in the form of deciding on a new theme, establishing the number of monthly articles to be added (drip feeding them), or – my favorite task! – boarding them to an ad network.

And remember, each site is different. So it’s not just “more,” it’s also “more complicated.”

Then there are the more active sites, where I have to be very involved, constantly shaping and adjusting strategy and implementation. It can be a LOT.

Trust me, some days I wish I had fewer sites!

But most days I don’t.

The Pros 👍

Yup, I do believe that at the end of the day, it’s worth it. At least for me. And here’s why.

Data Galore

With sites of all sizes and ages, you get a 360-view of your industry. It’s like a treasure trove of insights. I get to compare traffic sources and monetization options across multiple sites. Lots of eye-openers are revealed this way.

Room to Experiment

Multiple similar sites? Congrats, you’ve got yourself a lab. Experiment on one, and keep the other as a control.

We do this quite often. For example, I was wondering whether or not deleting failed “deadweight” articles will make Google like the site more. So I grabbed two of our sites, each with around 250 posts and a similar traffic profile.

I pruned one site, deleting the 50 least successful articles. Did nothing on the other site.

The pruned site saw an increase in traffic within a few months.

Is this conclusive evidence? Of course not. But it’s something.

Diversification

Moving on to what is possibly the most important item in the list of “pros.”

Google updates giving you sleepless nights? With multiple sites, it’s rarely all doom and gloom. Some go down, some go up. So far, it tends to balance out. For which I am very grateful.

It’s not just Google. Sites can get penalized and even banned by Pinterest or Facebook. Or they can get hacked or crash for a variety of reasons. This is a risky game. I sleep better at night knowing that I have multiple revenue-generating locomotives in our portfolio.

It’s just much more interesting!

Don’t tell anyone, but for me, this is just more fun.

With multiple sites, it’s easier to get a variety of dopamine rushes across the portfolio. Yesterday site A scored on Facebook, today site B had a spike of Pinterest traffic and tomorrow a Google update will bring an unexpected windfall for site C.

It’s an adventure that I enjoy!

Before I sign off, a quick reminder about the Niche Site Summit.

I’ll be there sharing my best strategies for large-scale content management—something we touched on today. But there’s so much more going on at the summit! It’s two days of tips, ideas, and inspiration from 22 experienced publishers.

And did I mention the live stream is free? Recordings will be available for purchase after the event (and I hope you get them after using my affiliate link for the registration!)

You’ll Learn:

• Traffic-boosting strategies that work
• Income-generating hacks from the pros
• And also my secrets to managing content at scale

As always, if you have any insights of your own to share or questions for me, hit reply and shoot me an email.