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Comment by pjy04 | Hacker News Reader

I know how you feel. I got out of the content race a year ago and it seems like Panda destroyed 9 out of 10 sites out there focused in the content space.

The best thing you can continually do is push out better content, get linkbacks and decrease your bounce rate.

Have you thought about putting adsense on your site?

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Thanks for the response. It doesn't seem like Google fully "gets" my site. It appears they often times try to rank me as if I'm a mainstream sports site but then overlook me for my area of specialty (sports collectibles). For instance, I may rank for the term "Lou Gehrig" or "Hope Solo" but not for "Lou Gehrig cards" or "baseball cards". Its bizarre since mainstream sports is so much more competitive an area. However a mainstream sports fan is going to bounce after reading an article unless they also happen to be a collector. That kind of traffic is better directed to mainstream sports sites.

I already have links from all the main industry sites and think I've done a good job of onsite SEO. What else can I do to help Google more appropriately "theme" my site and understand its specific area of authority?

As for Adsense, I have tried it in the past but the payoff per click for my niche is really low. I prefer eBay for this site because I can incorporate it in a way that actually adds value to the user experience.

Just out of curiosity, where did you go after leaving the content publishing arena?

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