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soloston Ask HN: How do you dole out commission payments to many users?

I strongly recommend that you consider one of the affiliate networks (CJ.com or one of the other big 4) to use for this type of thing.

They all handle payments and all of the other details automatically. All you have to do is keep some money in an escro account and be willing to absorb their fees. Generally they charge 20% on top of any affiliate payments.

soloston Ask HN: How long did it take to get a good amount of users visiting your site?

In my experience the fastest way to acquire users, other than paid search, is via an affiliate program. I have launched 7 programs for e-commerce properties in the last 3 years and the average first months traffic to a brand new site has been 20,000 unique visitors in the first month. Traffic growth has always excellerated from month to month as we acquired new affiliates to participate in the program.

soloston Ask HN: What are the benefits of a small business using Groupon?

My email adress is in my profile.

soloston Ask HN: What are the benefits of a small business using Groupon?

It depends on the type of small business and the situation that it is in. There is a wide range of risk vs. reward opportunities.

For example: If you are a service business, assume you are a massage therapist. If you are a new business your overhead tends to be the space you rent from a salon. So discounting your product to get 1st time customers in and filling potentially empty hours that are only costing you money is a good thing even at a reduced rate. Add to that knowing that if you do a good job some of those customers may repeat is a win win for your small business. Not only do you get business you might not have normally had you gain the true potential for future business and the opportunity for some word of mouth marketing as well.

A restaurant on the other hand is a much different situation than the massage therapist example from above. A restaurant owner has a lot of cost built into their product. Not only do they have overhead but they have a cost of goods sold and usually have a limited margin on everything but alcohol. Restaurant coupons are seemingly always in demand and the daily deals sites are always looking for more offers from them. Crafting a deal that can insure profitability is key because more often than not these coupon using customers don’t come back until they get the next coupon.

If you are an e-commerce small business and you are selling a product you have to be much more careful. Business with large margins and sales prices in excess of $100 seem to do best. Businesses with smaller margins almost always lose money on their sales because they don’t have the margins to be able to absorb the discount plus their share to the daily deals site.

I work with a few of the largest players in the space so if you need help or advice let me know.

soloston Ask HN: When is the time to walk away from a startup?

I think in your situation the answer is to start looking for your next opportunity now. It may take you a while to find that next gig and during that time you will have a little longer to evaluate / make changes to your current opportunity.

It sounds to me like you have also learned something; a lean mean start up where you have to live paycheck to paycheck is not the best type of environment for you to operate in. If finances stress you out then I am sure they are negatively impacting your work and personal life. I strongly suggest when looking for that next gig make sure you get a position where the wages will be enough that you don't have them as a source of continual concern.

Tons of startups fail for any number of reasons, walking away from 6 months work shouldn't overly bother you unless you believe strongly that the startup is close to turning the corner. Define turning the corner in whatever sense you need to - creating a great product, getting funded, becoming ROI positive without funding, etc.

Finally remember sometimes you will do more good by leaving than you ever could have by staying. If the technical process is making you insane, it might be best for you to go and for them to get someone else in who might be able to unmuddle the situation. Either way there is no shame in leaving, just be sure not to purposely burn any bridges when you do.

Best of luck with your decision.

soloston Ask HN: pre-screening the generalist employee

I think there are four things you want to look for:

A personality that meshes with your office environment – Will this person be an asset to the corporate culture and smoothly assimilate?

Signs of Competence – Will this person be able to complete the tasks assigned successfully and do they display a history of doing so?

Signs of Diligence and Follow Through – Will this person show initiative and make common sense decisions without having to ask permission every step of the way? Getting things done without excuses is important as the details always matter.

References – Can this person provide a list of quality references? Clearly if you can get referenced from an existing mployee that should always carry additional positive consideration.

I think that is about all you can ask for in a generalist position.

soloston Ask HN: How do you deal with all these passwords?

It might sound odd, but I just create an entry in my contacts in outlook for each service. I've never lost a password and I have access to them whever I go.

soloston Ask HN: Whats your preferred CMS for non technical users?

I highly recommend that you check out: http://www.expressionengine.com as it might be what you are looking for. I hope that helps.

soloston Ask HN: Best Book On Search Engine Optimization?

I recommend that you don't go for books. SEOMoz.com and SEOBook.com are the two best seo resources out there. They both have free servies and pay services and you cannot go wrong should you chose to invest in either even for a short time.

Also checkout seo.alltop.com for staying up to date on the latest happenings in the SEO world. Finally if you have specific questions feel free to send me a PM I have been an active full time SEO since 1999.

soloston Ask HN: Why is Everyone Leaving Google?

Why has no one said for the lure of financial gain? Google isn't going to make many of their new employee’s multi millionaires through stock grants. There are a lot of appealing companies that have an opportunity to make it really big right now and pay off handsomely for those that work for them.

Along the same lines a lot of people at Google have worked “enough” and want to take their money and relax / go do something else. Since many folks there are financial secure it is really up to them when they want to take a break. It seems in the technology space anything beyond about a two year term is considered a long time to work at a company.

Overall I believe Google is still very attractive, however if you want to hit if big financially there are a lot of other places nearly as appealing with that large financial incentive still out there.

soloston Ask HN: What are you reading right now?

I just finished The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss and started Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch. For those of you reading Ice and Fire or who have finished all of the current work I recommend both of these series.

I also look at The Book of 5 Rings and The Art of War on a regular basis.

soloston Ask HN: Interviews during startup acquisition process

I think it depends a lot on whether the acquisition is based on their desire to have your product or their desire to acquire your team or both. The reason the potential acquisition is taking place will have a lot to do with the experience you have.

As far as the questions go, I would expect them to be appropriate to your role and contribution to the organzation, however assume that everything will be fair game and be sure to review with the founder of your company where the off limits zones are.

I know it sounds bad, but if an offer doesn't materialize and they acquire some piece of critical information from you your business could risk losing some edge that you currently have in your space.

Good Luck!

soloston Ask HN: Unique domain or subdomain?

Taking a quick look, I think the experience is okay. While things are different they are not so radically different as to make me feel uncomfortable as a user.

I am not sure if this is the approach I would take, I very much like the homepage theme, however I am certain you have reason why you are doing what you are.

Good luck and keep us up to date.

soloston Ask HN: Unique domain or subdomain?

Why use subs over directories? If you really want to build a site and brand as well as have your hard work pay off I recommend directories over either option.

From an SEO and link popularit standpoint you will only have to worry about a single domain and all of the link building you do will benefit the site over all. With subs you need to treat each sub as a unique URL from a link popularity standpoint making your SEO efforts that much more work.

From a marketing perspective again directories feel like the better way to go. If you are building a single brand and not differentiating the products greatly other than by subject matter then directories again feel like a better way to go.

Generally I recommend subs for areas of a site that you don't want to have indexed and don't want to worry about natural search for.

As far as unique domains unless you want to operate a network of sites you would just be creating a lot more work for yourself than is probably worth it in the begining.

soloston Is it worth trying to work for a startup if you aren't a coder/MBA?

I think for someone like yourself it is all about fit. What type of work are you looking to contribute to the start up? Can you contribute to some or all of project management, marketing, design, strategic planning, or even basic coding?

Taking the time to understand how you can make a team better and then articulating that first to yourself (be honest about what you really have to offer) and then to a start up is in my opinion the best way to go.

If you want to work for a tech start up and have the personality to mesh with the team and the drive to contribute meaningfully even in the smallest ways (ego can often get in the way), then keep looking. Go to start up events, meet as many people as you can and eventually a relationship with click.

It is hard to be patient, however if you really want it then just keep going. Finding the work you may discover was the easy part, even if it wasn't so easy.

I wish you the best of luck.

soloston Should I leave my startup?

My suggestion before doing anything else, decide whether the real problem is the other founder or the business. Once you answer that question it can make the decision making process either. Looking at everything you have said, my interpretation is that you are basically displeased with:

1. Your non technical co-founder and the way he interacts with you

2. The lack of a technical team both from a work load and social perspective

If you really believe, like you say you do, that the business is going to go somewhere then it would be really foolish to walk away before exploring all avenues for solving issues 1 and 2 above.

I'd consider a heart to heart with your co-founder and explain very clearly what is bothering you about your interactions together and see if there is a way to solve your issues. I'd also look at the business assets and see if there would be a way to hire, even if part-time, another technical person to assist you. If neither of these approaches brings you relief, consider buying out your partner if it is something you could manage to do?

It isn't always bad to walk away from a project. However with what you have said, it opens a lot of questions about you personally as well. Starting a business is always extremely difficult, my last suggestion would be to take a really good look at yourself in the mirror and ask would you be leaving for the right reasons? If the answer is yes and nothing else works then you have to leave.

soloston Ask HN: How to select and build content for specific domain names?

Don't do number 1 - instead build that content on your own site. In the long run you will be better off. Number 1 is more of a way to creatively build links, but domain number 1 won't have link popularity to pass. So unless it has high exact match value, you are better off not using that strategy.

Number 2 - There is value in that domain buy only acquire it if you want to chuck your existing domain and 301 everything to the new one.

soloston Ask HN: Experiences with retargeting?

I strongly suggest that you locate a retargetting company that operates purely on a Cost Per Acquisiton (CPA) model. There are enough high quality firms out there that use this model that it makes no sense what so ever to pay a flat fee. However you must watch out for view through conversions. I recommend you hit this article:

http://www.adoperationsonline.com/2010/02/25/retargeting-exp...

soloston Ask HN: Who uses Google Alerts and what for?

I use Google alerts to track news on my clients and their competition. It seems to work well and I can usually skim through the data pretty quickly. In my line of work it is critically important that I stay up to date on the latest news in 1/2 a dozen retail marketing verticals and this is one of the many ways to do so.

soloston Ask HN: First employee salary?

My advice is to really work out the value proposition. How much value is the first employee going to bring when it comes to revenues and how fast will those revenues materialize? $5k just isn't that much money but if it feels like it will over-stress your business then maybe you are not ready for an employee and need to keep progressing the way you have been even if it means you move slower than you would like.

The other option I would consider is contracting out some projects to the experienced engineer if he is open to it and discover more about what he can do, how he can help, and get a real feeling for what he will bring to the business.

soloston Ask HN: Do all startups do SEO?

It depends what kind of business it is to be honest. Most start ups focus on their product and worry about marketing and SEO later on.

SEO is just a single internet marketing tactic and in all honesty until you have something worth marketing beyond friends and family, I wouldn't worry about it or any of the other internet marketing tactics you might consider until the appropriate time.

With that said there is nothing wrong with creating an SEO frinedly site and blog early on. However I wouldn't get overly concerned about them until you really have something worth marketing. At that point you need to look at the marketing plan and I would be sure to include SEO as part of it.

SEO really has three key parts. Good on page optimization, quality content creation, and high quality link building with solid anchor text. Do those three things well and you will succeed.

I hope that helps.

soloston Ask HN: Subscribe to SEO Book or no?

SEOBook and SEOMoz are both excellent services. I would recommend using all of their free resources first. SEOBook has a free 7 day "course" you can sign up for to get a feel for it, plus a lot of free content. SEOMoz also has excellent tools and information as well.

If you are just looking for the basics there is a ton of free information out there. Hit seo.alltop.com to see the majority of the best sites for SEO news and information.

soloston Ask HN: What are some good GoDaddy alternatives?

http://www.namesarecheap.com has performed great for me for the last 5 years.

soloston Secret Code Phrases to Get What You Want from Your Graphic Designer

I work with designers every day and I can tell you I had to share this around and their reaction along with my own is summed up perfectly in your comments. What a terrible way to portray the expectations of the design profession.

soloston Ask HN: Advice for Freelancing

I think the answer is that you should post any work that you have done and want to share with potential customers.

If you are going to post work for hire, make it clear it was work for hire and done to a clients specifications. If you are going to post projects from class work, just make clear the purpoes of the project.

I also think it is a good idea to post projects you did for yourself to display your level of talent and creativity, espcially when you haven't done a lot of work for hire. Just always be honest about how and why you did the projects.

Check out this site for portfolio ideas: http://alexmeraz.com/

soloston Ask HN: Advice for Freelancing

My first suggestion is to make sure that you have some type of portfolio even if it is small. In my experience a lot of web designers create their own brand around their name and have a site with their portfolio. I'd then make sure you have some decent business cards so that when you start attending local events you have something to leave with prospective customers.

In most decent sized cities there seem to be numerous networking and small business events that are usually free or have only a modest fee to attend. I recommend checking the local chamber of commerce as well as using Google to locate them. Sites like http://www.networkingphoenix.com/ in Phoenix have a lot of events where you can get out and meet small and large business owners.

If that isn’t your style there are numerous websites advertising the need for talent to do one off projects. The issue with many of these sites is they want a lot for a little. But if you need experience, want to build your portfolio and or don’t mind working cheap then this might be a good route to start.

From there it is up to you. Also remember as you start getting clients, make sure you give them the best possible service as over time they can become your best source of business. Referral business often generates the best possible customers.

soloston Ask HN: How early did you bring in a full-time marketer?

My first advice is figure out what type of marketer do you want? There is a huge difference between a business development specialist and an online marketer. Generally a business development specialist is focused on distribution, partnerships, sales, and potentially affiliate programs if you are lucky. A traditional internet marketer will be focused on SEO, content development, user experience, email etc.

My advice is that if you can make the time you should start looking now, even if you are not ready to hire. It is going to take some time to find the right person to mesh with your personalities and if you do find a great person they need to be as excited about your product as you are.

soloston Ask HN: Are irrelevant degrees at all useful?

I have had the exact same experience and I highly recommend it especially if you want to go on and get an advanced degree.

soloston Everything You Already Know About SEO

Google is a registrar and they look for patterns in how domains are registered. We know in their efforts to "fight" spam they certainly have some measurement in place that looks at domains that are registered for 1 year versus domains that are registered for more than 1 year.