If I go through it from start to finish, I can take care of PPC,
Web Server Configuration, Copywriting, SEO, and link building,
as these are the services that I’m currently providing to my
clients without fail.

I don’t claim to be an expert web developer, although I am proficient with both HTML and CSS. I’m not a programmer, but I do my own shopping cart installs, php configurations and have been known to bulldoze my way through a hack when necessary. My SEO skills are passable and by the grace of God or Google, some of my sites have surprising ranks for relevant keywords or keyword phrases; or maybe I just lucked out and rank well for a keyword no one cares about! As for picking domain names, well, I never set out to buy and hold; I’m just dumb enough to think I can “develop them all.” As for PPC, those skills could use a bit of work. Suffice it to say, I can certainly buy a domain name and have a site up by the end of the day with a first pass at decent copy, keywords/keyword phrases and Google Adsense ads in place.

Trust me, though, none of this has put me over the tipping point.

And, since 1997, I think I’ve tried it all… shopping carts with products I stocked and sold, shopping carts with products I sold but didn’t stock, blogs, PPC, parked domains, link building, affiliate programs… The skills I have certainly give me something to do but I would not consider what I am doing a “success.”

Melanie’s suggestions of “knowing how to spot the right opportunities” and networking skill is important and arguably critical.

But I think she is closer with “the drive to follow through on projects.”

It is this drive, coupled with confidence and discipline, that keeps us focused; focused on the site we are developing, focused on the pool of potential keywords, focused on our time and potential return, focused on the research we need to do to make the site “better” and therefore more profitable.

It is very easy (for me) to get distracted online.

I see the web as a huge library filled with volumes of information of varying and sometimes dubious quality. And I am like a kid in a candy store when I sit in front of this computer. Surely I need to know how to make that trolling lure RIGHT NOW… Oh wait, I like THAT website, it’s got information about blah-blah-blah and look at how they made that layout… Hmmm, so-and-so has a new information product out; lemme just read the ad copy… sucker!

I now physically keep in front of me exactly what I will be doing on any particular day, complete with a place to put an “X” for “done!”

My list of domain names that require attention sits right here and if what I am doing is not relevant to the development or profitability of any one of those domain names, forget it. I don’t do it. Get distracted? Lose focus. Lose focus; lose time. Lose time; lose money. Lose money? Husband goes crazy.

So, my vote for the most valuable skill for online success is focus.

I think I’ve become the mercenary I was always afraid of!

But what about softer skills like networking with the right people? Knowing how to spot the right opportunities? Or developing tenacity and drive to follow through on projects?

No amount of technical knowledge will help you succeed if you don’t have those types of “skills.”

Just my two cents. Thanks for the great list and discussion starting point.

I recently discovered I’m absolutely helpless in this area : ) and if you don’t have someone willing to run the site behind the scenes (gee, wonder who THAT might be!), it is easy to get discouraged and give up.

Regular templates, fine, but fine tuning and adding those things that make your site an individual expression don’t come packaged in a template.

A really good website is a partnership. Contract out what you don’t know? Heck, for me that’s everything but the posting! : )

Now, where DID I put that HTML for Dummies? Didn’t understand it the FIRST time I read it….