I have been dabbling with the idea behind a website for some time now, but due to lack of time, partnership and legal advice, I have realised that I will unfortunately not be able to take on the idea and evolve it myself. What is the point of coming up with an idea, realising you are unable to do it, and just letting is disappear? I feel that that is pointless, and therefore I want to share it with all of you, perhaps someone here will like the idea, and make it happen. If you are looking for an idea to make some money off adsense and the likes, this one might be a good one.

Without going on and on about how the system would work, I am rather going to try and give a general summarized idea of it, and if someone wants more advice, ideas, etc, you can simply contact me.

The website would basically be a company review system. Let’s say that you work for a company in South Africa, you could come along and post a review about this company, obviously anomity would be available. A user could login, choose a company from a list of South African registered companies are write a review. Furthermore, the second part of this would be an interview section, if a person has been for an interview, they could login and write about the interview they went to at a specific company. This would start to create an excellent information base for anyone looking for a job or a new job - the person could have a look at how the company structures their interviews, therefore being able to attack it in the correct manner, or the person could login and have a read about the company they are interested in, as well as get a good idea as to what the company is about.

Letting your mind go a little more would make you realise so many things, from rating systems, to dynamic search facilities, to top reviewed company, and so on, the secondary ideas are almost endless. Adsense and advert wise, this would be a good place to stick up some adverts, users would return on a fairly regular basis I would imagine, and your adsense would probably take on the form of job style adverts, which get a rather decent click through rate.

Well, that’s the idea in a nutshell, I would actually love to see a version of this idea go live, a fancy web2.0 system, with user interaction, ajax forms, and a good sleek look!

I think it’s a good idea, what do you think?

P.s. My one concern was that of negative reviews, and companies getting angry?

Beyond The Rhetoric, by Michael Kwan, is running an excellent contest, one definitely worth taking a look at, I know the Web Entrepreneur did! He is giving away a free USB TV tuner (more about the tuner here) with PVR and time-shifting capabilities, to the value of $80!

There are three different ways to enter the contest:

1. Add Me To Your Technorati Favorites. This is by far the easiest way to enter, because all it takes is a single click. See the button on the top-right underneath the massive RSS icon? Click that. Everyone who has already added me as a favorite is already eligible to win! It’ll help if you leave a comment below with your Technorati username, but I’m sure we’ll be able to figure it out even if you don’t.
2. Review My Blog OR Put Up A Post About This Contest. Your blog entry has to be at least 200 words and it can be positive, negative, or anything in between. I’d appreciate if you linked to http://btr.michaelkwan.com using the anchor text “freelance writing“, but this is not required. If you blog about the contest, please link back to this page. For a bonus entry, take a screenshot showing that you subscribe to my RSS feed and include it in your blog entry.
3. Be One of June’s Top Commentators. There’s five spots and each of the top commentators will get one entry into the contest. Be number one on this list and get a bonus entry.

The deadline for entering the contest is July 1!

These days, the chance of coming up with something new in terms of website ideas is getting harder and harder. Technology and the likes is still expanding rapidly, which would make us think that coming up with a new idea would be easy, but truth be told.. it isn’t! I have a number of websites, which I read daily through my RSS Reader, and some of them are excellent, perhaps not completely unique, but the content is interesting, and the authors are very reachable. In my opinion, being able to reach a webmaster plays a huge role, if you have a question, and the webmaster gets back to you sooner than later, I feel that the chances of you visiting the website again is definite.

Of my regular blog reads, there are two, which I am very impressed by, and have been following them, and reading them on daily basis for a good several months now. I am going to chat about each one below, and before you ask.. No, the authors did not ask me to review their websites, nor are they even aware that I am writing this.. so I do truly think these two sites are great!

Romance Tracker dot com is a fantastic website about Old-fashioned romantic ideas, and is authored by none other than Phil van Treuren. Phil and I have chatted a number of times via email, and from what I know of him, his experience with websites and the likes was not great (in the beginning). I remember Phil asking me several questions about search engine optimisation, and a few other things, and the difference between him and most of the people who ask me questions, is that Phil took the little knowledge I gave him, and spent a lot of time researching the topics, testing the topics, and mastering them. I have watched his website start off with a really simple design, and now his website has evolved from something simple into a portal for his followers, which there are many! From just being a simple blog, now you can now find books on his website, as long as a myriad of other things, which I am not going to talk about, rather head on over and take a read yourself! Phil.. I’m truly impressed mate!

Sa Property, by WizardMan is another website, which I frequent on a regular basis. His opening paragraph reads: “A blog and homespace aimed at helping and talking to the youth in South Africa to find great financial advice with regards to bonds, finance, investing, home loans and mortgages. This is also aimed at building a greater awareness to all in South Africa as property prices escalate.” - and that is exactly what the website is about. Steven takes a great deal of time keeping his viewers happy, so much time and effort, that I actually received an email the other day stating that I had won a hamper!!! I didn’t enter a competition or anything, it is just a completely generous offer by Steven, and this is something new to me - how many websites do you frequent, where you suddenly receive an email stating that you have won something? I hear you say.. NONE! Stevens website has also evolved over the last several months into something very worth while, I am a regular reader, and always will be, as the knowledge he shares, is priceless! Loving your site Steven!

So there we have it, two fantastic websites, both worth adding to your RSS feeds!

Apologies

A mix up with my bank and a medical aid company resulted in a credit card problem, which in turn lead to an unpaid server account. I am terribly sorry for this inconvenience, and as of today, things will be back up and running.

Chris M