Every web site has ONE thing in common: to be successful, they must have traffic. No Traffic will equal NO sales no matter how well done your site is or how high your closing rate is. So, every web site out there is looking for ways of producing more traffic at a lower cost.
Today, we are going to be examining some of the best of those ways and show you how you can put them to use in your site no matter what your products or services are...These are not a complete list of traffic tools, but they can get you started in the right direction.
1) Search Engines
I don't put as much value on the search engines as I used to, but they are still an awesome way to build traffic to your site without having to spend your hard earned dollars.
It has quickly erupted into a major battle between webmasters and search engines to try to figure out how to get that coveted Top 20 position in the rankings under searched for keywords. If you come up on top, you get hundreds of hits from each keyword monthly. If you come up in the 1,000 position, you get zilch.
The difficulty in achieving the top positions is the fact that many of the search engines change their ranking formats almost monthly to stay ahead of the pack. It becomes almost a full time job just to figure out which techniques work on which engines.
To help you out in your battle for supremacy, I have recorded some of the top Internet Resources for the war:
http://www.magic-city.net/
http://searchengineforums.com/bin/Ultimate.cgi
http://www.bizpromo.com/free/fivetips.htm
2) Newsgroup, Forum, and Mailing List Participation
The second tactic I recommend EVERY internet marketer use is to participate in targeted forums and newsgoups on their subject. If you are not currently participating, why not? It's Free!
You start visiting the forum regularly and then once you know your way around it, you should start answering questions for people and becoming an all around helpful individual. Give and it will be given back to you.
You will be able to build up relationships in these forums and build up your traffic at the same time without every having to spend a penny...
To find out more about how to participate in forums for maximum traffic, check out this free report:
http://www.bizpromo.com/free/networking.htm
The Best Places to find the actual forums and newsgroups are:
Forums can be found at http://www.forumone.com/
Newsgroups can be searched at http://www.dejanews.com/
Mailing Lists are found at http://www.liszt.com/
3) Trading Links with Other Sites
Another ZERO cost marketing technique is to trade links with other web sites. Now, I know from experience this can be a daunting task at first...you trade 10 links and only get an ounce of traffic from it...but what happens when you start having hundreds or thousands of sites linked to you?
Where do you start? Start off by getting out there and offering...offer to trade links with people who are in the same forums, newsgroups, and mailing lists as you. Go to some of the online databases that have links. Participate in banner exchanges and link exchanges. Nothing will happen unless you take the initiative and do something today...
For top resources in this area, check out:
http://www.whitepalm.com/fourcorners/linkswapping.shtml
http://www.ezfree.net/free/users/main.shtml
http://www.bizpromo.com/free/banners.htm
4) Writing Articles for Ezines and Magazines
There are thousands of ezines and magazines out there just waiting for your articles. What is your area of expertise...write on it OR if you don't want to do the writing, collect the information together in some kind of organized manner and have a local writer (Check the newspaper reporters) do your article for you.
Once you have your highly informative article ready to go, contact publishers of ezines and magazines and submit your piece. Think about the publicity you can get through this...it can bring thousands of people to your site with almost no cost at all.
For information on ezines, check out:
http://www.site-city.com/members/e-zine-master/
For the Top Media Directory for Offline Publications:
http://www.gebbieinc.com/
5) Use CGI Traffic Plug-Ins On Your Site
There are many CGI programs out there which can help become traffic generators by having your visitors return over and over again. Tools such as classified ad sites, free-for-all link pages, message boards, chat rooms, postcard sites, and more can all contribute to your overall traffic building plan.
Many of these programs can be added to your website for little or no money. Take a look at this resource for finding these types of scripts:
http://www.cgi-resources.com/Programs_and_Scripts/Perl/
For many people though, installing a CGI program may be the nightmare on web street. For those of you who are technically challenged, CGI Resource has a list of places where you can have your traffic plug-ins remotely hosted for you. Check out their remotely hosted scripts at:
http://www.cgi-resources.com/Programs_and_Scripts/Remotely_Hosted/
6) Running Co-op Ads with Other Web Sites
Many webmasters are now achieving large amounts of traffic at their web site by organizing co-op ads. For example, you could purchase a postcard in a card deck which goes out to 100,000 people for between $1495 - $2000. Then, you would sell 10 or so ads on it for $149 or $199 and make back the money that you paid out for the ad. Then, your web site ad gets to ride along for FREE.
Some webmasters are employing this technique so far that they get 10 million or more postcards mailed out for their web sites every year for FREE. What kind of traffic would that build to your site?
Call Money'N Profits for information on their deck at: 212-785-9080
7) Press Releases
This is a technique that is only now coming of age online. How many times have you heard all of the other techniques I gave to you above only to have this one left out of the entire web marketing picture.
Don't just think it takes knowing the right people to get your press releases out there...it doesn't. If you can give the media stories which are interesting and revealing, they will be glad to publish it...Do you have a new exciting product? Do you have an event going on at your site that's newsworthy? Come up with one and then contact the media...
Now, with the power of email, we can contact the media for little or no cost. Although there are services online which will do the contacting for you, I recommend you get a hold of the media addresses and contact them yourself for best results.
The best way to get a hold of the media's contact information is through Gebbie All-in-One Media Directory. Gebbie Press publishes the All-In-One Media Directory, listing: 23,000 USA TV/Radio stations, Daily/Weekly newspapers, Trade/Consumer magazines, Black/Hispanic media, syndicates, networks and more. They offer this in print, on disk or mailing labels. They've been doing this for 40 years and are the best around.
They will send you a sample disk full of addresses ready to use for FREE if you simply fill out their form at: http://www.gebbieinc.com/
Next time some one asks you to plunk down $1,000 for an ad, check back on these 7 ways to advertise your site for little or no cost. Many of them can create awesome traffic at your site and don't cost a penny. The ones which do have a small cost to them can produce traffic worth far more than many of the ads out there.
To promote an internet web site does not require a large advertising budget. In cases, I think those who have a large budget at their disposal have a BIG disadvantage when marketing online. They pay for ad after ad and end up losing most of their money. Online, in many cases, the best things in life are free.