Advertising on the Internet
Without promotion, something terrible happens - NOTHING! -- P.T. Barnum
Think about New Years Eve, midnight. Think about billions of bits of confetti falling from the sky. Now, write an ad on a few dozen or hundred or thousand pieces of
paper and throw them into the air with the rest. That's what it's like to advertise on the internet.
Trying to make your product, service or web site known to the rest of the internet community can be very, very frustrating. Not only making it known, but getting
visitors to actually visit the site can be downright annoying.
When advertising on the internet, I have several quick rules of thumb. These are not cast in concrete, but they seem to serve me very well.
Rule number one is "people use search engines, and to get them to your site you MUST show up in the top 50 or so listings for your keywords in all of the major search
engines". Period. Nothing else will build traffic faster than getting listed in a search engine.
Rule number two is "concentrate a lot of steady effort on getting your links on other sites". This is an excellent, although very time consuming, way to build steady,
permanent increases in traffic. Not only that, but Google (and other search engines) base much of their ranking system on the number and "quality" of links to a site.
My third rule of thumb is "start free and stay free unless you've got a very good reason to pay for advertising". There are many, many ways to get free advertising on
the web. I've found very little reason to pay for submission services, email lists, banner exchanges or anything else to advertise my site.
There are many ways to get traffic to your site, and it's more-or-less worthwhile to pursue all of them. You can explore some of the following.
The domain name - Look for and find a great domain name, one that people actually type. I've got some of these, and they can generate far more traffic alone than any
search engine. If you can get hold of something that is commonly used in the address bar, then you've got it made! And it's only $8.95 to try ...
Email campaigns - Targeted email campaigns are an awesome way to get traffic to a site. The traffic from a mailing does not last long (a few days at most), but the spike
in hits can be huge. The advantage of this method is if the campaign is very well targeted then your visitors will be almost "pre-sold".
Newsletters - If your web site does not have a newsletter coming out at least monthly, then you are missing a huge promotional technique. You see, if someone likes your
site they will sign up for a newsletter. Why? Because they want to know when you've added more material and they need to know what you have to say. The wise web-marketer
will feed this need.
Free content - You want to build a steady flow of traffic that puts the search engines to shame? Give away content. Some webmasters create web graphics, which you can
use at will for a return link. Others (like myself) write articles which anyone can put on their site as long as the four like signature is included. Some even have little
java applets or other doodads which, again, can be included for a link. The massive advantage of this type of promotion is YOU DON'T HAVE TO LINK BACK. They have to link to
you, but you don't have to link to them. Thus, there is no PR (Google) risk at all, and you don't have to mess with those awful links pages which no one ever looks at.
Ebooks - Another great way to promote a site is to create an electronic book. Make the book available to all for download or distribution. Include lots of links to your
site. If the book is any good, you will have a massive number of visitors as a result in no time.
Exchanging links - Link exchanges are a good way to build traffic, although not as great as they once were. The problem is that most surfers have given up on checking
out the links on "links pages", especially if it is obvious. Be EXTREMELY careful to avoid programs which look like a link farm, such as the very popular Zeus and Links To
You programs. Google and other search engines will actually reduce the ranking and has been rumored to even ban sites which are members of link farms.
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/Linkexchange.htm
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/Linkexchange_zeus.htm
Banner programs - I've found these to be virtually worthless. Sometimes a very well designed or targeted banner can cause some traffic, but be careful spending any money
here.
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/Banners.htm
Webrings - you should join many of these to build decent traffic. They do not create huge amounts of hits, but once set up they continue to drive visitors to your site
day after day. Put the web code on pages all over your site - generally do not put them on your home page or on a webring page. See So you want to be a ringmaster? for more
information.
http://www.ring-master.net/
http://www.ring-master.net/webring000.htm
Major Search Engines - An excellent way to build traffic fast but they tend to be fickle. I've had sites appear overnight only to disappear a week later. You must
continually monitor your listings in these engines.
Directories - Get you site listed in as many as possible. At the very least, get a listing in Yahoo and DMOZ (Google uses both of these directories to seed it's own
indexes.) DMOZ is free, and you can get listed in Yahoo without charge, although it is faster and easier sometimes just to pay the few hundred bucks to get reviewed within
a couple of decades.
Minor search engines - Get listed in them all if you can. Use an automated submission technique but DO NOT submit multiple times to the major engines as this may get you
removed for spamming. Traffic is minor but steady.
Email lists - very good for building traffic. You should always have a list for your site so visitors get a constant reminder to come back. Also if you can add articles
to other email newsletters in exchange for your link appearing than do so as this can create traffic quickly.
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/Elists.htm
Newsgroups - Don't explicitly advertise as this is spamming. There are newsgroups for advertising but the return tends to be low. What you can do is make a signature (4
lines or so) and post useful messages and replies. I've found this does create some traffic, although it's not huge and it's limited in duration.
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/newsgroupwatching.htm
Email - Careful here as spam is on everyone's mind. Can build some traffic. Your own newsletter is a great way to go, as are email lists.
Awards - Apply for as many as you can for your site. You will win some. The bigger ones will generate lots of traffic. The smaller ones will cause an occasional hit but
are a good ego boost at least. See So you want to run an awards program? for a series of articles about this subject.
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/awards.htm
http://www.webs-best-awards.com/awards000.htm
All of the "multi-million hits" and similar pages - can be useful if you aggressively promote them. Get a free one (install ours if you want) and be sure to submit the
page to the search engines. See Hit Trees - Are They Effective? for more information.
http://internet-tips.net/hits/index.html
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/hittree.htm
Press Releases - These can be costly but they can also be very effective. If you can get listed in a major newspaper or web site, you may very well see your traffic go
through the roof.
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/pressreleases.htm
Contests - Run a contest of some kind on your web site, promote the contest, and you will see your hits climb.
Viral Marketing - Check out some of these viral marketing techniques. This is defined as getting others to promote for you in a subtle but effective way.
http://internet-tips.net/Viral/index.htm
Message boards, newsgroups and forums - A sure fire way to get traffic is to occasionally post relevant data to message boards, newsgroups and forums. If you include
your URL in a signature line people will visit your site to find out more about you and what you have to offer.
http://internet-tips.net/Msgboards/index.htm
Giveaways - Give away a freebie on your web site. An ebook or some such thing makes a perfect thing to give to people. Generally, it's a good idea to exchange the free
item for adding their email address to your mailing list.
Signing Guestbooks - Used properly, signing other people's guestbooks can bring a number of visitors to your site. Always say something nice and comment positively on
their site. No direct advertisement is needed, just leave your URL in the place provided or in the message as a signature. See Let the webmaster know what you think of his
site and Netiquette - Guestbook Entries for more information.
http://internet-tips.net/Surfing/Guestbooks.htm
http://internet-tips.net/Surfing/netiquette_guestbooks.htm
Weblogs - Also known as blogs, these can be great ways to promote your site. They allow you to write editorials and articles which reference your site but in a way which
you perhaps would not normally do.
Affiliate programs - Got a product to sell? Create an affiliate program and promote that. You will quickly find your links on other web sites promoting your program.
Conferences and the like - Be sure and visit as many conferences (locally is best) as you can, and bring some pens or coffee mugs with your URL engraved on it. Give
these away liberally at the conferences.
FFAs - generally not very worthwhile as your links fall off the lists too quickly. Use an automated submission program or service - don't waste a second with manual
submissions. It's also critical to remember to never, ever use your primary email account to submit to these. Your email box will be flooded with so many messages you will
want to scream.
http://www.webspiner.com/advertising/FFAs.htm
Creating FFA pages - This allows you to send confirmation emails to people who add links. A very poor way to build traffic as anyone with a brain sends these messages to
an email account which is just ignored.
My basic operating procedure is (a) examine statistics, (b) try something and then (c) reexamine statistics. For example, let's say you want to add your site to a
webring. Record your statistics for a couple of days. Add the site. Then compare. In this case, you'll also want to look at the statistics for referring sites to see if the
webring shows up. If it worked, great. If not, that's okay also. You just want to get a feel for what's working and what's not so you know where to put your time, effort
and possibly money.
Also remember that your site is more than just a homepage. In actuality, you have dozens, hundreds or even thousands of pages, each of which is a potential entry point.
Make sure each one of them advertises your site, links back to the home page and is complete within themselves. You can also run multiple advertising experiments with your
site by using the different pages.
One of the really great things about the internet is how automatic it all can be. Many of these advertising techniques are of the "set it up and forget it" variety. Add
a site to a webring, then forget about it. Visitors will be drawn to your site from now on. Maybe not many, but you do not need to put in any more effort to get those
visitors after your site is added.
Some things, however, require constant vigilance. Search engines top this list. You can easily fall off a search engine, so you must constantly (weekly perhaps) check
your ranking in each of the major engines.
In a nutshell, use statistics. Monitor your progress. Set up as much automated advertising as you can. Initially concentrate at least half of your efforts on search
engines, then once you are listed concentrate on setting up link exchanges with other similar sites. Don't forget the other avenues for advertising, though, as all of them
have some kind of payoff.
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