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If you own a website then you are certainly concerned with getting it noticed and increasing your traffic. However, you might not have a large budget for advertising or marketing and simply don’t know what to do to get your website noticed without spending a lot of money. Well, the following 5 tips will help your website attract attention without spending any money!

Tip #1 Submit to Directories
Submitting your website to directories is generally free and all you have to do is provide your website’s URL, a brief description, and then your site will be listed in the directory for people to browse. In addition, not only will people be able to browse the listings, but your site will also have more one way links pointing back to your site that will increase your rankings in the search engines.

Tip #2 Submit to Search Engines
If you want to get your site noticed then you want to make it easy on web surfers to find your site. So, submit your site to the search engines to have it indexed. Then , when people search the web for certain keywords they just might find your site and drop by to take a look.

Tip #3 Reciprocal Links
Reciprocal links are another good idea if you are interested in increasing your search engine rankings. Simply trade links with other websites and you host their link on your site and they host your link on their site. This does not take much effort or time and once you have the links you will basically have free advertising.

Tip #4 Include Your URL Everywhere
Your URL needs to be on all types of communication you use. For example, make sure your URL is included on your stationary, business cards, in all of your e-mails, and the like. When your URL is posted everywhere you will surely increase your site’s traffic.

Tip #5 Email List
You can create an email list from all the visitors that have visited your website and periodically send them updates advertising different services or specials. Make it easy to unsubscribe, too. Before you know it you will have more people visiting your site and others recommending your site as well.

SearchArticles.net features over 13,000 articles, tips and information. Visit www.SearchArticles.net for more Web Site Promotion articles

Well I find it time to speak again about linking as I have a couple of times in the past two years. I think I have gone the cycle and I think I have arrived.

What do we want linking to do for us and what can linking actually do for us?

Well we want it to get us traffic. Most of us think it can get us traffic two ways. One way we hope to get traffic is by making the search engines think we are good because of all the links to us. We are hoping that will rank us higher in those search engines.

All the SEO companies want to help us be on the FIRST PAGE of Google. Well with the billions of websites now and all the keywords maxed out – can we all be on the first or second page? Of course not!

So, how much does it really matter where you rank in Google?
Let me give you an example provided by David Notestine from Zeus link management programming. He will provide server logs to back up stats that show:

- they get 6000000 hits per month for Zeus

- about 20 of those hits are from search engines

- about 3 percent result from paid adwords (not profitable he says)

- the remainder are from hits from links on other websites

What should we really expect from our linking strategy. Let’s get hits from links on other sites. Forget that other stuff about pleasing the Google Gods!

So why don’t we all help each other with good linking practices? If you are going to link to me so that others can find my site, why in the hell don’t you make it easy for those visitors to go from your home page to your link index? WHERE IS THE DAM Text to click on for links? If I can’t find it to verify my link, then I know damn well that your site visitors won’t find it or even look for it if it’s that hard to find. As you can see, this really irks me.

Secondly, for your link site to be useful to me, visitors need to find me or my product in that huge directory that we all are trying to develop. The best way to make it easy for searchers to find a link to a website or product is with a “search utility” installed and kept current on the page of that big link directory. Visitors can then search for a product, name or contact and get easy and immediate results.

The difference we see here is that a few little things like this will make linking work the way it should for ALL of us and not for just ten or twenty websites!

Tom Henricks is an amatuer webmaster who has written a few articles that have been published to the internet.
He operates a website for marketing of quality products at fair prices.
See website http://www.tomsvirtualmall.com

Increasing website traffic involves setting aside a definite number of hours in a day to promote the business. This also means taking time for business planning to establish a definite direction for the site.

It is also important for the owner not to rely on the strength of his product or service, or of his employees. In addition, any effort to boost traffic does not have to entail huge costs.

The owner should endeavor to maximize use of all outgoing print or electronic documents to promote the site. These would include business cards, business stationery and other print material.

The company’s name, URL and all other contact details, logo, address, and slogan should be prominent in all distributed material.

This move to exhaust all promotional possibilities should also apply to emails, bill payments, faxes and receipts. The data should always contain updated information, including pricing and special offers and awards received, if any.

Press releases and articles are also useful tools for low-cost business promotion. Such articles can serve as free advertising and lead to word-of-mouth promotion of the site.

An article should be as specific as possible and appear in a print publication or e-zine that reaches the website’s core audience. The market now offers quite a number of both print and online sources open to unsolicited content from unknown writers – as long as the article is not in any way offensive or would create legal problems.

Press releases are another free tool for building a company’s site traffic. However, such a release should be newsworthy and attract interest. This means news such as business expansion, a new product, sponsorship of a major event, or an award for business excellence.

High-traffic Internet forums are another inexpensive way of marketing the site. Although blatant advertising is generally prohibited, the site owner can let forum members know his business background and basic data on his company’s product or service. This approach is ideally geared more toward business-related forums and sites.

Buddy marketing is another inexpensive way to promote the site and boost traffic. The strategy calls for adding a partner company’s leaflet or card when sending out one’s own brochures, with the other busines reciprocating. This gives both businesses the ability to reach more potential customers.

This marketing style works particularly well for complementary businesses such as a sporting goods store and a store offering athletic apparel, a newspaper dealer and a magazine seller, and a pet supplies and pet grooming company.

Offering freebies either as a reward or business promotion also works for most businesses. This could be extra roses for a buyer of a bouquet of flowers, free cones for every gallon of ice cream bought, or a strong hanger for someone who purchases a particular type of coat. This approach builds positive consumer sentiment that can easily translate to more traffic.

One more way of site promotion to boost traffic is by appearing on a local radio or TV show looking for guests or an expert in a particular field or industry. An auto mechanic can offer advice on car maintenance and repair, while a pet store owner can give pet care tips. Similar to freebies, such appearances generate goodwill for the business.

Free seminars or presentations will also help boost site traffic. A local carpet maker can schedule one to teach participants about installing specific flooring types and later offer special discounts for that particular product.

Some companies also have their names and key contact details painted on vehicles. This mobile form of advertising is ideal particularly for businesses that depend a lot on the transportation of their products or goods.

An enjoyable way to promote a business is through the owner’s leisure activities. Participation in a rock band, a local race competition or marathon can be taken as an opportunity to have the company’s brand on printed on promotional t-shirts or simply mentioned to identify the owner and his business before or after the performance.

Free public relations opportunities are also available ove the internet. One crucial factor with Web-based PR work is that it should match any campaign in print or other traditional media. This will ensure that consumers are not confused with mixed messages.

The main consideration a site owner must remember is that any effort to promote the business and increase traffic without incurring significant costs only requires creativity and the willingness to try simple ideas that already work. However, any approach adopted must not pull target consumers away from the company’s product or service.

Webmasters understand that quality and relevant inbound links can increase site visibility; your search engine rating; and with any luck increase your traffic and revenue.

While working to locate relevant links for our site, we discovered a disturbing practice apparently being used to increase link popularity and search engine ranking. The following are the sorted details of our journey and discovery.

1) Most webmasters understand the hunt for quality relevant sites is, like most things of value in life, a time consuming and difficult task. Being limited on time, we first tried to hire a leading SEO expert to locate relevant links. When the SEO expert did not return emails, we tried a few link exchange sites. While a few good quality links were unearthed, the link exchange sites simply did not offer a large quantity of good relevant sites. After all, our competitors had hundreds of thousands of inbound links and we had less than 900. While tempting, we skipped over the advertisements for traffic as our desire was for prospective customers not traffic.

2) We finally decided on the DIY approach. First step, check current reciprocal links page to insure all was well. A few sites no longer linked to us, so our webmaster links page required a few updates.

3) Next we chose to use Link Popularity Check to locate links that our competitors have, that we perhaps missed. The first thing we noticed was hundreds of inbound links a competitor had, all coming from a few specific sites. Upon visiting the sites, we noticed that one was a “directory” and several others were normal sites that contained very little content. In short, the directory and other sites were nothing a competent webmaster could not create in a day or two.

4) We found it odd the inbound sites all have the same visual look, color scheme, and navigation. Our competitor’s site was also listed in the “Related Resources” area on each and every page. The light bulb suddenly switched on! The inbound sites appeared to have been created for the sole purpose of increasing link popularity and therefore the competitor’s search engine ranking!

5) Ping the four sites to locate the IP addresses. Four different addresses, not in consecutive order. Perhaps we were mistaken.

6) A few mouse clicks to see who owned the domain names of the four sites. All the sites are owned by the same company, are housed at the same ISP, and have the same email address listed for the administrative and technical contact names.

7) A few mouse clicks at Alexa.com to review traffic patterns show the sites have very little traffic, yet all have a PageRank score of 6 or higher. Site traffic is increasing for each.

Nope, it does not appear we were mistaken. It appears a competitor actually created web sites for the sole purchase of increasing his/her link popularity and search engine ranking for their primary business site. To recreate such a process:

• Register a domain name that is tied to your primary sites keyword list. For example, if your primary site sells widgets and has a domain name of Widgets.com, something like “Widget- Directory.com” would be ideal;

• Setup a new hosting account with your ISP, using a different IP address, for Widget-Directory.com;

• Create a few pages that use the keyword list from Widgets.com, then setup a link system that invites webmasters to exchange links. Remember, no need to get carried away with content as the purpose of Widget-Directory is really keyword tie-in and link exchanges;

• Now, code every page of Widget-Directory with a link back to Widget.com;

• Sit back and watch. As webmasters enter their sites and subcategories into Widget-Directory, the results will increase the link quantity and apparently your search engine ranking of Widget-Directory AND Widgets.com.

We were curious to see if this was an isolated incident or a rampant practice. While not rampant, it did not take us long to find others companies utilizing this technique. Is this ethical? I am sure some would argue this is a savvy internet marketing practice, while others will view the practice as repulsive. Ethical or not, this technique is simple, cost effective, and apparently will increase your search engine ranking. One thing is clear, I will never look at directory sites or link exchange pages the same.

Hopefully, the search engine will adjust their algorithms and nullify this practice. In the interim, for those that take a negative PR and/or link exchange hit, remember that honesty builds longevity and lasting relationships. Remember the SEO expert we previously tried to hire? We went back and checked his site, and yes he utilizes the same technique. Odd thing however, his sites no longer enjoys top ratings on the major search engines. Perhaps, the search engines are starting to figure this one out.

Lew Newlin is CTO of Information Solutions, Inc. that operates SiteRecon that specializes in email monitoring and web site monitoring for businesses.

You’ve got some content on your site. You are looking to get the word about your site out there. Getting a marked increase in web site traffic can be a challenging task for webmasters, especially aspiring webmasters. Internet traffic plays a huge role in determining the success of your web site.

Don’t have enough traffic? Then you won’t have enough opportunities for visitors to perform your most desired action. This action could range from getting your visitor to subscribe to your newsletter or to contact you for more information about your business.

So how do you get that increase in web site traffic you want? There are a variety of ways, both free and paid, to get more web site traffic. You could go about getting any type of traffic, but that wouldn’t help much unless it was targeted. Targeted visitors are more valuable. Targeted visitors come to your site with the right frame of mind. They are hoping that your site will provide them with the information they are looking for.

1. Search engines

Search engines can provide an enormous increase in web site traffic. Search engine spiders can find you through their daily travels on the web. However, it doesn’t hurt to manually submit your site to search engines. And if you want to increase the chances that you’ll be found in search engine rankings, read up on search engine optimization.

2. Link exchanging

When you exchange links with relevant, non-competing sites, you add value to your web site. If your visitors can’t find what they’re looking for on
your web site, your links may help them. And if you have only high-quality links, you’ll increase the chance that your visitors will come back to your web site.

3. Submit to directories

Submit to major directories like the Open Directory Project and Zeal so that your web site becomes more visible. Also submit to themed directories with topics relevant to your web site. Smaller directories may not be too beneficial in terms of web site traffic but they can give you more inbound links.

4. Pay-per-click advertising

Pay-per-click advertising can help you get more web site traffic. Pay-per-click advertising is a popular form of advertising where you pay for an ad to be included in specific search engine results pages. It’s easy to lose money with this type of advertising so get a guide. Pay-per-click advertising can deliver targeted traffic to your site as interested visitors click on your ad. Make your ad specific and bring them to a relevant page on your web site.

5. Submit articles

Write excellent articles about your web site’s topic. Articles can increase your reputation and establish you as an expert in your field. Or they can shine a negative light on you if you submit total garbage. If your articles keep readers interested, then they may want to visit your site for more information.

6. Word of mouth

Tell everyone you know about your web site. If your web site is excellent or stands out from the crowd, the word will spread as more and more people hear about it. If it works, the effect can be huge. So do whatever you can to mention your site in your daily contact. For example, add an email signature to promote your web site.

7. Traffic exchange

You have to be careful with traffic exchanges. Some programs tend to be very untargeted as they simply show pages to members. However, there are programs that can bring in more targeted visitors. Some programs let you show ads so only visitors who are interested will come to your web site.

Article by Derick Yung. Increase your web site traffic with Instant Buzz, a free traffic exchange that brings in targeted visitors. To find out how to earn a cash flow from your website’s content, get traffic, and monetize your site, visit Cash From Content

Link exchange is a must – First of all, link exchange is an essential part of search engine optimization and website traffic. A constant effort at exchanging links will result in more and more steady web traffic and an gradual increase in search engine rankings on all 3 major search engines.

Manual link exchange is slow – However, link exchange done manually can be very, very time consuming. I have found that when I search for relevant sites, email the site owner, finally contact someone, post the links, etc. It can take up to 2-3 hours just to find one good backlink. I hardly think this is worth the time.

Join a link exchange service – One way to get more links at a time, is to join a link exchange service. This can be a big time saver. These services are also usually free or low priced.

Buying text links? – There is also the possibility of buying text links, which are usually much more expensive and the link is a one-way link. The problem that I see with these types of links, is that they require a long term commitment of sometimes hundreds or thousands of dollars in order to see any result. Also, if you do see a result, then you are really locked in to paying the monthly fee for the link.

I prefer methods of getting backlinks, where I can exchange many links with many people for a small fee. I havent had much success with free link exchange programs, nor expensive ones, but more success with programs that are right in the middle.

View our recommended link exchange program online to get thousands of backlinks, fast and cheap.

Cheap Ski Transfers provide reliable, swift and custom ski bus transfers from from the airport in Geneva immediately to your luxury ski chalet in La Grave, Portes du Soleil, Chamonix town and the nearby Mont Blanc area.

Our Geneva airport minibus service service includes skiing transfers to La Rosiere, Les Trois Vallees, Val Cenis, La Grave, Les Gets, Samoens and even La Clusaz and Flegere and we can provide luxry ski transfers to varying ski resorts if requested.

With our professional air-conditioned twelve man fleet of minibuses and Audi, Abarth, Subaru, or BMW cars we can happily transfer as many people as seventeen, or twenty plus when you and your group require this. Furthermore our chauffeurs are extremely trained in challenging winter conditions for your groups safety. Of course the company is fully indemnified and have licenses.

The company organize mountain bike Geneva airport transfer from Feb to Nov and provide locations like our top 10: Les Deux Alpes, Chatel, Savoie, Montroc, Le Tour, Chastreix-Sancy, Avoriaz, Isola 2000, Hautacam, Plateau de Beille, Les Contamines-Montjoie, La Chavanette.

Traveling to the Chamonix valley, Les Orres or La Plagne from your plane couldn’t be easier. For private snowboard transfers from your plane to your luxury chalet in Chamonix Mot Blanc France email Ski Holiday Transfers now, afterwards relax and enjoy your ski trip.

The beauty of ezine advertising is that it’s the most targeted form of advertising on the internet. If, for example, someone has subscribed to an ezine about fishing, then they are expressing a strong interest in fishing equipment, tips on improving their skills, travel packages, and an endless list of other possibilities.

This is why ezines are such a good choice. As long as your ad relates closely to the theme of the ezine, the person reading your ad is already halfway toward buying what you have to offer.

There are three types of ads that you can place in your chosen ezine: a classified ad, a sponsor ad, and/or a solo ad.

The classified ad is the smallest and least expensive. This three to five line ad is often run in a block with other classified ads, one on top of another, similar to a page of classified ads in your local newspaper. This contains just a brief description with an email or link to your web site. This costs a few dollars, generally about half the cost of a sponsor ad.

A sponsor ad is placed at the top of the ezine, often under a heading like: “Please support our sponsor.” This ten to fifteen line ad will draw more attention since it is the first thing the reader sees when the email is opened. This is priced around twenty dollars.

The most effective, and naturally the most expensive, is the solo ad. This is not part of the ezine, but instead goes out as an email to everyone on the mailing list. The message is all about you and your product or service. This ad can be as long as 700 words, allowing you to go into great detail, and will cost in the neighborhood of forty to fifty dollars, about twice the cost of a sponsor ad. However, some of the larger ezines may ask for hundreds or even several thousand dollars for a solo ad.

Once you’ve written your ad and chosen an ezine, the best way to proceed is to think like an educator. The most effective teaching method is repetition. Experienced teachers will cover the same information in several different ways. They might lecture one day, followed by a reading assignment and discussion, and then an essay, all on the same topic.

Very few people learn something thoroughly the first time they see it. And few people respond to an ad the first time they see it. Since you are trying to educate and motivate your target audience, you want them to see your ad more than once.

This is best done by first running a solo ad, then running a sponsor ad in the next two or three issues of the same ezine. Finally, for the next five to seven issues run a classified ad. The readers will see your ad for many weeks and begin to understand the message and warm up to your offer. They need time to mull it over, compare products and prices, and decide if they really need it. Give them time, educate them, and they will buy.

Dave Starner is a former teacher and coach who markets ebooks and software. Visit the Net’s #1 infoproduct site at www.ebooksnet.com and instantly download great ebooks and software on Internet advertising and hundreds of other topics.

We think that once our well developed and designed website is launched, magically a large number of people will visit immediately. With the millions of websites launched weekly and monthly, we have to do some extra work to make sure that those people we want to visit our website can find us.

TIP #1. Include the features and factors that help a site gain higher listings in the search engines.

• Include a descriptive title in the title bar of every page. When you visit a website, look at the top blue bar, and you should see a title for the page. Besides letting visitors know where they are, this helps with search engines.
• Include keywords in your content, your titles and your meta tags.There was a time when keywords in the meta tags helped with search engine placement. Now, they very seldom do, but I still suggest adding them. They are, however, important in your content. Decide what words a visitor would use to find what you offer and include them throughout your site.
• Include a short (about 25 word) description of the site and its purpose in the meta tags. Search engines do check the description and often use it when adding a description to the link that they list for your website. Make it short, punchy and to the point.
• Make sure that your content is excellent, ever-changing and includes links to other sites. Finally, the search engines are aware of the many tricks that were initially used to get good placement, so they no longer work. Excellent and updated content wins today — and brings visitors back!

TIP #2. Avoid the pitfalls that will guarantee poor and/or no search engine placement.

• Avoid using frames. Frames can make the navigation of a website easy and quick, but they almost guarantee that your website will never appear in a search engine. Technically, search engines will only see the navigation frame and no content or any important keywords.
• Avoid the use of databases for information you want the search engine spiders to find. Databases are a great tool for organizing data that networks need to access — for example, employee lists or manufactured items — but are not searchable by the spiders. They cannot get into your database.
• Avoid the under-handed tricks like cloaking and overloading a page with hidden keywords. Yes, some search engines can still be fooled, but they are all getting smarter, and if you are caught, you will be black-listed and no-one wants to face that.

TIP #3. Besides designing and developing with search engine placement in mind, use every other possible opportunity to plug your website.

• Every piece of printed material that you give out or send should have your website listed. This should be obvious, but I still meet business people who fail to have the address of their website on their business card, their letterhead, their envelopes, their brochure and/or their printed newsletter.
• Include the address of your website in your e-mail signatures. Use it for all e-mail messages — new and replies — including those posted on forums, lists, newsgroups and other groups.
• Print your website address on T-shirts and your bumper stickers. That is, if you tend toward the fun and outrageous! You will get attention.

I have just scraped the surface of how to encourage traffic to your website. I strongly recommend the book 101 Ways to Promote Your Website by Susan Sweeney.

Chris King is a professional website creator / designer, storyteller, writer, free agent, and fitness instructor. You will find her business website at http://www.creativekeys.biz and her information website at http://www.creativekeys.net