How to Create Backlinks

Backlinks are really important in the world of Search Engine Optimization. If you want your site to do well in Google search results you have to have a good page rank. If you want a higher page rank you're going to need some backlinks.

What is a backlink?

Backlinks are a link to your website from another website. The search engines love these. When they see the link on someone else's site it sends the spiders over to your site and they index your site getting it placed on a search engine organically instead of you going over and entering it. This way is preferred by the search engines.

Where do I put backlinks?

You can put backlinks in any number of locations. You can use them in signatures in forums, you can pay for them, but today we are talking about putting them in blogs.
You find a blog that is about a similar topic as what you will be linking to. You read the blog and then you make an insightful and meaningful comment to the post. When you are finished with your post you also put a link to the site you want the search engines to go look at. (and the other people reading the blog for that matter).

How do I make a backlink?

• Know your URL. If you want your link to send people to the front page, or to a specific article or blog post, make sure you have the specific URL for that.
• 
  
• Now you need a little html magic. You will need to use this html code to make a link:

<a href=http://yourURLhere.com>Your Keywords Here</a>

• You will need a keyword for your link. Don't use a keyword that is in the title of your blog/article/website, because the search engines will already see it in your url. Choose something else that is relevant to where you are sending people. For example, using the above post I might use the key word Peanut Butter and Jelly Chicken Stew.

Let's use the example from my blog and I'll show you what it looks like, in code and then the way it appears in code.

<a href="http://iwra.blogspot.com/2009/09/ how-to-create-backlinks.html">How to Create Backlinks</a>

Here's what it will look like in my comment:

How to Create Backlinks 

Backlinks from blogs are great and you need to think about the page rank of the blog before you leave the backlink. You should be backlinking from a blog with a higher page rank. I would choose at least a 4 or 5. It may have to be lower depending on your niche.
Searching out blogs and figuring out what their page rank is could take forever. That's not even including going and making your comment.
You guessed it. I found you some great software to use to help get this done fast.

Comment Hut (www.commenthut.com)

Let's see what Comment Hut is and what it will do for you.

• Comment Hut is NOT a blog spamming software. It does not leave your comments and backlinks.
• Comment Hut DOES search out blogs by keyword and then tell you what the page rank is of the blog.
• You then go and read the post, and post your comment with your backlink.
• It is a huge time saver. You no longer have to spend all your time looking for appropriate blogs which can take forever. You also now know what the page rank is for the blog and you can choose to post a comment or not depending on the page rank.
• It's a great piece of software, and it will save you time and you will see more traffic and you will find yourself on the search engines faster and easier. The other plus, my favorite one, it's free! Well again, there is a "lite" version for free. You can get all the blogs from wordpress listed in the lite version. If you want more choices from other places you can upgrade and get blogs from just about every other blogging source you can think of. The wordpress blogs will do you for a while though.

Ways to Create Backlinks

Creating backlinks can be time consuming and seriously tedious and boring, but you have to do it. Aside from my previous article on How to Create Backlinks, Here are list of things you can do to build more backlinks!

Article Marketing - add your link with keyword anchor text in your resource box. Distribute articles to tons of directories, for tons of backlinks.

Forum Posts - add your link with keyword anchor text in your sig file.

Blog Comments - keyword in the "name" area, and then your url. (will create a hot link with anchor text).

Comments at Ezine Articles - this one just occurred to me recently. I checked the source code and they do not appear to use the "no follow" attribute, so Google should count these links. You may even get traffic from these too. I just enter my main keyword, and add a relevant comment to the article. I use this like I would a blog comment with my keyword in the name area and then my url. You have to wait for EZA to approve your comment, but it's worth it.

Set up Google Alert for keywords - each time I set up a new site I also set up a Google alert for the keyword. I only choose to get alerts from blogs. Now each time someone posts a blog on my keyword I know about it and can get over there and add a comment.

Build free Blogs - build a blog at wordpress.com, blogger, tumblr or wherever. You can do this blog on a related topic and add your site in the blogroll. This will give you a link for each page you publish on this blog. I use PLR for these blogs, and just change up the articles a little bit so they are more original. You can also add links within the articles to your blog for added links.

I didn't build these blogs expecting to get traffic from them, but I quickly started receiving traffic via the wordpress search function. So make sure your content is at least decent and you may find yourself getting more traffic as well as backlinks.

Hubpages and Squidoo - build pages at both of these free sites. Make sure to add a link to your site using keywords as your anchor text. At squidoo you can also add a link to your product or service you are promoting. Depending on how you want to use Hubpages I would be careful adding links to affiliate products over there. I just use hubpages as a way to get one more link from a quality source to my new niche site.

Zimbio - this site is new to me. I have used it for my squidoo lenses, by adding my lensmaster RSS feed url from Squid Utils it will post each new lens I write on Zimbio. You can do this with the RSS feeds for each of your sites, including your main niche site, as well as any free blogs you set up. Make sure to do this first so it will catch all your articles as you put them up.

Directory Submission - there are tons of directories you can add your site url to. Here's a great list of directories you can get started with. (this site also has a huge list of social bookmarking sites and article directories) I set the timer for 30 minutes and just go as fast as I can submitting. I do this at least once a day for 30 minutes.

Wis.dm - a fun little site where you can ask a question. There is space for you to submit a url where people can find the answer. Just think of a question that relates to your niche and then add your site url in the space provided.

Twitter - not sure how good this is for backlinks, but if you have some people following you, it might be worth sending a quick tweet about your new site. You might just mention you found a cool site etc, so as not to give away all your niches.

If you want to take things to the next level there are also services and membership sites you can join to build links. I have not joined any of the link building membership sites as of yet. If I decide to do it, I'll let you know how it goes. If you are currently using a link building site, leave a comment and let me know about it.

I keep remembering this comment from Court's Internet Marketing School Blog. He talked about how you should be spending 90% of your time building links. When I thought about how much time I was spending in this area it was probably about .5%. Stay focused, and set up a system for yourself and you too can build tons of great backlinks!

Related Articles:

Article Writing to Increase the Visitors to Your Website

When I set up my site, I promoted a web traffic scheme that actually did increase my internet traffic! The idea was that you clicked away looking at other people's sites and they did the same. One problem soon became apparent. We were all happily clicking away and no one was actually interested in the websites. We were all simply trying to earn points to get more hits that were totally worthless.
Since setting up my site I have tried many ways to gain visitors to this and my other sites. Without visitors, or web traffic, your site will be floating around unnoticed in cyberspace!
It doesn't matter whether you want to earn money from your site or you just want to share information with like minded visitors. Without web traffic you are wasting your time. I have now found what I believe to be the best way to increase your visitors without it costing you a fortune.
Yes, you can delve into pay-per-click with Google, Yahoo and others, but I wanted a system that delivers targeted traffic without the cost! But for now I want to tell you about Article Marketing.
Before you dismiss this idea, let me tell you it works and it is dead easy! My traffic has increased; in fact, I have had to upgrade some of my sites because they could not handle the traffic I am now getting.
You are still reading this page, so I know you are becoming interested, so let me tell you now that this is not some extended sales pitch! What you are about to learn will cost you nothing if you if you prefer to put all the hard work in yourself.
However I do have something that will help you get started in article marketing and save you money and time into the bargain, and it will cost you less than a burger from your High Street burger bar!
Still here? Good. Let's get started:
Have you ever read an article on the Internet and noticed the 'Resource Box' at the end of the article? In the resource box you add a few lines about yourself, plus, more importantly you place your URL right in there as well!
"So what?" I hear you say. First of all, if that was your article and it quite easily could be, you would have what is known as a 'Back-Link' to your website. Back-links are worth much more than a reciprocal link, where you exchange links with another site owner. Search engines place much more importance on a back-link than a two-way link. Simply put, the more back-links you have, the better the ranking you get from the search engines! Now that's not bad for starters.
You can write an article.
You may be thinking that you can't write an article. Let me say here and now that I believe you can. A few months ago I thought the same, it terrified me to try and write an article and then try to get it published. But with just a bit of practice you can do it. And there are directories just waiting to get hold of your article.
What you are reading here is in fact an article and because I know what I'm talking about, it has only taken me around fifteen minutes to get this far! And I'm not an experienced article writer. Write an article about a subject that you know. Just sit down and start typing! If you know your subject then you should easily be able to knock up an article in less than half an hour.
Don't worry about grammar or spelling at this stage. Just get your article written. When you've finished your article, sit back and read it through. If you are using a good word processor program, then any spelling mistakes will be underlined and you can correct them now.
Next get a good friend to read your article to make sure it makes sense. Then when you are happy with it you can add a resource box. This is just a few lines at the bottom.
When you have your article ready, you should submit it to an article directory. You will have to open an account with them and read their rules prior to submission of your articles.
I hope I have convinced you that article marketing/writing makes sense. There is much more to it, for example; Re-writing ready made articles and making them your own! Stringing several articles together and turning them into an e-Book which you can also market as your own and much more.
However good you are or become at writing articles, there comes a time when you may become despondent or get writer's block. Don't worry, it won't last. You could also do some research using your favorite search engine, taking notes as you go. Do not ever copy other authors' work as this is copyright theft.
I've introduced you to article marketing and hopefully shown you the benefits of using this method to attract visitors to your site. Good luck with your article writing.

Author - James Ackroyd

Article Marketing

Profit from Articles: Article Directories::
Websites that house free articles are called article directories. As a promotion method, the articles are put there by whoever owns the copyright. Every article has the authors byline put beneath it in order for the people who ultimately read the article to become familiar with the writer and at a minimum be able to contact the author via email or their own website.

A directory of articles is a good place to post your articles to earn you some cash. People will view you as an expert and use your product or services, as a result of your having written an article. If you are unable to write an article based on the idea you want to promote, consider hiring someone to do the writing for you. Frankly having excellent articles written for your site will be costly, but they will more than pay for their high cost immediately, by the number of customers your site attracts or by the amount of products sold on your site.

Let’s consider this actual example. Consider the scenario that you are an accountant that works from your house. You pen an article on an accounting theme and post it on different web blogs. An individual who reads your article will notice your skill and overall knowledge about a subject related to their needs and will contact you through your website or drop you an email. Whether it is one time revenue or a repeat customer, you will have earned a profit.

Others who have affiliate websites for accounting will use your article on their website, as it will be in a free article directory. You will receive exposure for each site posting your article as it will have your byline. The additional traffic on their website will benefit you.

Available for use are any number of article directories. For maximum exposure, you should put copies of all of your articles in article directories. This ultimately will increase the number of hits to your site, which, in turn, will result in additional sales and profit.

Using Outsourcing to Get the Best Writers From All Across the World Writing For You

The material utilized on your site informs people regarding your website. It will tell people all about your site and also inform people what your site is providing. Articles and website content are crucial to the success of your site because they can draw visitors to your website and keep them there.

With high-quality website material, you obtain the advantage of visibly illustrating what it is you wish to share with the public. Besides, high quality material and articles may guide people to your site. More site traffic results in more sales and profits. Whether a website is for profit or not, its success is dependent on the number of people visiting that site.

How does polished content and interesting articles result in additional hits on your site? Various search engines depend on specific words and specific expressions on a site in order to put it in their output catalog. If your materials have a handsome amount of keywords and keyword expressions it can be selected to be a piece of the top ranked sites in the search results pages.

However, before you litter your site with keywords and keyword phrases, be aware that search engines filter out abusive use of keywords. You should have high-quality well written articles which include the specified words and specified idioms correctly in their material and articles.

Many just don’t have the time to write their own material for their websites. While it may take some time (not to mention research and education) getting up to speed on writing content and articles specifically designed for the web, there are plenty of writers all over the world who have the ability to do it for you.

The majority of us are not experienced enough to create content for the internet and have no time to learn. There are essayists who have a wealth of experience in doing this and charge only a small fee for such a job. Such authors can be considered as specialists in such modes of scripting and can really assist your website to obtain that popular place in the search engine positions.

Not only can they get your website in the web results page of search engines, but they can also provide substantial articles and content for your website that will impress your website visitors and attract others to your site. Every website can benefit from increased traffic.

There are also people who need papers written for school or work. The best writers in the world are well-informed and go through a great deal of research to provide the most accurate work. They are extremely experienced, as well, in various script techniques which are required to best match the client’s want.

A lot of writers in the world ask for the smallest payment relying on the sort of scripting work required and the amount of words needed in the substance. Generally, a 250 worded article would charge from 4 to 8 dollars relying on the author’s skill and capability. It is a little amount to give for a substance loaded site or for a finely explored and written paper.

There are also several sites which may present you such assistance with their team of compliant and veteran authors. They represent several script services that would be capable of covering any writing requirements you might need. An author may live anywhere in the world and you are assured he will provide excellent materials and articles. Every single one is tested twice, assembled and proofread in order to obtain your money’s merit.

All you have to do, to locate a good writer or a company offering such services, is to conduct an online search using one of the search engines. Write your specific word or specific expression (like Subject Writers, Article Writers) and you will see a lengthy catalog of sites that present such assistance.

The best sites would most likely be the best choice as they have performed a fine job of producing high quality material, in order to obtain those high standings. However, you may wish to research further and review samples of their work in order to have an opinion of what you think you should be charged.

Search Engine Optimization And Why You Must Use SEO

E-commerce is extremely competitive. You must have the appropriate knowledge and tools to make your site rise above the sites of others. If you aren’t vigilant, then you may lose your ranking, as other sites fight for your spot.

A large number of e-commerce sites nowadays extensively use the term search engine optimization. Search engines are the best tool in recent history for generating site traffic.

The majority of searchers on the Internet only view the initial page of the top ten search results. A barometer of a site’s success in search engine optimization is if you make it on to the first page. Being ranked high gives you a higher percentage of probability in being clicked on. How much business you take in depends on how much traffic your site generates.

It is important to get your ranking to be higher. As mentioned previously, e-commerce sites can rate themselves higher day by day using search engine optimization. Improving your site consistently is very important.

So you need to ask yourself what is search engine optimization and do you need to use it? There is a simple answer to why you need to employ SEO. You must optimize your search engine to be a top site, or at the very least make your site generate more income.

You can benefit from obtaining high traffic on your site through search engine optimization. Hypothetically, let’s consider if only ten or twenty percent of the traffic results in successful sales. When you get a hundred visitors or more a day, you are on the path to good sales. Even if you only get ten or twenty hits a day, you would only get one or two if any at all.

I repeat, what exactly is seach engine optimization and what does it do? Your site can be improved through search engine optimization thereby improving your ranking. Placing your site on the first page will increase the awareness of your site’s existence thus enabling your site to make more money.

Search engine optimization needs a great deal of work to be completely utilized. You may need to change many aspects of your site in order to improve search engine optimization. Lots of information regarding keyword phrases that are well-known in your site’s niche or theme will be included.

Your site should contain the right keyword phrases without becoming overly commercial, even if it means a little rewriting is needed. This includes certain rules and guidelines to follow to make your site’s content applicable as a result of search engine optimization.

You can get link exchanges and page transfers by collaborating with other sites. Inbound and outbound traffic generated by a site is one of the parameters search engines use to determine the ranking of sites.

Useful help can be obtained by searching the internet. There are plenty of resources for suggestions, ideas, and methods. You can improve your search engine results by reading articles relating to this. The more information you have about this, the better off you are. In the end this will help you get the higher rankings for your site you desire. The benefits will be incredible from the time and effort spent.

There are many sites on the internet that can improve your search engine optimization, if you have some money to spend. There are many sites that track keyword phrases that can then be used to improve your site. Good keyword laden content can be generated for your site by quality writers with experience.

Search engine optimization benefits can be shown if you act immediately. Better traffic and business improves the sales of your company and website.

The fundamentals of RSS (Feeds)

What does RSS mean?
No doubt, you’ve come across this little acronym as you’ve browsed the Internet. RSS, or Realy Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary, means republishing an article that appears on a website or other source.

An RSS is an easy way of letting people know about the latest content on websites. A summary and images of the most recent postings are sometimes present. However, those that furnish only overviews (hence Rich Site Summary) let users scan the article in order to later determine whether they wish to access the original article site. You will often find the title of the update from the source website in the RSS feed. Usually it is also a connection to the website source.

What are the positive aspects of RSS?
RSS provides advantages to readers or users as well as internet publishers.

1. You will receive the most current information.

You will be one of the first to know of site updates, relating to subjects ranging from the weather, the latest music, and software releases, to news in your area or a recent posting on a relatively quiet site.

2. You won’t need to spend as much time searching the net.

Because an RSS feed furnishes an overview of the affiliated article, the user saves time determining which items to give priority as they search online.

3. The user gains the power to subscribe.

Users are provided the liberty of deciding on which sites to subscribe to in their RSS aggregator, as well as the liberty to modify these choices if they choose.

4. It reduces the amount of inbox clutter.

Despite having to provide your email address to gain access to online RSS aggregators, you do not receive RSS updates via your email account.

5. There is no spam involved.

In contrast to email subscriptions, RSS doesn’t utilize your email address to issue alerts, therefore your privacy is protected from spammers.

6. It is very simple to cancel your subscriptions.

In contrast to email subscriptions, where the user is questioned about the reason for unsubscribing, then asked to verify it, you only need to remove the RSS feed from your aggregator.

7. It is a handy way to advertise and sell your products.

Without spam e-mail, users who subscribe to syndicate product websites, receive news on products and services without the website sending spam mail. The website owner, along with the site user, will benefit from this as the advertisements are aimed at those people who are specifically interested in such products or services.

What disadvantages does RSS possess?
The drawbacks of using RSS appear since it is a recent technology with certain user-preference issues.

1. There are users who would rather get updates emailed to them via the RSS feed.

2. Not all RSS feeds contain graphics and images.

For purposes of brevity and easier publication, RSS feeds don’t show pictures from the original site with the update announcement, with the exception of certain online aggregators.

3. The originating site’s identity may be baffling.

It can be difficult to determine what feed a reader is reading, as the feeds don’t include the website name.

4. Publishers can’t determine the number of users with subscriptions to their feed or how often they visit.

Furthermore, they would be unaware of what led users to unsubscribe, and such data could be valuable in making their advertising more effective.

5. RSS feeds form greater traffic and challenges to the server.

The majority of readers would still rather read the entire update and not just a summary, so they visit the site anyway.

6. Many sites do not support RSS, because it is new technology.

How should I begin utilizing RSS?
There are a couple of requirements: an RSS feed and an RSS aggregator or browser. The RSS feed arrives from an online site that is supported by RSS. Some websites supply a catalog of RSS signals of other various websites. The RSS feed from the originating website is read by an RSS aggregator. It browses and gathers data on the most recent RSS feeds from the internet.

Aggregators take a couple of forms: desktop aggregators which are downloaded programs, and internet aggregators. Downloadable aggregators might ask for a fee prior to issuing them, while online aggregators typically come at no cost. You only have to register an account and you will be ready to make use of their services. Regardless of which type you choose, you have the choice of which RSS feeds to subscribe to, and you can also customize them to suit. More experienced, paid users have more opportunity to customize feeds.

1. Select the RSS aggregator that you would like to work with.

For novices, online aggregators are advised, because they are typically user-friendly.

2. Browse your intended website’s homepage for the presence of the RSS or XML button.

It includes the RSS code that is required for entering into the aggregator. Make a note of this code. You can find a list of websites that support RSS at Syndic8.

3. Now put the code into your aggregator, including the url.

To paste the code, a space is supplied.

You may start studying the RSS data from the website, once you have completed these three simple steps. The latest postings show up when they are published in real-time at the originating site.

RSS and Internet Marketing: The initial concept of RSS originated with Netscape, which aims to furnish a way for users to individualize their private homepages to include link to sites of interest to them, much like bookmarking sites.

The implementation of RSS to online selling was an unpredicted event to RSS technology innovators. Because users are provided the liberty to supplement their aggregators with RSS feeds, those in the market for certain goods and services offered online can currently receive real-time notification. Selling grows more explicit to interested parties and is not a tentative procedure.

Individuals who plan to utilize RSS for marketing their products and services would be advised to connect up with email account suppliers, like Yahoo, MSN, and Google mail; networking websites, like Friendster, FaceBook, and MySpace; and online periodical and TV network sites, like the New York Times and CNN. Minor businesses can additionally investigate networking sites along with private blog sites (e.g. Blogspot) and online sites of groups and associations that would likely utilize their goods or services (e.g. a marine equipment retailer can search for the site of the nearest boating association for potential RSS selling).

Obviously, RSS is a revolution in data management on the internet as a whole, along with web marketing. With its popularity expected to quickly increase among both web users and website proprietors, some improvements in RSS technology are likely to be on their way.

Pay Per Click (PPC) Marketing: What ?

PPC marketing is a useful form of Web advertisement and is the Internet advertising method of choice for a wide range of websites. PPC marketing is sometimes called pay for position, cost per click or pay for performance. It doesn’t matter what you call it, for those advertising online, PPC marketing is the first choice for promoting products and services to online customers.

PPC marketing is advantageous for the promoter as well as the purchaser. Advertisers who make use of PPC marketing will only be required to pay for click throughs from search engines to their sites. Also, customer like not receiving pestering emails or pop-up ads for services and products.

When a customer searches online for a particular product or service, relevant PPC marketing ads appear beside the search engine results. These ads are geared toward a very targeted group of potential customers, ones that are more likely to be interested in that particular service or product. Thus by using PPC marketing, advertisement costs can be limited on websites. PPC marketing provides a win-win solution for both parties.

Possible drawbacks of PPC marketing: While there are many obvious advantages associated with PPC marketing, there are some possible disadvantages that can negate its benefits. One of the most common drawbacks of PPC marketing is that there are many inexperienced people trying to use this profitable method of advertising. An entire campaign does not consist of simply sending in the PPC marketing adds to a search engine, even one as large as Google.

PPC marketing requires a well thought out, strategic approach to setting up ads. To get high search engine rankings, try PPC marketing, which involves the use of bidding and specific keywords. Finding good placement on a search engine will help to increase traffic to a website which then leads to increased profits.

If you don’t have the experience and knowledge required to carry out a typical PPC marketing ad campaign, it may become nothing more than a costly ad campaign that shows no profit. Continuous payment is essential for PPC marketing ads, because if payments are stopped, ads will be stopped also. If a website has already developed a high ranking through its PPC marketing advertisements, this will not be in their best interests.

As the number of websites on the Internet explodes and everyone competes with each other for the most popular keywords for their PPC marketing advertisements, the cost of such keywords is climbing higher and higher. Clearly small business are somewhat at a disadvantage here because larger businesses can pay more for popular keywords related to their website or product. This is due to the fact that most small businesses usually reserve only a small portion of their budget for advertising, putting them at a huge disadvantage.

Running an effective PPC marketing campaign: In order for a PPC ad campaign to be effective, there are several considerations. To get the best payback from PPC marketing, you must develop a marketing plan. Choosing the best keywords that go with a site’s business is critical in PPC marketing.

Keep in mind that just selecting the most popular keywords does not guarantee a site will make money. To get more attention from online customers, you want to be sure you are selecting the specific keywords that will put your site within the first ten results of a search. Also, it is less expensive than the top spot for PPC marketing.

It is also critical to constantly monitor how your PPC ad campaign performs. The website can therefore modify any PPC marketing ad in place to increase its productivity. At the same time any PPC advertising campaign that is not getting results can be pulled immediately. Many websites constantly change their PPC marketing ads as a way of increasing their return on investment.

Getting professional help with PPC marketing: As PPC marketing has become more popular, a new breed of marketing professionals providing PPC marketing services for small and large businesses has grown as well. If you are a small business inexperienced with using PPC marketing, you are strongly advised to hire a company that specializes in PPC marketing. The majority of PPC marketing companies provide moderate rates against their services and give reasonable outcomes.

An affiliate of PPC marketing will be able to lend a hand with the common details that come with campaigning through PPC marketing. Controlling a PPC marketing campaign is time intensive, which can be devastating for a small business. PPC marketing professionals can initially set up your ads and then ultimately train employees in handling your PPC marketing campaign to keep it successful.

Affiliate Programs – How do i Choose One?

There are a multitude of affiliate programs to choose from. How do I pick one?

Prior to joining an affiliate program, ask questions first. Evaluate and study the options for the course that you wish to join. The replies will play a vital role in the decision regarding the achievements of the future.

Are there any fees for joining? The majority of affiliate programs presented now a days are 100% free. Thus why go for those who ask for a few dollars for connecting.

At what time are the commission checks released? Each program has unique characteristics. A few release their checks monthly, quarterly, and so on. Choose one that you think would be best suited to match your reward time. For many affiliate programs, there is a minimum earned commission amount they expect an affiliate to attain or surpass if they are to receive their checks.

What hit per sale ratio is offered? This statistic is the average number of hits per banner or text link required to produce a sale, and is based on all affiliate sales statistics. This is an essential point, as it determines the amount of traffic you need to generate before you start earning commission from a sale.

How does the program track referrals from an affiliate’s site, and what is the length of time they stay in the system? You really need a program that can correctly track the people who are referrals from your site. It is the only possibility to get credit for a sale. It is also important to consider the length of time people may remain in the system, since few visitors don’t purchase at first but later wish to come back to buy. Seek information about the credit of the sale if it occurs weeks after the specified time.

What are the types of affiliate stats obtainable? The affiliate program you select should be able to provide you with detailed statistics. You should be able to access this information anytime you want to. By continually monitoring you individual statistics, you will gain important information such as the number of hits, sales and impressions your site has generated. Impressions show the number of times a visitor visited your site. Hit is a single click on the banner or text links.

Is the affiliate program responsible for paying for the impressions and hits as well as sales commission? Impressions and hits should also be paid, as this increases the Affiliate earnings you that will accrue from the sales commission. You will find this particularly important if your program offers a low sales in order to hit ratio.

Who is the online seller? Make sure that you know who you are doing business with and that they are a strong company. Obtain knowledge of the selling products and the rate they are obtaining. If you seek out as much information about the retailer selling the affiliate program as possible, it will help you decide if it’s the best program for you and your website.

How many tiers does the affiliate program have? If the program is single tier, you will only earn money for the business you have personally generated. If the program is two tier, not only do you get paid for the business you generate, you also earn commission on sales that are generated by the affiliates sponsored by your program. If it’s a two-tier program, a small fee might even be paid for every new affiliate you sponsor. This is similar to a “finder’s fee.”

In the end, how much commission is paid? Several programs pay commissions falling in the 5%-20% range. 0.01% to 0.05% of the amount is offered for every hit. If you come along a program which pays for markings, the payment is very low. These figures clearly demonstrate why the hit-to-sale ratio and average sales amount matter so much.

Before joining an affiliate program, you must know the answers of these and more queries. You need to be informed about key features of the program you choose before you make them part of your website. Find out all you can about your affiliate program options. It can help you decide which program, of the many on offer, is best for your website.

How Can Affiliate Marketing Be Defined?

There are many ways to describe affiliate marketing but they all have a common definition. Affiliate marketing is a widely used Internet business tool. It is a collaboration between retailers and the website belonging to an affiliate. For quite some time now, affiliate marketing has been demonstrated to be an inexpensive, quantifiable strategy that delivers long-range results. It has gained renown for online sites for those attempting to earn extra cash for their websites. Daily, people become attracted to affiliate marketing and they want to profit from it. However, quite often these novice affiliates don’t completely comprehend the affiliate system and make mistakes that end up costing them. Put another way, affiliate marketing has frequently been misinterpreted.

Among the typical misunderstandings involving affiliate marketing is that it involves sales; while sales is a significant part of affiliate marketing and the basis of any business, this is not the whole story. Yet another is that affiliate marketing is closely associated with ‘advertising’. Although the significance of advertising in marketing a particular item should not be underestimated, the truth is that advertising, like selling, is only a portion of the many roles of marketing.

The affiliate marketing system compensates affiliates for each visitor, subscriber and/or consumer that he or she provides. Compensation can be paid according to a set value per visit. The most appealing facet of affiliate marketing from the retailer’s perspective is that the affiliate isn’t paid until the results are realized.

Affiliate marketing is usually run by affiliate networks, and these networks are comprised of two practical bodies which are the group affiliates, as well as the group merchants. Each of these has its own unique role and function for affiliate marketing. The affiliate network serves as a third party in the middle of the retailer and the affiliates who are associated. The network furnishes the technology to convey the retailer’s promotions and deals. In addition, the affiliate network obtains commissions from the merchandiser and that is how the affiliate members of the program are paid.

The retailer is any owner of a website who wishes to exploit the benefits of performance-based marketing. There are a number of advantages that accrue to the retailer. Initially, the retailer is the one who runs and keeps up the affiliate program. If it is to be extracted, the retailer must perform their task of studying interested affiliate sites to guarantee that they are a proper fit for a certain website. Discovering where their products fit is the essential element in producing greater profits. The retailer gains access to markets and consumers and doesn’t have to spend precious time seeking them. The site user will not be distracted by banner ads on the affiliate sites. It may elicit interest in that item and send the customer to the retailer’s website. In addition, it is the retailer who determines the amount he will agree to spend on each transaction that results from a buyer who is sent by an affiliate.

The partners or the affiliate dealers will reap many rewards. The affiliate is the owner of a website who markets for one or multiple retailers and their affiliate networks. Affiliate marketing may even produce a full-time living for the affiliate. However, this is not a simple mission to accomplish. The affiliate requires greater communication with the retailer concerning the commission amount, the method of payment, and the time frame of the contracted agreement. In addition, it is the affiliate’s duty to represent the products that their audience would have the greatest interest in. For instance, if the website’s base audience is primarily moms who don’t work outside the home, then online opportunities like surveys would be an ideal fit. This audience would additionally respond positively to direct links to items for and informative websites about kids. Retailers frequently furnish desirable, best-selling products and individual support to their affiliate. They frequently propose sales promotions that will help both the merchandiser and the affiliate.

Affiliate marketing is a terrific system for the retailer as well as the affiliate. By joining forces, they can create a win-win situation. Not only this, but it is easy to understand, is simple and cheap to set up and you can get started in a matter of days. However, there is something to think about, and that is how to attract visitors and make your offer unique from the rest.

Social Networking: What ?

Although almost everyone has heard the term ’social networking’, some may still be uncertain about what it refers to. If someone asked you to define social networking right now, could you do it? Unfortunately, many people are unable to do this, even when they themselves are participants in online social networking.

Social networking is the gathering together of people with similar interests into online communities. Though social networking can be done in person, particularly in schools or in offices, it is really carried out mostly online. The reason for this is that while real-world communities like high schools, colleges, and workplaces let you network with a few people, online communities let you network with millions.

Social networking online takes place on dedicated websites. This type of website is called a social networking website. Social networking sites can best be likened to an offline community, just on the internet instead of a neighborhood or club, for instance. Many members of a particular social networking site may share a common bond, be it politics, hobbies, religion, or something else. You can gain admittance to a social networking site, and you can start making connections. These social activities might include passive activities such as reading others’ profiles, or even actively contacting them.

The friendships you’ll make are just one of the positive things about social networking online. Another benefit is the huge variety of people. In contrast to schools and workplaces, the Internet democratizes social networking, making it easily accessible to everyone. Without the problem of distance posed by real-world social networking, online social networking makes it easy for someone from the United States to make friends with someone in Japan, for instance. You can form new friendships and learn about other cultures.

As described earlier, social networking frequently comprises bringing together particular individuals or organizations. Many social networking sites cater to people with specific interests, while others are more general in nature. These sites are known as standard social networking sites. These kinds of sites normally have open membership. It shows that anybody may join, irrelevant of their pastimes, faith or ideas. That said, once you enter this online community, you can apply exclusion criteria to your searches, ensuring that you meet only those people who match your desires.

If networking online interests you, don’t just jump in feet first; you need to understand the dangers before taking the plunge. The primary dangers are imposters or people with malicious intent. Dangers exist when networking anywhere, either online or offline. Just like when you meet with people in the real world, you must be careful when you meet people over the Internet. Remember where you are and that the other person may or may not be who they say they are, and you should be able to enjoy social networking online and stay safe.

Once you have completed your research into social networking online, the next step is actually find a community to join. You can do this easily by searching the web. Your search will produce various outcomes, comprising MySpace, FriendWise, FriendFinder, Yahoo! 360, Facebook, Classmates, and Orkut.

Professional Submissions To Over 80,000 Directories

Getting Included in Google News

Google News can send tons of traffic and help you gather a lot of inbound links. In this article we discuss Google News editorial and technical requirements.

Editorial Guidelines

Content Requirements

Content must be 100% original. Google News does not support news scrapers. You can sign up for PR wires to track news updates from around the world (along with the clutter of press releases). Having buddies on the “inside” also goes a long way, since you can be the one to break hot stories ( search engine Land, Wall Street Journal, etc).

Authors/Editors

Google requires more than one author for a website, so if you’re a one-man blog you won’t get into Google News. The number of authors/editors required is not specified, so all we can do is guess. Barry Schwartz of Search Engine Round Table managed to get into Google News with five writers/editors and two featured writers, so you need at least several people.

Some forums state that the minimum required number of editors is three, but those are merely guesses.

Organizational Requirements

Google News only includes sites that they perceive as operational organizations. This requires a clear editor/writer structure, author bios, company information, a physical address, phone numbers, etc. In short, it includes anything that shows you’re an operational publication that can produce consistent, high quality, fresh content.

Number of Articles Per Day (frequency)

There is no official statement on this from Google, but it’s obvious they want to see at least two to three quality articles per day.

Number of Articles on a Website

Just as with article frequency, there’s no word on this directly from Google. Common sense tells us, though, that you need a few hundred articles in the archive before they include you.

Content Format

Each article must have a clear title (more on titles in the technical section), author name and date of publication. It should also be a minimum of 200 to 300 words.

Ads

Google is 100 percent okay with ads on the site. In fact, it encourages all Google News publishers to use the AdSense Network. Advertisements also indicate that the site has visitors and a functional business model to support authors and continue publishing.

Multimedia

Google is okay with images within content, but does not allow content that consists of images only. The same goes for videos. You can include You Tube videos, but there must be words in an article to qualify it for Google News.

Overall, Google wants to see quality; this is probably the reason they have no clear qualifications. If a small publisher can contribute to the Google experience, Google editors will include that website, regardless of size.

Also keep in mind that once publisher is accepted in the index, everything else is handled by algorithms, without human input, so Google editors naturally want to make sure that the site will live up to the standards.

Technical Requirements

Article Titles

Titles should be news-like and clear. Browse CNN and the Wall Street Journal to get a feel for news headlines. They usually summarize content and include the names of the main players. Including names of companies will increase the likelihood of the article showing up for company specific searches (i.e. Google, Yahoo).

Title length should be between two and twenty-two words.

Date and time are prohibited in titles. If you’re using a content management system, you can disable that feature. Article titles should appear in both the

of

tags.

Google does not support the usage of the title as a link (the usual case on blogs), so you must disable this feature.

URLs

To be included in Google News, article URLs should follow Google News bot standards. URLs must be unique, and each unique URL must point to only one article. URLs must be permanent, without the use of session IDs. Google does not support dates in URLs, so set up your content management system to exclude dates.

Each URL must contain at least three digits. For example:

Bad:

www.site.com/news/article/54.html

Good:

www.site.com/news/article/547.html

www.site.com/news/article/4534343.html

Google cannot crawl articles that include a year in the URL.

URL Attributes that Prevent Crawling

Any of the URL attributes below will prevent the Google News bot from crawling your link:

• /board/ or /boards/

• /forum/ or /forums/

• /messageboard

• /showthread

• ?threadid= or &threaded

• Anything that is similar in nature

Google does not support news posted in a forum format.

Template

Your website template should look like a news source. Milind Mody of eBrandz recommends staying away from a blog format.

JavaScript

Google News does not support JavaScript in any form, such as links, navigation or content hidden within a script.

Redirects

Google supports redirects, meaning you can plug content (like ads) in between Google News and your article. Guidelines include no session IDs (&ID=), use of 301s for permanent redirects and a minimal number of redirects to get from one page to another. Also set the redirect time period for a short amount of time and make sure that redirects don’t point to themselves.

Many companies show ads with delays before taking users to the actual article; this is why Google supports various redirects.

To find out how the crawler would see a redirect, disable cookie, JavaScript and CSS support in your browser. You will probably see plain and ugly pages.

Frames

Frames are evil; don’t use frames. Sites that use frames call upon the dark forces from the depths of hell to be punished by low rankings and crawler problems.

Language

Google News supports only one language per page. The best code is UTF-8. Keep only one language version of the article on one page to avoid problems. If you support more than one language, you can contact the Google Team to be featured in other countries.

No Support

Google News does not support PDF articles and non-permanent content (content which sits on a URL but changes from time to time).

Dynamic Pages and more

Google's news crawler can spider dynamically generated content, such as .php, .asp and others, but it can run into problems which can prevent articles from appearing on Google News. It recommends that you use static URLs rather than dynamic URLs, or set your content management system to produce static looking links.

If you must use both dynamic and static URLs, block the Google bot from accessing dynamic ones to avoid duplicate content penalties. You can block the Google bot in robot.txt file.

Flash, graphic/image or JavaScript links

Google News does not recognize or follow Flash, graphic/image or JavaScript links which link to articles. Its automated crawler is best able to crawl plain text HTML links.

Snippets of Content

Google shows content snippets in search results with keyword occurrences. It requires sites to have NO content, other than the article, in an area between the title and content.

Registration and Subscription Content

If you run on subscription revenues, Google can add more ROI to your bottom line. There are three ways to handle this, but first you must allow Google in. The G-crawler has to see content to classify it, and pay-walls prevent this. You can work around this issue by putting in an exception for the Google bot.

• First, make sure the Google bot is allowed to crawl your pages (robot.txt).

• Second, configure your servers to serve registration when Google bot comes from 66.249.64.0/20.

Once you let Google bot crawl your subscription pages, those pages will be featured on Google News. From that point on there are several options:

1. First click free. With this option visitors can reads full versions of your articles when and only when they come from Google News/Web Search. All other clicks on the site lead to the subscription page. Google claims they’ve increased subscription rates for some publishers with this method, and I believe it works best.
   
   Once users read full articles, they have a clear idea of the quality of your articles, which is better than any marketing message. For example, from time to time I read tech-related Wall Street Journal articles and I am often amazed at their quality, depth and level of connections with stakeholders in the industry. After reading one of their articles I am more likely to subscribe then after reading only a small summary.
   
   You can contact Google to arrange the first click free feature. Please note that only Google News/Google Search users will have access to the full article.

2. A subscription page. This one is plain and simple. When users click on the link they are directed to subscription page. This is not effective in getting more subscriptions.

3. Snippets of the page. You can also feature a partial snippet of the article with an offer to subscribe.

Feeds

Google does not require RSS feeds, but you can definitely benefit from having one. Feedburner offers free feeds, and all blog platforms produce RSS feeds by default.

By: Ivan Strouchliak

Changing your site's title and description in search results

Google's creation of sites' titles and descriptions (or "snippets") is completely automated and takes into account both the content of a page as well as references to it that appear on the web.

We use a number of different sources for this information, including descriptive information in the META tag for each page. Where this information isn't available, we may use publicly available information from DMOZ. While accurate meta descriptions can improve clickthrough, they won't impact your ranking within search results. We frequently prefer to display meta descriptions of pages (when available) because it gives users a clear idea of the URL's content. This directs them to good results faster and reduces the click-and-backtrack behavior that frustrates visitors and inflates web traffic metrics.

While we're unable to manually change titles or snippets for individual sites, we're always working to make them as relevant as possible. You can help improve the quality of the snippets displayed for your pages by providing informative meta descriptions for each page.

Create good meta descriptions

• Differentiate the descriptions for different pages. Using identical or similar descriptions on every page of a site isn't very helpful when individual pages appear in the web results. In these cases we're less likely to display the boilerplate text. Wherever possible, create descriptions that accurately describe the specific page. Use site-level descriptions on the main home page or other aggregation pages, and use page-level descriptions everywhere else. If you don't have time to create a description for every single page, try to prioritize your content: At the very least, create a description for the critical URLs like your home page and popular pages.
• Include clearly tagged facts in the description. The meta description doesn't just have to be in sentence format; it's also a great place to include structured data about the page. For example, news or blog postings can list the author, date of publication, or byline information. This can give potential visitors very relevant information that might not be displayed in the snippet otherwise. Similarly, product pages might have the key bits of information - price, age, manufacturer - scattered throughout a page. A good meta description can bring all this data together. For example, the following meta description provides detailed information about a book.

  In this example, information is clearly tagged and separated.

• Programmatically generate descriptions. For some sites, like news media sources, generating an accurate and unique description for each page is easy: since each article is hand-written, it takes minimal effort to also add a one-sentence description. For larger database-driven sites, like product aggregators, hand-written descriptions can be impossible. In the latter case, however, programmatic generation of the descriptions can be appropriate and are encouraged. Good descriptions are human-readable and diverse, as we talked about in the first point above. The page-specific data we mentioned in the second point is a good candidate for programmatic generation. Keep in mind that meta descriptions comprised of long strings of keywords don't give users a clear idea of the page's content, and are less likely to be displayed in place of a regular snippet.
• Use quality descriptions. Finally, make sure your descriptions are truly descriptive. Because the meta descriptions aren't displayed in the pages the user sees, it's easy to let this content slide. But high-quality descriptions can be displayed in Google's search results, and can go a long way to improving the quality and quantity of your search traffic.

Prevent search engines from displaying DMOZ data in search results for your site

One source we use to generate snippets is the Open Directory Project. You can direct us not to use this as a source by adding a meta tag to your pages.

To prevent all search engines (that support the meta tag) from using this information for the page's description, use the following:

To specifically prevent Google from using this information for a page's description, use the following:

If you use the robots meta tag for other directives, you can combine those. For instance:

Note that once you add this meta tag to your pages, it may take some time for changes to your snippets to appear in the index.

If you're concerned about content in your title or snippet, you may want to double-check that this content doesn't appear on your site. If it does, changing it may affect your Google snippet after we next crawl your site. If it doesn't, try searching Google.com for the title or snippet enclosed in quotation marks. This will display pages on the web that refer to your site using this text. If you contact these webmasters to request that they change their information about your site, any changes to their sites will be recognized by our crawler after we next crawl their pages.

Content Source:

Battle of the URL Shorteners

In the social web it seems there is nothing quite as fun as sharing URLs. With the rise of sites like Twitter, which limits communications to only 140 characters, and the often long length of URLs, there is a new breed of sites coming online that shorten URLs into tiny snippets of their former selves.

Take this URL for example, on Yahoo! about the Manny Ramirez drug scandal: http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news?slug=ys-ramirezsuspension050709&prov=yhoo&type=lgns. If you were to post that URL to Twitter, 85 or your 140 character limit would already be used up, leaving you just 55 characters to type in your witty comment.

Along come the URL shorteners. Go to Tinyurl.com, copy that 85 character long Yahoo! URL into the text box, click the "Make Tiny URL" button, and receive this alternative tiny URL, http://tinyurl.com/cmrt9s, just 25 characters in length. That leaves me with 120 characters for my witty remarks.

Tinyurl has been around the Web for a long time, well before twitter came along. It has been a simple and single-purpose website. But, now that Twitter, Facebook, Digg, and so many other social sites have reached the big time, something new is happening. The sharing of URLs has reached critical mass, and services like Tinyurl have an opportunity to grow into something altogether new.

The sharing of URLs online is no longer just random unimportant noise. It is news. It is a pulse, indicating what is happening in a society. Take Tweetmeme for example. They get it. They treat all URLs shared via Twitter as news, and sort the most popular shared URLs to the top. Go to Tweetmeme any time of day and you can see what the society thinks is important right now, at this particular moment. That is because what we share via Twitter, in aggregate, is news.

Does Tinyurl understand how sites like Twitter have changed what it means to be an URL shortener? Upstart URL shortener Bit.ly seems to get it. They understand that the act of sharing an URL is an explicit act indicating interest in an URL and that there is more to be done with that information. Here are some new features of Bit.ly that prove my point:

• Bit.ly remembers the URLs I've shortened. When I go back to Bit.ly they are all there for me to peruse.
• Clicking on "info" shows me stats for the shortened URL. How many times was it clicked? Where were people located geographically when they clicked my url? What services were people on when they on when they clicked my shortened url? Who else shortened that URL. And so much more.
• Bit.ly submits all shortened urls to OpenCalais to be semantically classified, categorized and tagged.

There are a number of other URL shorteners out there with other interesting and sometimes even funny features (I'm talking about you, I CAN HAZ dot COM.) I mention Bit.ly and Tinyurl.com specifically because Twitter recently switched from using Tinyurl's URL shortening service to Bit.ly. Now, when you type a long URL into Twitter, it will automatically shorten that URL for you using Bit.ly.

Until now, Tinyurl has been the biggest of the URL shorteners by a comfortable margin. I suspect, with this recent change by Twitter, more people are going to see the advantages of Bit.ly and start switching over. It won't happen overnight, but having Twitter repeatedly show your URL to millions daily is bound to have an effect on users. Looking at the chart to the left you can see the relative size of the two services, Bit.ly and Tinyurl.com, measured in visitors, and the amount of overlap between the two. Two months from now I expect that green circle to be a lot larger.

Another less discussed effect of having Twitter default to Bit.ly as an URL shortener is the profound effect it will have on Bit.ly's search engine placement. Search engines always try to sort the important links to the top, and one of the most important measures of a site/link's importance is the number of links pointing to it (this is a somewhat simplified explanation, but mostly right.)

As you can see from the data below, Tinyurl.com has been benefiting from the Twitter relationship.

Number of sites linking to Tinyurl.com and Bit.ly that are in the Alexa Top 1000:

• Tinyurl - 386
• Bit.ly - 9
  

The net result of this difference in number of highly ranked links is that Tinyurl has been doing well in search engines, while Bit.ly has not. Tinyurl gets an estimated 530K visits via search per month, while Bit.ly gets approximately 56K.

Bit.ly will soon have tens of millions of links being pointed to it, all because somebody typed some link into Twitter, Twitter turned it into a Bit.ly URL, and somebody shared that shortened URL on a page, whether Twitter, Facebook, Digg, a personal blog or other. Soon, all the search engines will see Bit.ly as an important Web presence, causing it to get even more traffic from search. It is a virtuous circle and Bit.ly is the beneficiary.

It is still way to early to call a winner here, but the next six months will be an interesting time as these URL shorteners reinvent what it means to be an URL shortener, fight over market share, and come up with business models that allow them to sustain their business for the long haul.

Posted by Geoffrey Mack

How To Increase The Traffic To Your Website

I get asked this all the time, whether via Alexa's forums, or after work by my friends: How do I get more traffic to my Web site? I wish there was just some simple button that I could tell people to push and that it would solve all their traffic issues. But it doesn't exist; if it did, everybody would already be using it.

But there are whole heaps of great advice, which if followed, will lead to more visitors to your site. What follows is a simple to follow list of best practices to help get you on your way.

1. On-Site Factors. Start with your site. You need to make it the best it can be. So that it will be attractive to visitors AND search engines.

• Keywords. What is your site about? Find a few key words and phrases that you think describe your site and that people may actually enter into a search box on Google. If you pick very popular keywords and phrases, you might be disappointed. Millions of people will search for those keywords and phrases, but you will be way down the search results because lots of sites are optimized for those phrases. If you pick less popular keywords and phrases, you may have a shot of actually showing up in the search results because fewer sites have optimized for those keywords and phrases.

• Optimize Your Site. Use your keywords and phrases on your site. Put them in the title of your page, in the H1 tags, metatags and throughout your site. Use them in the text of links that point to your page. Shoot for having keyword density of about 6%.
  

• Have Good Content. You should strive to have something new on your site once per day. Don't let your site get stale... Google's algorithms will notice and so will visitors to your site. If you don't have a lot of time to create unique content every day, consider putting up a daily poll, creating a forum on your site, or leaving a comments field/Guest Book for visitors to fill out. If you use Twitter or Facebook, you can have your updates automatically appear on your site.
  

• Unique Value Proposition. Give something away on your site to your visitors to remember you by. Otherwise people may forget your site and won't come back. You can find interesting content on widgetbox.com, or you can give them a custom Alexa Toolbar. Just give them something.

• Create A Sitemap. Every time you update content on your site you should update your sitemap and submit the site map to Google, Yahoo, Bing, Ask, etc.. There are lots of free sitemap tools out there. Find one and get started. It is a great way to let Google know when your site is updated.

• Return Visitors. How are you going to get people to return to your site after they have left? You may want to consider an e-mail newsletter. But don't spam... please. If people like your content let them sign up to get your newsletter. You should also allow people to subscribe to your updates via facebook or twitter. Most blogs offer easy plugins for this feature.

• Link Bait. People love lists. Make lists of things that are relevant to your site and put them on your site, like top ten fishing sites. Then let the sites in your list know you have made your list. They may take that list and put it on their site... Or give out awards like "fishing site of the week." which brings us to...

2. Off-Site Factors. Once you have a great site you need to start thinking about other factors, mostly links. If nobody links to your site you are going to have a tough time getting seen in Google's results. More links = better placement in Google. So how do you get links?

• Link Number One. The first link is easy. Alexa already has a link to your site, and Alexa's page rank is high, so the link from Alexa counts more than most. You just need to let Google know that Alexa has a link to your site. How do you do that? Install the Google Toolbar then visit Alexa. But be sure to put your Alexa Toolbar back!
  

• Get Listed In Directories. Directories that are relevant to your site are generally more important than others, so if your site is about basket weaving, find a basket weaving directory and ask them to list your site. Get listed in as many as possible. And then find other general directories like DMOZ and get listed there. Are there Wikipedia articles that should list your site as a place for more information on a topic? Get listed.

• Participate In Social Media. Find forums that are relevant to your content and participate... a lot. Update your signature footer on the forum to include a link to your site. Use Twitter, Facebook, Digg, but, in all cases, do not just post or write about your own site. Nobody cares. Write and post about things that you care about, sometimes your site, and people who like your posts may make their way over to your site.

• Have Something Newsworthy. If you have something newsworthy, don't just blog about it. First post it as a press release on your site, then update your sitemap, then post it to the newswires, then submit it to ezine articles, Article Base and/or Go Articles, then blog about it, twitter about it, etc. If you do it right you will have at least a couple of new links to your site, and if you do it really right you could have dozens of new links.

• Advertise. There are lots of great advertising solutions out there. Google AdWords is a great place to start and, if done well, can offer you a good deal on targeted traffic. Display advertising can be effective and affordable as well. The social networks are now offering do-it-yourself advertising at reasonable prices, and even Alexa allows you to advertise at inexpensive CPMs.
  

And, as always, install the Alexa Toolbar. It won't increase the traffic to your site, but it won't hurt and you will be helping Alexa to track your site and helping the entire Internet Community by contributing to Alexa's Traffic Data.

Getting more traffic to your site is a journey. Take the first steps today, and with a little hard work and some luck, you will be counting your visitors in the millions before too long.

Posted by Geoffrey Mack