How To Get Tons of Traffic To Your Site Or Blog

The million dollar question on the tip of any Newbie's tongue is always about traffic. You can have the best online business in the world, but if people don't visit your site it is all a waste of time and money. And it is not just about getting anyone, you want people who are truly interested in your product. This is why getting your SEO right and getting found organically in searches is by far the best way to make sure you have interested visitors. If you can get to number 1 on a competitive keyword in Google, you will have more interested traffic than you can handle. By the way, they will only be interested if you are interesting! So, the first thing to do is write.

If you want people to buy your product, you must make sure you are an online authority on your subject. This can be achieved by writing an e-book, or posting quality content. Make sure you are in every conceivable corner of the internet with original work that is not simply a rehash of something that someone else has already written.

You can write and submit: hubs, articles, press releases, blog entries, forums entries (quality ones), directory listings, e-zines or product or book reviews. Make sure you include a link back to your site wherever you can (including your email signature) and make it easy for people to find you. Encouraging people to subscribe to your RSS feed is good practice too. If you do start a blog, keep it up and be consistent with your posting. If you have images, brilliant, they attract attention and people might find you on Google Images, or you could tag photos on facebook or Flickr. Get your keywords in the title, tags and the body of the text, and in your domain name if you can.

Take part in respected niche forums, but stay well clear of the spammy, scammy ones full of negative people who moan. Make sure that you add quality posts as opposed to lots of rubbish. No one wants to know what you had for breakfast!

Think carefully and edit your work. Spelling mistakes and typos can be a real turn off to people.

A lot of internet marketers become hermit crabs when they should be more like butterflies! You will do well if you learn to pull traffic towards you by being the kind of person who people want to e-hang with. Be helpful, answer questions on Yahoo and network like you would offline, be valuable. You can point people to good sources of work, give them free e-books or tips and tools. Anything FREE is always attractive! Find out if they found your freebies useful. Get them involved and make communication two way. You can do this by inviting comments, offering surveys, fun contests, or participating in conversations on social networks. When you are posting in social networks avoid spamming people on first introduction with a URL. You should aim to provide 4 pieces of useful content to every time you post a link to something you are selling. Add photos (with links) and keep it light and fun. Post topical and newsworthy things and keep up to date. Every now and again, post something controversial, just get the conversation going and make people remember you.

Develop a daily routine and discipline with social networks. Be consistent but don't waste all of your time on the sites. I find LinkedIn, Twitter and facebookthe best, but consider YouTube and FourSquare. Do add a badge to your sites and blogs so people can link back and forth.

Appeal to people's emotions. You could sponsor a charity for instance, someone asked me today to sponsor a dog (l love dogs). That is another point. Be real. Authenticity is great for business, but also I really believe that if you are being true to yourself and writing from your heart people will be attracted. Stay positive and think positive things. This is sometimes called The Law of Attraction and it works!

If you have an option to allow translation, choose it especially Chinese.

Remember to include a photo, link, logo and maybe a slogan wherever you go online. My lovely friend Al Diaz has coined the phrase Ilumine Ao which has become a trademark of his very strong branding. Clever man. It is important to do something or be something unique to people. My friend and colleague Paul and I share a blog that we like to think of as a drop in centre, a kind of coffee shop where we offer help to struggling internet marketers. Our brand is all based on being real, being available and lots of integrity.


Submit

A really obvious one that people forget. Make sure you submit your sites to DMOZ: http://dmoz.org/ and to the various search engines. Don't just stop at Google verification. Try to get included in newsletters.

This is critical. It takes a long time and a lot of work to really brand yourself well online so while that is happening engage with real people. Do good work with them and don't forget to ask for a link and a testimonial. I do a lot of offline work in my community because I get a massive kick out of seeing people get found online. I teach them how to build their own websites and then introduce them to everything in this article. I love seeing them soar to the top of Google. I also go to Chamber of Commerce and frequently speak at various business meetings. I have a deal with the local Further Education College and they pay me to hire graduates who I employ to do some of my time consuming work. At the same time I train them in the art and science of internet marketing so it is a win win situation. I have a particular interest in helping charities and third sector organisations raise money online and I do this at a reduced rate.

We have looked at the process of getting traffic, but you also need to have a great product. Sell things that you know lots of people are looking for, but are scarce online.  You can check this out by looking at the number of searches for a keyword compared to the number of providers. Google Keyword Tools is useful and you can also look at Clickbank to see if there are any products that you could be an affiliate of.

Don't spam and bombard them!  Send free things and also make offers that compliment what they have already bought.  Traffic Geyser is really good at that.  They offer really good quality video training and then offer a complimentary product that helps you to use the really useful information that they have just given you.  Give excellent customer service everytime. Answer emails and deliver your promises.

If you are going to be really successful you will have to buy traffic in one way or another. Direct mail is becoming popular again because it is different to email. It makes a change. Offline ads in local papers or supermarkets. I know one marketer who slipped his business cards in books at supermarkets! Be creative! Promote yourself with PPC ads or get yourself on a traffic exchange or two. You can do those on a budget if necessary.  Some people buy lists, but I am skeptical about that and don't want to encourage spamming in anyway. Do spend some time learning how to advertise well before you spend any money.

Do your market research well and hunt for niches that will pay you well.  High ticket items are great, and then I recommend making a blog post, an article, a podcast and a video and feeding all that through Traffic Geyser who hurl it all out to the world, saving you loads of time. Keep testing your work to find out what is working and what is not.  This is a crucial step and if you are to become very successful you need to do it.  Be curious and don't get too attached to what you think should work. 

Teaming up with other businesses or individuals is fun and smart. Mashable media do that one really well. I loved their #beatcancer campaign. Cross marketing will save you time and money and can lead to quality friendships.


One last thing...keep checking your sites for broken links and fix them. There is nothing worse than a 404 error!

Well thanks for reading this far and I hope you have found it useful. I would love your comments! Kay