Get Free Traffic

Archive for October, 2009

One of the easiest ways to facilitate the sharing of your site URL is by providing links for readers or visitors to “share this site” with others (as the ones you can see below this post) usually in the form of little favicons or buttons–basically a recognizable image that is linked to a social network, a feed reader, or a link aggregating service. Examples of these types of sites include Stumble Upon, Delicious, or Google Reader.

If you post regularly on a company blog, it makes sense to have these buttons automatically inserted at the ending of every post. If a reader likes what you have to say, they can choose the button that is appropriate, and send a link to your blog post to other via a tweet on Twitter, a link on Delicious, a Digg, or even by email.

There are almost unlimited sites through which you can share, though you need an account on whichever ones you personally want to share through. To post the buttons on your blog post, you do not need to have an account with each site.

If you use a self-hosted Wordpress site, consider adding a plug-in that will automatically add these sharing buttons to each post. Your readers can then easily share your site with the click of the mouse, and giving them this convenience helps bring in more consistent traffic, at no cost to you.

If you haven’t yet jumped on the social networking bandwagon, do so now! If you think that networking through being social and having fun isn’t beneficial to doing business–think again.

Social networking has quickly become one of the most efficient ways to get the word out about what businesses have to offer. Whether it’s through Twitter or Facebook, many are enjoying the benefits of a large audience centered in one small location–at the same time.

One of the newest trends in social networking is participation in parties that are hosted in real time on Twitter. A website’s equivalent to a “housewarming” party, these gatherings bring thousands of social networkers together in a chat room type atmosphere. For anywhere from one to several hours, the marketing hosts talk about and spread the benefits of your website, product, and/or services.

Another new trend is the creation of “fan pages” on Facebook. Individual companies are creating pages (the web’s equivalent to an individual website). As each user marks your page as a favorite, their entire list of contacts is notified. So essentially for each fan you gain of your website, you can receive up to thousands of free referrals to your page.

It’s not too late to use social networking to your advantage. Begin participating in these sites today and you’ll be on your way to driving free traffic to your website without much effort.

There are many ways to draw in traffic to your website through the use of multimedia, and photos are no exception. You may wonder how a photo can bring in visitors, but there are several ideas you may not have considered. And no–you don’t need to run a photography website or blog for this to work either!

If you have a free photo service account, or participate in any of the popular social networking programs–you have a way to entice potential customers to your sites.

Think of a photo as a marketing tool. A billboard in smaller form, pictures tell the story. If you run a website on restoring antique cars, you can try taking a photo of a restored vehicle and posting it on your networks, your profiles, or your blog.

Popular networks such as MySpace, Twitter, and Facebook even now allow the uploading of photos through mobile devices. Most will also allow you to leave a caption in case the photo doesn’t speak for itself. The photo itself will usually link back to your site, or a profile where you have your site URL located for readers to see.

This is just one great way to use photos to gain free website traffic. Get creative and find other uses for those relevant photos you have!

Bringing in free traffic to your website via online means such as forum posting, blog commenting, or social networking is fast and efficient. It serves another purpose though–bringing in traffic while you’re not even online.

When you leave a comment on a blog or forum, with your website address link in your signature line, you are allowing the power of the web to work for you. Each link you leave remains on that site permanently, and you by regularly participating in forum posting or commenting in this way, you continually add to your incoming traffic.

Social networking also brings in free traffic while you are offline, though in a slightly different way. The nature of Facebook and Twitter are that updates are continuous. If you post an update with a link to your site, it will eventually be buried and no longer as valuable for traffic. However, these social networking platforms allow generous opportunities for advertising your website links on your profile.

By taking the time to create an attractive and complete profile on Facebook or Twitter, you will draw the attention of potential visitors to your site. Remember to keep updating regularly though–it’s these updates that get readers to your profile, which is where your site links are located.

If you’re looking for a quick way to bring more traffic to your site than you’ve had in a long time, running contests is the way to go. You might think that you need an expensive item to give away, but people really are happy to get anything that’s free. Offer a book, a small gift basket, or a free sample of whatever product or service you sell through your website. Gift certificates work well too, and are cheap to mail to the winners.

Once you’ve decided what to give away, put up a post on your company blog with the parameters of the contest. Give yourself a few weeks before the deadline to enter if you want to maximize the number of entries. The longer the contest runs the more exposure you’ll get as readers pass the link along to others who may be interested in entering.

Besides the traditional “shout outs” through social networking, you can also now advertise your contest through websites such as Prizey. These contest-listing sites are usually free, and you reach thousands of people already interested in entering a contest. Of those, even if 3% of them visit your site and enter your contest, you’re doing quite well.

Remember, you’re marketing yourself just by running the contests, even if the product you are offering is unrelated to your site. It helps to offer a product or service that is relevant though, so that entrants will have a reason to return to your site–even when you aren’t having a giveaway.