- by Jim Edwards © Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
                              http://www.TheJimBoat.com                     
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   After all the debate over website design, shopping carts and credit card processors, every website owner eventually comes to the startling realization that they need one more thing to survive: website traffic!

   But not just any traffic - they need *targeted* traffic.

   In other words, they need people who are interested NOW in what they sell or offer and are actively looking for more information right now.

   SIDE NOTE: Here are two key concepts to burn into your brain when it comes to traffic:

   1. Immediacy - they want it now (not later).

   2. Relevancy - what they see must be exactly what they are looking for, or they'll keep looking.

   Without targeted website traffic it's the same as building an expensive billboard and, instead of placing it alongside a busy highway, hiding it in your *basement* where nobody can see it.

   Upon realizing they need traffic, most website owners run out and start blowing chunks of money and time trying to get "hits," but they fail to grasp that there are really only three (3) reliable ways to get traffic to any website.

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                                   Method #1: BUY Traffic
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   The fastest way to get traffic to any website is simply to BUY it!

   The fastest way to buy it is to use the little classified ads on the right side of search giant Google's results pages.

   Called Google AdWords, the system allows any advertiser to open an account with a small activation fee and start seeing their ads appear on Google within about 15 minutes.

   Advertisers only pay when visitors actually click through from their ad on Google to their website or affiliate link.

   But here is where most people stop! Somehow Google got people to think the ONLY place you buy traffic is from Google (good for Google, bad for website owners).

   In fact, you can BUY traffic from numerous different sources if you know where to look.

   Let's look at a just a few other places you can look to buy ads to drive traffic:

   1. Yahoo! also sells traffic by the click. You can find out more here
        http://sem.smallbusiness.yahoo.com/searchenginemarketing/

   2. MSN also sells pay-per-click (ppc) traffic here:
        https://adcenter.microsoft.com/

   3. Here's one I bet you didn't know about! *Amazon* even sells pay-per-       click traffic through www.clickriver.com.
      These are very targeted ads that appear in front of serious buyers.

   4. You can also buy advertising on dozens of other pay-per-click search
      engines. Log on to www.payperclicksearchengines.com for a list of
      hundreds ranked by market penetration.

   All ppc engines follow the same basic model of only charging advertisers for targeted visitors who read an ad based on a keyword search and actually click through for more information.

   A word to the wise on pay-per-click advertising: Watch your costs and track and measure everything.

   Even though you can get traffic for as little as a penny, you should track your results by search engine and by individual keyword if you want maximum success.

   Many a company has lost its entire advertising budget at a nickel or a dime per click by not watching their conversion rates and continuing to pour money into keywords that don't convert... while neglecting the keywords that do bring sales (mainly because they don't know which is which!).

   However, don't make the mistake of thinking your only paid traffic sources can come from pay-per-click search engines.

   You can also buy ads on blogs and other targeted sites, either through ad networks or by negotiating directly with the sites.

   http://www.blogads.com makes a great place to start your research for additional blog ad opportunities.

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                              Method #2: BORROW Traffic
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   If you need traffic to a website, then borrow it from people who already have it... especially people with lists of loyal subscribers or traffic from search engines, affiliates, or other steady sources.

   "Endorsed Mailings" and "Reciprocal Linking" by other people represent the two fastest ways to borrow someone else's traffic.

   If they maintain a list of subscribers, convince them to send an email out to their people telling them why they should check out your site.

   Also, negotiate a prominent link on their web pages to siphon off targeted visitors who find their website.

   Often the best way to persuade someone to do this involves paying them a commission, agreeing to do a similar mailing to your own list, or providing a link to them on your site (or a combination of all three).

   Imagine how much traffic you could get if someone with a list of 10,000 loyal subscribers told their people to go look at your website! It happens all the time... so why not make it happen for you!

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                                 Method #3: BUILD Traffic
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   If you don't want to pay for traffic, and you don't have any friends with lists, building traffic makes a great option. Building traffic means you use targeted content to create targeted traffic.

   Let's look at the 3 fastest ways to build traffic.

   ~ Article Marketing - Publish articles on specific topics of interest to your target market. Content drives the Internet (ever heard the term "Information Super-Highway") and both consumers and publishers need a constant stream of new content. Once you publish an article, you can include a link to your website or blog in the "resource" box to drive visitors to your site for more information.

   This technique rates so effective that you can even use one of several services to announce your articles to thousands of website and blog publishers who *want* to publish topic-specific articles and will link back to you.

   ~ Blogs - Both search engines and Web surfers love blogs because they can get updated, relevant content quickly. Blogs also create a great potential source of revenue for you because you can run ads for your own products on your own blog.

   ~ Social Media - Sites like Twitter and Facebook can drive large amounts of traffic if you take the time to build up a following and provide excellent, relevant content people in your target market value and want.

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                                       BONUS (Expert)
                              Method #4: "RECYCLE" Traffic
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   The most economical way to get traffic involves turning one-time visitors into regular, repeat visitors that you direct to multiple sites over time.

   You do this by pulling website visitors into your sphere of influence by enticing them to sign up for your newsletter, autoresponder sequence, or "mini-course."

   Bottom line: instead of just getting one-time clicks, you get people to sign up to your email list!

   Then you keep in contact with regular articles, special reports, and recommendations enticing them to visit your own and other people's websites.

   Ultimately, every website owner should orient all of their marketing efforts towards this end of developing a stream of recycled traffic, because it costs the least and creates the best return on time and money invested.

   It doesn't matter if you promote your own product, promote only as an affiliate, or some combination of the two... if you don't recycle traffic and get more than one hit out of each visitor, you're making one of the biggest mistakes anyone can make in online business.

                         (Print this article - it'll be easier to use)
      --------------------------------------------------------
      Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the
      co-author of an amazing ebook that will teach you how
      to use free articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted
      visitors to your website or affiliate links...

Our Reports and Getting Started Tools are updated regularly by RichardPresents.com.






           

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