If you recently decided to start an online business, you’re probably wondering how to advertise it. If you’re a cheapskate like me, you’re probably wondering how you can advertise it for free and still get good results. If this is the case, this is the perfect article for you.
You don’t have to pay one cent to successfully advertise an online business.
As odd as this may seem, my most successful online businesses didn’t get any paid advertising, where as my less successful online businesses did get paid advertising. I’m not sure if this was supposed to be an omen or something, but I found it to be rather peculiar.
The point here is simply that you don’t need to buy advertising in order to have a successful online business. Would it help to buy it? Typically, yes it would. Do you need to buy it? Probably not, unless you’re planning on launching something of a rather high magnitude.
Here are some ways to advertise your online business for free:
1. Automatic link lists, also known as topsites.
Topsites were the first real way that I generated traffic for my online businesses back when I started out. The reason for this is that you get traffic basically instantly. All you have to do is sign up, put your special link code on your website, click on it to send in a vote, and next thing you know you will be listed (as long as there isn’t too much competition). There are plenty of topsites where you will only need one vote to show up on the first or second page, and instantly start receiving traffic. You can start your own topsite and/or find topsites at www.top-site-list.com and a gazillion other places on the web.
2. Link exchanges.
Exchanging links with other quality websites related to yours is a great way to increase traffic, make friends, and increase your pagerank. Just send an email or fill out a provided form to a webmaster you are interested in trading links with, put his link up, and see what happens. Every link you have up on another site will send you more visitors, and further legitimize your website. If you are interested in exchanging links with this blog please click here.
3. Search engines.
Search engines are probably the best way to score a lot of traffic. However, to successfully get a lot of visitors from a search engine for your specific topic is anything but easy. You will have to optimize your site for search engines with the correct meta tags to stand a good chance. Pick as many different and specialized relevant keywords and phrases as you possibly can. As far as I can tell, the more different and ridiculously specific keywords/phrases you have, the more traffic you will get. The reason for this is that the more general terms are fought for tooth and nail by tons of websites. The more specific terms/phrases aren’t fought over much, and can be more easily won over. However, each one of the more specific terms/phrases will not give as much traffic as a more general term/phrase would. To make up for this you need to come up with a ton of the more specific ones.
If you haven’t already submitted your website to the biggest search engine, Google, and you aren’t listed yet (you might want to check first), you can do it here: http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl
4. Directories
Directories are a great way to easily gain exposure and pagerank. However, they typically don’t provide as much traffic as the other options. There is one directory that may be the exception to the “not as much traffic” rule, and that one is www.dmoz.org. However, getting listed there may not be easy. Dmoz.org (aka The Open Directory Project) is a highly respected hand picked directory of websites. The data is so well respected that Google and many other search engines use it in their results. A listing at Dmoz.org is like a listing in multiple search engines with an extra hint of respect tagged on. Believe me, you most definitely want this. The directory is a non profit volunteer run organization, so there won’t be any paying for listings. You have to earn a listing with quality content and a noticeable website. Good luck.
5. Forums
Using forums to generate traffic is quite nice in the sense that you can join forums on specific topics and know there are a bunch of active users that could very well become active users/visitors for your website. All you need to do is put a link to your website in your signature and post away. Every post you make will have a link to your website. To demonstrate a more extreme version of doing this, if you make a post on every thread of a forum for a year then anytime someone searches for something on the forum they will probably come to a thread with your link on it. I haven’t actually done this “posting on every thread for a year” thing, but the more I think about it if you were to do it on a really big forum it could generate ridiculous traffic. Make sure, however, that your posts aren’t blatant spam. Try to make yours posts as useful and on topic as possible. One extremely popular forum is www.offtopic.com.
6. Social bookmarking websites.
If your business involves any kind of daily updates that include unique content, you can probably use social bookmarking websites to promote it as well. Here is a short list of some good ones for you to join: Digg, Netscape, StumbleUpon, Reddit, Del.icio.us, and Newsvine. Just submit your new content to these websites every day and you will increase your traffic as well as your pagerank. You will also find yourself coming across a lot of interesting material that may take up quite a bit of your time if you get too engrossed in it, so be careful
You don’t have to pay one cent to successfully advertise an online business.
As odd as this may seem, my most successful online businesses didn’t get any paid advertising, where as my less successful online businesses did get paid advertising. I’m not sure if this was supposed to be an omen or something, but I found it to be rather peculiar.
The point here is simply that you don’t need to buy advertising in order to have a successful online business. Would it help to buy it? Typically, yes it would. Do you need to buy it? Probably not, unless you’re planning on launching something of a rather high magnitude.
Here are some ways to advertise your online business for free:
1. Automatic link lists, also known as topsites.
Topsites were the first real way that I generated traffic for my online businesses back when I started out. The reason for this is that you get traffic basically instantly. All you have to do is sign up, put your special link code on your website, click on it to send in a vote, and next thing you know you will be listed (as long as there isn’t too much competition). There are plenty of topsites where you will only need one vote to show up on the first or second page, and instantly start receiving traffic. You can start your own topsite and/or find topsites at www.top-site-list.com and a gazillion other places on the web.
2. Link exchanges.
Exchanging links with other quality websites related to yours is a great way to increase traffic, make friends, and increase your pagerank. Just send an email or fill out a provided form to a webmaster you are interested in trading links with, put his link up, and see what happens. Every link you have up on another site will send you more visitors, and further legitimize your website. If you are interested in exchanging links with this blog please click here.
3. Search engines.
Search engines are probably the best way to score a lot of traffic. However, to successfully get a lot of visitors from a search engine for your specific topic is anything but easy. You will have to optimize your site for search engines with the correct meta tags to stand a good chance. Pick as many different and specialized relevant keywords and phrases as you possibly can. As far as I can tell, the more different and ridiculously specific keywords/phrases you have, the more traffic you will get. The reason for this is that the more general terms are fought for tooth and nail by tons of websites. The more specific terms/phrases aren’t fought over much, and can be more easily won over. However, each one of the more specific terms/phrases will not give as much traffic as a more general term/phrase would. To make up for this you need to come up with a ton of the more specific ones.
If you haven’t already submitted your website to the biggest search engine, Google, and you aren’t listed yet (you might want to check first), you can do it here: http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl
4. Directories
Directories are a great way to easily gain exposure and pagerank. However, they typically don’t provide as much traffic as the other options. There is one directory that may be the exception to the “not as much traffic” rule, and that one is www.dmoz.org. However, getting listed there may not be easy. Dmoz.org (aka The Open Directory Project) is a highly respected hand picked directory of websites. The data is so well respected that Google and many other search engines use it in their results. A listing at Dmoz.org is like a listing in multiple search engines with an extra hint of respect tagged on. Believe me, you most definitely want this. The directory is a non profit volunteer run organization, so there won’t be any paying for listings. You have to earn a listing with quality content and a noticeable website. Good luck.
5. Forums
Using forums to generate traffic is quite nice in the sense that you can join forums on specific topics and know there are a bunch of active users that could very well become active users/visitors for your website. All you need to do is put a link to your website in your signature and post away. Every post you make will have a link to your website. To demonstrate a more extreme version of doing this, if you make a post on every thread of a forum for a year then anytime someone searches for something on the forum they will probably come to a thread with your link on it. I haven’t actually done this “posting on every thread for a year” thing, but the more I think about it if you were to do it on a really big forum it could generate ridiculous traffic. Make sure, however, that your posts aren’t blatant spam. Try to make yours posts as useful and on topic as possible. One extremely popular forum is www.offtopic.com.
6. Social bookmarking websites.
If your business involves any kind of daily updates that include unique content, you can probably use social bookmarking websites to promote it as well. Here is a short list of some good ones for you to join: Digg, Netscape, StumbleUpon, Reddit, Del.icio.us, and Newsvine. Just submit your new content to these websites every day and you will increase your traffic as well as your pagerank. You will also find yourself coming across a lot of interesting material that may take up quite a bit of your time if you get too engrossed in it, so be careful
0 comments:
Post a Comment