How to Get Traffic to Your Site

[kasjaws]

I have a couple of websites. One is for a business that I own and the other sells homemade gifts and items. Like everyone else that has a website I struggle with the issue of how to get traffic to my site. I can’t afford major advertising as mine is a very small home business. Yet I can’t grow the business if no one visits my web site. I can’t improve my standing with Google if I don’t have enough hits on my site.
Then there is the whole are of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) which I must admit I don’t understand as well as I should but I am learning. Learning about key word saturation and back links. Learning that the content of my website is critical to how the “bots” read my site and rate it for Google. Learning that new content is essential and you need to update your website constantly to stay in good graces with those “search bots”.
Recently I have returned to “traffic exchanges” and have seen a definite increase in the number of hits on my site. What I wonder is does this really do me any good? If I have thousands of hits but no one really stays on the site and no business comes from those hits does it really get me an improved rating on the search engines?
I would love to hear from others on how you get traffic to your websites.

[sha3k3r5]

Forum back links are also a good way of promoting your website although this is most unfortunate for sites like this and makes a moderators job that much harder to try and have a good balance between allowing users to register and post freely but enough restrictions in place that it stops spammers. The policy on thatforumsite with regards to backlinks is that they are allowed but only in your signature and if the post is relevant. Anyway, I digress...! Backlinks are great as they are seen by search engines and therefore the site the links are pointing to appears to be more popular. The thing that many people are unaware of is that many forums (including this one) have all links set up as "no-follow". This means that when the search engine looks at the HTML it does not follow the link and so no backlink exists! The reasoning behind this is to stop a website being associated with bad links to poor websites.

Another thing to consider which follows a similar idea to backlinks is social networking links. Sharing something on twitter or having a page that people can "like" on Facebook will do your website no end of favours

[Frugaldom]

Personally, I'd prefer to have 10 visitors a week and convert 9 of them to members, paying customers or clients, but when you multiply that up to equate to the worldwide web, the numbers are unimaginable.

In most of my previous research, conversion rates online are running fairly parallel to every other traditional form of media advertising - 1% can be acceptable, 5% is fairly good and converting more than 10% on a busy can be phenomenal. I trained with a company who classed their salesteam members as failures if we didn't surpass 50% conversion! (Slave drivers!) So it CAN be done - you just need really, really well qualified leads in order to reach those levels. The easy answer is there's no easy answer barring throwing £millions into advertising and settling for a miniscule conversion rate.

Example: look at the likes of eBay against the likes of eBid online auctions. Millions flock to eBay, everyone's heard of it, the web is littered with affiliate links, banner ads, pop-ups, PPC etc, it's on TV, radio, films, sponsorships... they are throwing the name in our faces at every opportunity. The name has become synonymous with online auctions! But look in their forums! They are filled with complaints about their fees, services and alleged atrocious treatment of their sellers. eBid has plenty of fee free options for sellers, but do the grumblers descend en masse to make the most of some money saving and free advertising? No! Why not? Because the site owners don't appear to have a multi-million pound advertising and marketing budget in place that can convince the public that they are worthy.

Think how often you walk past shop windows without going inside. You will still look in the window but unless you are captivated by what you see and get that sudden 'must have' urge, there's nobody at the door to encourage you to enter and shop. That's where blogs and forums come into play - target your specific market and then invite them in... strike up a good rapport with your forum and blog readers and their respect will be repaid many times over by personal recommendations. Get it wrong, however, and you're as well shutting up shop.

Just my personal take on things but I don't really sell products online, so I could be talking absolute nonsense.

[Jonson844]

Hello,
One other good way to get backlinks and traffic is to post on forums and blog comments. If you post on a forum try to find a thread that only has a couple of replies.

Thanks
Jonson844
.........................
Appliance Zone Complaints

[ThatForumSite]

Hello,
One other good way to get backlinks and traffic is to post on forums and blog comments. If you post on a forum try to find a thread that only has a couple of replies.

Thanks
Jonson844
.........................
Appliance Zone Complaints

Agreed, backlinks are important however your website needs to have good unique content in order for it to be search engine friendly. simply posting lots of backlinks will not get you high on search engine rankings, especially if the website you are posting backinks on has a "no follow" policy as ThatForumSite has.

[Michael Smith]

Hello,
Another good way to get backlinks and traffic is to post on forums and blog comments. If you post on a forum try to find a thread that only has a couple of replies. Answer the question in the thread and post your link for further information. Make sure it is a good answer so you don't get banned for spamming.

Thanks
Michael Smith

[sha3k3r5]

Hello,
Another good way to get backlinks and traffic is to post on forums and blog comments. If you post on a forum try to find a thread that only has a couple of replies. Answer the question in the thread and post your link for further information. Make sure it is a good answer so you don't get banned for spamming.

Thanks
Michael Smith

All depends on who is moderating the forum, how leanient they are towards such posts and what the rules of the forum are, luckily for you I am quite leanient....

[Frugaldom]

YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

I've got a spectacular website that PAYS YOU £100 to read it...........

[ThatForumSite]

YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

I've got a spectacular website that PAYS YOU £100 to read it...........

Well that caught my attention, tell me more???

[Frugaldom]

Well that caught my attention, tell me more???

What would you like to hear?

[PIPER]

Backlinks are essential from what i gather, in hand this would increase your Alexa rank which i understand is quite important - http://www.alexage.com/blog/is-alexa-rank-important/

[Frugaldom]

Does it really matter where your site ranks in the search engines? You can't force people to click links when they find them and you still need to convert visitors into paying customers in order to generate any form of commercial success.

The search engines are nothing more than global directories and, at the end of the day, if you're talking money, you want the end result to be satisfied customers and your business showing healthy profits.

Apart from that... what happens when the likes of Google, Bing, Lycos etc get too big? When you're dealing with a global market, specialisation and affordability are what I would reckon counted most and those two things combined equal something worth talking about - spreading the word - generating increased interest.

Then again - I still can't get how Facebook earns sufficient income to call it a successful business model.

[skymo]

Using the SEO techniques we can increase the traffic of the website ,
For that one visit this site http://www.thewebpole.com/increase-visitor-traffic/ , here it gives the best way to increase traffic through blogging , adding keywords, article submission, & directory submission.........

[brygidaray]

If you get more traffic on the website than you can so some link building method.Linkbuilding is the best way to generate traffic on the website.Search engine marketing is the best way to increase traffic on the website.

[gilbertgilard]

There are many different way to generate traffic on the website.Off page seo is the best way to increase traffic on the website.Article submission,Forum posting,Blog posting,Bookmarking is the best way to increase traffic on the website.Search engine marketing also best way to increase traffic on the website.

[David Smith]

For attracting more and more traffic towards your website social media optimization(SMO) is the best process because now most of the internet users have social media profile, and they are always busy with them. So if you're able to optimize your website over social media, then definitely you can get the more and more visitors.

[Frugaldom]

If it's an active forum you are looking for, it helps that there are others here with whome to intract, especially the forum masters... where are they and what happened to the competitions? Should we all just pack up and go elsewhere?

[sha3k3r5]

If it's an active forum you are looking for, it helps that there are others here with whome to intract, especially the forum masters... where are they and what happened to the competitions? Should we all just pack up and go elsewhere?

It is sad that this site seems to have been neglected lately, I have spoken to the owners earlier this week and they assured me that business will resume as normal this weekend.... I hope it does anyway as things were starting to pick up and it would be a shame to throw it all away.

[Frugaldom]

I agree, even with my dodgy keyboard spitting out extra letters and omitting others.

I think it is a case of specialisation and finding a niche that most interests you, otherwise the forum owners can become jaded with their own projects. (Voice of experience after nearly 15 years of running forums.) Site traffic isn't always the biggest problem, it's providing enough interesting content that makes visitors want to stay.

Personally, I like this thread, as it could be so helpful to so many others who are just starting out in the wonderful world of the web. I did run a thread about promotion and affordable marketing for new starts and there were loads of ideas. Getting them implemented isn't always easy, as competition is global even on a tiny forum. And at the end of the day, we all still need to earn a living besides sitting at computers and reading/participating in forums. They are more like the canteens of the companies concerned, or, as eBid used to call them, 'the kitchen table' of the forum household, where folks come to pass some spare time interacting with like-minded others.

Edit - missing letters now included.

[Blueberry]

Hello,
Getting Traffic is an ongoing task which one must be constantly doing and the result will definitely be amazing.

Thanks
Blueberry

[milecorea]

These are the best ways to get traffic to our site.
1. Link Wheel
2. Forum Posting
3. Social Bookmarking
4. Blog Commenting
5. Article Submission.

[Frugaldom]

Quickest fix, I suspect, is buying visitors by way of high profile paid advertising. Not many 'ordinary' website or forum owners can afford that, though.

[ankur35]

hello guys,

wen a person creates his website he does not knw how to get traffic..the solution of getting the traffic into yur wesbite

first is seo
2nd is adwords
3rd is traffic exchange
4th is backlinks
5th is social bookmarking sites
6th is email sending
7th is ptc sites
8th blog posting


well knw a days seo is very common mostly people doing learn seo its is the best way of getting traffic from google
WELL adwords is paying product from google but it really helps to get traffic ...adwords is getting popular and popular every days ...its is the best paying way of getting the traffic into websites
or my best opinion is getting the contacts and send them emails its free techniques but u must have good email lists

and ptc sites is also great way its is a gurrented ways of getting traffic its very cheap way like adwords everyone must visit in yur website surely
social bookmarking sites is a part of seo:)

now a days automatiac softwares provide yur traffic ...

[Barbara G.]

Thank you for all the great ideas listed. I am learning in this area, too. For my sites, I have been creating some unique blogs which have small info about what my sites have to offer. For example, if I am selling resume coaching services, then I will have posts on a blog concerning tips for creating a great resume. Other blog posts are added which are related to the site I am trying to "grow." Of course, I have several places with this unique content with links back to the original site.

Another thing I have done is to add the site to some high quality directories. I have also created some articles for "article directories" which allow me to place a link in my signature line.

I am also learning the SEO side of this area as well as how to increase your rank in the search engines. Thanks for sharing with the group!

[ThatForumSite]

Feel free to link to your sites on your signature Barbara, would be nice if you mentioned ThatForumSite.com on any of your sites/blogs too.

On a totally seperate subject, link exchanges are always a mutually beneficial way of boosting traffic to your site. Search engines love links in to your site from other sites