Sunday, January 15, 2006

"The Web's Best-Kept Traffic Secrets"

- by Jim Edwards

(c) Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
http://www.thenetreporter.com
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Did you realize that thousands of website operators use a
simple technique to generate targeted visitors to their
websites without paying a dime in advertising? It's true.

In fact, the technique works so well that many of them
don't want you to discover how they get those thousands of
website visitors and make so many sales on virtual "auto-
pilot."

Their method?

Creating tightly focused articles other people publish in
their ezines (online magazines and email newsletters) and
post on their websites. This method rates so powerful that
some even call it "the web's best kept traffic secret."

Now, you may ask, "Why would an ezine publisher or website
owner publish my articles for their subscribers?"

The answer: Content!

Over a 100,000 ezines and newsletters operate on the web
(along with millions of websites) covering everything from
pets and cooking to investments and real estate. Many of
them need tightly focused content and they simply can't
produce all of it themselves.

Look at it this way... it's the same reason newspapers use
the Associated Press. Individual newspapers often can't
afford staff writers to cover every story, so they accept
articles from outside their organization.

You can do the exact same thing for various ezines and
websites catering to your niche audience!

You can get valuable publicity -- exposure you often
couldn't even pay for if you wanted to -- by providing
valuable, content-rich articles in exchange for a byline
and a link to your website (called a "resource box")!

The following represent only a few of the enormous benefits
of writing and distributing simple articles online:

** Attain "Expert" Status **

Let's face it! In the eyes of virtually everyone who reads
your articles you rank as the "expert" on the subject.

Just look at people who write newspaper columns. You
may disagree with their viewpoints, but they still have an
elevated status in your mind compared to the "average Joe"
off the street.

** Pre-sell Website Visitors **

If your article appeals to a niche audience hungry for more
information on a very focused subject, you actually pre-
sell them better than any sales pitch. In their minds,
you've already delivered content they really want so when
they click over to your site you already have a
"reputation" in their minds.

** Traffic Lasts Longer **

Even though the Internet changes very quickly, webmasters
are usually very slow to remove content from their sites.
Once you get an article posted on another person's website,
you have an excellent chance of that article staying there
for weeks, months, even years.

** Increase Links To Your Site **

In a recent search I found just a dozen of my articles
posted on over 813 different websites! Not only do those
postings bring me traffic, but they also help my search
engine positioning because of my increased "Link
Popularity."

** Builds Your Affiliate Base **

Fact: Affiliates always take the path of least resistance.

If you provide excellent articles they can easily post on
their sites or copy and paste into their ezines, your
affiliates will promote you more often and more effectively
compared to those who don't give them tools.

Plus, as you make more sales and publish articles, other
people will see you providing excellent tools and will want
to sign up as your affiliate so they can use them too!

** Build a Huge "Opt-In" Email List **

You can use articles to build up a huge list of subscribers
by simply compiling several articles into a series and
delivering them at preset intervals.

Often called a "mini-course," this technique allows you not
only to prove to your subscribers that you deliver great
information, but enables you to capture their name and
email adress so you can send them articles and special
offers in the future (with their permission).

** Requires No Special Skills **

People often think they need to be a "writer" in order to
publish articles, but that's not true!

FACT: If you have a passion for a subject and can talk and
explain things like you would to a friend over a cup of
coffee, you can write articles people will love to read.

So if you operate a website selling virtually any type of
product or service (whether your own or as an affiliate),
publishing and promoting with articles should rank high on
your list of traffic generation strategies.

No other method of generating targeted traffic to your
website provides the quality, quantity and steadiness of
traffic in such a simple, straightforward, and cost-
effective manner.

----

Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the co-
author of an amazing new ebook, "Turn Words Into Traffic,"
that will teach you how to use free articles to quickly
drive thousands of targeted visitors to your website or
affiliate link!
Click=> >http://hop.clickbank.net/?richidiot/ezarticles

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

Internet Advertising Options

By Eric Switzer

Your online business will likely require more
advertising than a contemporary business downtown, yet
some new to the world of online business do not spend
the time and money to advertise their business
appropriately and are, in turn, loosing money. Your
online business is crammed into the world wide web
along with thousands of others selling the same
product or service as yourself. Consider this
scenario: In your hometown you want to open an art
supply store. In that same town there are thousands
of art supply stores. In order for your business to
be successful, it will have to stand out in some way
from the others. This is exactly what is happening
when a business is opened online. There is so much
competition, that you must take drastic measures to
ensure that you are getting noticed. Advertising can
be done in so many ways online. These are some of the
most successful ways that you can promote your online
business.

Advertising in e-zines is a popular way to promote
your online business. Ezines are the magazines of the
internet; they written on a particular subject and
read by those interested in that subject. Therefore,
ezine readers are already potential customers and
advertising your site in ezines that are related to
your business is almost guaranteed to help drive
traffic to your site and increase sales for your
product. You should be sure when advertising in
ezines that you are not advertising along side
competitors. Ask the ezine producer if there is a
policy concerning posting competing ads. It is also
a good idea to subscribe to the ezine before making a
decision about whether or not to advertise in it. An
ezine that runs fewer ads is a better choice than one
that runs many ads. You can look at the online
Directory of Ezines to find publications that are
relevant to your company.

Pay-per-click programs are an excellent way to
advertise your business without taking a risk that you
have advertised in the wrong place. With
pay-per-click, you can advertise you site and only
pay for those who click the link and go to your site.
Another popular pay-per program is the pay-per-lead
program that allows you to only pay for leads.
Usually this means that you pay for only those who
download a trail, fill out a form or enter a
sweepstakes; whatever you choose. Lastly you can
display pay-per-click banner ads in which your company
would be allowed to place a banner on their site and
you will be charged for every click that your banner
receives.

Opt-In email is a great way to advertise your
business, however it is expensive and it can be
misused very easily. Using opt-in emails, you would
submit your sales copy to the company that will in
turn email it to those on their mailing list. You
should be very careful since some of the companies
that advertise their mailing lists as opt-in email
service is sometimes really SPAM. It is essential
that you have a perfect and effective sales letter
when using opt-in mailing lists. Without and
effective sales copy your money and time have been
wasted.

About the author:
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To find the best home based business ideas and
opportunities so you can work at home visit:
http://www.moneymakinfool.com
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