Showing posts with label website. Show all posts
Showing posts with label website. Show all posts
Believe me, in spite of the current financial turmoil, there hasn't ever been a better time to generate an online income stream!
And yet it seems that so many budding Internet marketers are finding it hard to break through VNB - the "Visitor Numbers Barrier."
When I started, I thought there was some magic elixir or secret technique that would transform my visitor numbers! If only I could find THE ONE successful method!
Well, this article is to let you know that while there may be hundreds of ways to get visitors to your website - I've selected some of the techniques that work best for me.
And they can work for you, as well.
Because, if there IS a secret of success, it is this: "Don't rely on ONE way to generate traffic. Become familiar with MANY." Better to have many visitor doors to your website, rather than just one, don't you think?
I'm still surprised how many serious Internet marketers neglect the basics. And one of the most basic ways to improve your visitor traffic is to be absolutely certain that your website is listed by the search engines.
Don't trust the search engine spiders to do your work for you. All the major search engines have detailed and easy-to-follow instructions on site submission, as well as how to create and submit site-maps.
I don't think Facebook needs a great deal of introduction, does it? But you can mine value for Facebook if you look for opportunities to include your website on information that you provide.
Then, there is what I call the secret power of blogging: search engines LOVE blogs. The search engine spiders thrive on novelty and change, and if you write or post a new entry to your blog every day - or every other day - the search engines will recognize what is going on and begin to rank your website blog higher than a website that doesn't change its content from month to month. And a high ranking means visitors to your site.
Don't forget that you can leverage your signature in online communities or discussion groups. If your product is specifically niched, then you know that there are loyal and relevant online communities or discussion groups who want to hear from you.
And, your forum signature could be a goldmine once you have thought through the best way of expressing your product's unique feature so that readers find your website irresistible.
Would you like your web address to be seen by ten million people in ten minutes? Well, it's possible - if you're careful! Because there are three kinds of people: those who love Google Adwords, often known as Pay Per Click, those who hate it - and those who haven't tried it.
Many people just go nuts trying to get their advertisement absolutely perfect. And, if you don't read the small print, you could find that your budget is exhausted quickly. But if you follow the guidelines and budget sensibly you could attract many, many hundreds of paying visitors on a daily basis.
Do you remember those kid's stories where the fairy Godmother tells the child to repeat a word three times for magic to happen? Well, here's that word: "eBay", "eBay", "eBay".
There - I've said it. eBay is perhaps THE most underestimated visitor generating resource. Ignore eBay at your peril. There are many, many resources available on the web where you can discover how to sell products on eBay. Until recently you could sell digital products (i.e. eBooks, which you can download) but the rules have changed and currently you can only sell physical goods, so your eBook will have to be on a CD. Personally, I think it's a good move, and opens up many possibilities.
Don't forget that Ezines and Newsletters are the Grand Daddy and Grand Mommy of all website visitor attraction and list building activity. The thing is this - Ezines and Newsletters work!
If you love your niche product, you'll have LOTS to say about it, and there will be people who want to hear what you have to say. I built a subscriber of almost 3,000 with a business coaching Newsletter.
Another way to get visitors to your websites is to write an ebook. I'm not embarrassed to say that we're not talking great literature here. We aren't talking about the Pulitzer Prize. We're not even talking more than, maybe, 30 pages, double spaced, and size 12 font.
But the fact is this: your eBook will attract visitors to your website single-handedly.
Later, you can provide your eBook to affiliates so that they send visitors to your site as well! If you're more of an audio expert than a novelist, why not create a podcast? Uh? Well, a podcast is a series of audio files that is distributed over the Internet to iPods and other music players and personal computers. This is the future - and it's fun!
The fact is, everyone loves information but don't always find printed pages the best way to get it. If you can provide the same information that can be played on an iPod or similar media player, or a mobile phone, you're offering a higher value product.
You needn't start from scratch - you can plug your product or service almost immediately by converting your existing articles or eBooks into .mp3 recordings. (.mp3 is the industry standard audio format that is widely accepted for iPods, mobile phones etc.) Remember, you have, on your hard drive, stuff that you have written, or will write, that you can add value to by converting it into an .mp3 recording.
Again, it's the basics that are often the key to increasing your visitor traffic, so you might need to shine your light on your meta tags. (To put it briefly, a "meta tag" is used by search engines to allow them to more accurately list your site in their indexes.
To be honest, it works most of the time, but not always! Search engines are always changing their methods, and some use Meta tags a lot, while others don't, but I would not want to neglect this technique. It is a small piece of the mosaic that completes the whole visitor traffic picture.
How many times have you wanted to speak your mind? Well, now you can - and it'll help drive visitors to your website. How? Leave testimonials on other people's sites. This won't take you a second, but your web address will be around for years. Go for it. It is so simple, and so little done.
Another technique I used to attract visitors was to write a priority email to customers with an attention-grabbing subject such as "The Top Ten Myths In Your Industry." Or, provide something like this as a freebie. Make certain that there are clear links to your website, and a compelling reason for the reader to visit.
Finally, I don't think YouTube needs much introduction! It's simply one of the largest websites devoted to online videos covering every single subject you can think of - and more! So how can you use the power of YouTube to get more visitors? Simply this: upload a video of you talking about your niche.
Many cheap digital cameras have a video option - and you do not need a high-end movie camera. You could get a friend to film you. Or, you could use a built in camera on your PC or Mac, if your model has one. Aim to talk for not much longer than 10 minutes maximum, and sign off with your website address. Again, this is much easier than you would think.
Remember, so many people focus on one traffic building technique, and one only. I hope I've shown you that there are many ways - and you should have fun with all of them. My best to you.
By James Gladwin (c) 2009
Here is a collection of what we consider "must have" tools for webmasters. These tools will benefit any webmaster, both novices and experts alike. Arm yourself with these tools in order to achieve a more professional online presence.
1. Custom 404 Page
Use a custom 404 page, so that if a user incorrectly types a webpage URL, they will still retain navigational options within your site and be provided alternative solutions. When a domain is correctly entered, but a specific webpage's URL is entered incorrectly, it is possible to display your custom error page to the visitor. By providing users with a navigational bar and further assistance, rather than leaving them with a generic "page not found" error screen, you can often keep prospective customers on your site by providing them with navigation alternatives.
2. UrlTrends
UrlTrends is a service that shows historical trends, so that webmasters can see how their SEO efforts are affecting websites in the search engines. UrlTrends should be used in conjunction with web-logging software.
UrlTrends - www.urltrends.com
3. Favicon
Polish your website by adding a Favorite Icon. When a "favicon" is available on your site, and the site URL is entered in the user's web browser URL box, the favicon will be displayed beside the URL. This gives the website a more professional and polished look.
Favicon HTMLKit - www.htmlkit.com
4. Color Matching
Match the primary web colors with those used in your logo. Simply choose a preferred color using the ColorBlender service below, and a 6-color matching palette and blend will be automatically calculated for you.
ColorBlender - www.colorblender.com
5. Online WYSIWYG Editing
Online webpage editing allows for collaboration, so that different users can log in and edit web pages.
Edit - www.edit.com
6. RSS Feeds
No longer considered to be just a nice addition, RSS feeds are now a "must have" for popular websites! Create RSS feeds for newsletters, press releases, educational articles, product tutorials, new product promotions, or just about any other sort of web content. FeedForAll - www.feedforall.com
7. MaxEmail
MaxEmail's very affordable Internet fax and voicemail service allows a fax message to be delivered to an email address as a PDF formatted attachment. This allows fax messages to follow you regardless of your location. And, it also eliminates the need for a costly extra telephone line and a dedicated fax machine.
MaxEmail - maxemail.com
8. Royalty-Free Images
Locate stock photos to incorporate into your web design. Use royalty-free stock photography to add professional, high-quality images to your website.
Photo Wizard - www.photo-wizard.net
9. Submit Corner Web Assessment Tools
These web assessment tools help you use search engines to effectively monitor who links to your website, how many links, and who your competitors are. The tools include search indexing, link tracking, and competitor identification.
Submit Corner - www.SubmitCorner.com
10. Ranks.nl
This service assesses keyword density and prominence of a domain. The tool parses keywords and assesses the number of times a keyword occurs, and then discerns the density of the keywords.
Ranks.nl - ranks.nl/tools/spider.html
11. Webmaster Toolkit
The Webmaster Toolkit is a collection of webmaster tools developed to help webmasters with daily webmaster chores. The suite of free tools and resources included continues to grow, and contains something useful for the beginner and the advanced webmaster alike.
Webmaster Toolkit - www.webmaster-toolkit.com
12. HTML Web Templates
Make it clean and professional. Use easy-to-edit HTML web templates for web design.
Web Design - www.webmaster-templates.net or www.webdesign-elements.com
13. TrafficZap
This website includes script, page rank checker, link popularity checker, and more.
TrafficZap - www.trafficzap.com
14. Compete.com
Web Analytics - Stay on top of rivals with site metrics and audience profiles for the top 1,000,000 web domains. Identify rival search marketing strategies to take your SEM and SEO efforts to the next level.
SiteAnalytics - siteanalytics.compete.com
15. Thumbshots
Easily add thumbshot images to your webpages. Integrate website thumbnails by simply copying and pasting HTML code. Additional software is not needed.
Thumbshots - www.thumbshots.org
Use top-notch tools to make web maintenance and management a little easier.
By Sharon Housley (c) 2009
Social media is here to stay. There. I said it. It will be around in some form for years to come. Do you really see Facebook, Twitter and Web videos going somewhere?
Or do you just see them evolving and becoming part of a larger system the same way business blogs did? Great. Then we can start figuring out how to use social media to our benefit.
How do you know if sites like Facebook are for YOU? How can you tell if a social networking site can help YOUR company?
It boils down to three things.
1- Are There Enough People on the Site in Your Interest Area for it to Be Worth Your While?
You have to think about business connections too, not just clients.
You can connect with people who send you business. Think about what the value of a new client is too, whether you think you can get one out of 100, and how long it takes. When people come to your profile, are they visiting your site? If not, is your profile set up correctly?
Experiment. There are several very subtle things you can do that maximize your exposure, not just daily clicks through to your site.
To find out if there are enough people on Facebook who need your plumbing services, search for home improvement groups. Check your regional network and look on the Marketplace page. See if you can find people in your local area to befriend who would need your services - but for heaven's sake, don't be aggressive in your promotíon.
Instead, create a Facebook page, run an ad, or have the type of networking conversations where "so, what do you do?" will naturally come up. And you can take it from there.
Networking at Facebook can be like hanging out at a neighborhood mixer. Yeah, you might want to mention that you're a handyman, or that you work at the bank, and give someone your card, but you don't want to turn those first few getting-to-know-you conversations into a sales pitch.
Let them know who you are, what you do, and after a few conversations, send them a no-strings coupon for them or a friend "just in case you ever need it buddy" and go on being friends.
They'll remember you if you keep in touch, and are a nice enough guy.
2- Does your company have an RSS-capable site that updates frequently?
If it does, a profile on Facebook gives you another place to share your RSS link. You can import your blog posts going forward, or summaries. There are also applications like NetworkedBlogs that will help your blog posts get exposure from interested readers.
3- Do you already have clients, friends, associates, whose signal you can isolate, or whose noise you can penetrate, using Facebook?
This has to be the most underestimated use of Facebook. My first month at Facebook I had direct interactions with ten influential people I admire. Some of them I look up to for personal reasons, others are greats in some aspect of search, the internet or technology. One actually sent me a client.
Instead of installing hundreds of applications and super-poking someone or posting spam to their Super Wall, you can be the smart person who sends a letter and gets a response, the one who sends a private message and is sent a gift in return, or just get the wonderful feeling of having a world famous personality you admire not only acknowledge you, but contact you directly.
One of the greatest things about Facebook is how it can help cement relationships between you and people you know but didn't think you had much in common with. You know how sometimes, you want to write to say hello to someone, but at the same time, you don't want to waste their time?
Or when you think about some great author or celebrity you admire, and what you'd say to them if you could meet them? Maybe you just want to compliment a more famous colleague and not sound like a dork.
Facebook can help with this when it functions as an automatic ice-breaker, facilitating an intial contact between you and someone you wish you had more reason to interact with, then another, and another, until you become friends who call each other on the phone and plan to visit or meet at conferences.
Those are the reasons. It's not a matter of time because you can block all the nuisance requests and there are ways around the irritating app requests.
It's not a matter of just traffic because first, you can set up a profile in 15 minutes to automatically send you traffic and you don't have to mess with it again if you like. Or you can go in and meet people every day and it can be a major traffic source.
And it's not a matter of whether you can get anything out of it - it's more a matter of whether you're willing and whether the available traffic is targeted to your topic. It's not for everyone, because let's face it, not everyone wants to do the work, or even use Facebook that way.
And that's okay! For some people, it's a nice little escape, like a mental, online Starbucks. For some it's a bother, and the pain of learning a new way to do things isn't worth the time. I don't mean that sarcastically - if you're functioning as a CEO, you may not want to focus on Facebook.
With a little research, you can find out what kind of role it will play in your life.
by Tinu AbayomiPaul (c) 2009
By Mike Tekula (c) 2009
What makes or break an SEO campaign is knowing where to start, what is important and what is simply not worth the time.
Resources are never infinite. If you're not careful you can spend them spinning wheels and tweaking things that will have no real effect on your search traffic. Plan effectively, and you'll achieve true growth and a positive return on your investment.
The difference lies in understanding how search engines work - how they crawl the web and how they use that data to rank web pages - and how your website does or doesn't meet these criteria.
The Technical Audit
The first order of action is the technical audit of your site. Tackle these issues first because this represents the foundation of your site. Some technical problems can render web pages invisible to search engines. Identifying and resolving these issues upfront is critical.
A technical audit should include: Code cleanliness / content visibility, File size / page load time, Navigation structure, URL structure, Title tag / headlines, Current index, Canonicalization issues.
Other problems are not quite as detrimental to SEO but still should get attention.
If your site navigation is generated by JavaScript and does not occur as standard HTML in your source code, it's likely that search engines aren't seeing it. This means they also aren't reading the words in your links - an important signal for page relevance. In the worst cases, they haven't indexed pages linked to this way at all. Rebuilding your navigation to be SEO-friendly can yield positive results without requiring significant costs.
The Content Audit
Some of the content aspects that are important: Keyword targeting, Link attraction, Readability.
The Trust Audit
Why do search engines rank some pages over others? The simple answer: they trust that the content will satisfy the user.
Google's algorithm has always been focused centrally on signals of trust. There is money in ranking well, and for this reason webmasters, bless our hearts, can't be trusted to be honest or objective about how much trust we deserve.
This is why Larry and Sergey (Google founders) decided to focus on links as a signal of trust and authority. The basic idea is that the more links that point to a page, the more authoritative and trustworthy the page. The other major search engines followed suit.
Over time, since links were "out of the bag" and link building schemes erupted across the web, search engines have honed their algorithms to use other signals to determine trust.
Still, links are the single most important aspect of trust - and, in almost every case, SEO as a whole. Even tiny sites with just a few, poorly-optimized pages can rank well for competitive keywords if they simply have a powerful enough inbound link profile.
What to look at in evaluating website trust: Inbound link profile, Site age, Outbound links.
Before you start researching keywords, creating content, building links or otherwise optimizing your website (or hire a professional to do so), you need to know where you stand and what to expect moving forward.
The answers aren't always pleasant, but if building the volume and relevance of your search engine traffic matters to you these answers matter too.
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