Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Top 10 Tips For Generating Big Traffic To Your Blog Today

(C) Copyright Ewen Chia, http://www.EzineArticle.com

Let’s face it, blogs (or weblogs) are getting incredibly
popular amongst people with an internet connection due to
the ease and practicality of setting one up.

Despite this however, there is no value in having a blog
if no one is visiting and reading it!

Therefore, it is important to know exactly how to drive
traffic to your blog if you desire to increase your
readership or monetize it.

To do that, here are 10 quick tips to generating more
traffic to your blogs:

Tip 1: Reciprocal Linking

One of the most proven ways to gain targeted traffic is
to exchange links with other bloggers or site owners.
This is a task which requires a little work – by sending
an email request for a link exchange with a few follow
ups but the results are worth it.

Another linking method is to simply write a testimonial
for a product you have purchased. If your testimonial is
good, product owners will usually publish it on their
sales page with your blog URL included.

If you want to skip the traditional way of exchanging
links and go for the easier way, you can automate the
process with various software and services found on the
net. Just do a search at Google.com and you will have
a list of these.

Tip 2: Blog Commentaries

Do you know that your comments also have high potential
in generating targeted traffic to your blog and is an
effective linking strategy?

All you have to do is find a blog related to your niche
and post your comments. At the end of your comments you
can include a link back to your blog, this way people who
are interested will be able to visit your blog as well.
However you should never misuse this to spam other blogs.

Tip 3: Blog Directories

Blog directories are similar to search engines just that
they cater only to searches for blogs. It is advisable to
submit your blog to the major directories, some of which
include feedster.com, technorati.com and blogstreet.com.

Similarly, there are many blog services like pingomatic.com
which you can use to ping your blog. Pinging your blog
notifies the service that you have updated your blog.
These services will then publish your new posts and you
get traffic from interested readers and search engines.

Tip 4: Writing Articles

This is one of the best ways of pulling targeted, steady
and long-term traffic to your blog. By writing your own
articles and submitting them to article directories, you
can invite a lot of targeted visitors to your blog.

In order to generate traffic by writing articles, you
need to include your resource box at the end of every
article you have written. The resource box is where you
promote and introduce your website or blog.

To truly maximize your results, you need a system to create,
submit and leverage off your articles easily. One of the best
available is seen at http://EzineArticle.com/aa.htm

Tip 5: Writing Press Releases

Press release is a very effective way of generating instant
traffic to your blog. Although press releases only pull in
short-term traffic, they can work very well if you
continuously write and submit press releases regularly
while monetizing the traffic received.

PRWeb.com is one of the oldest and most trusted sources
for news distribution on the web. Or you can use an automated
press release service like http://www.SubmitYourPressRelease.com
to do the work for you quickly.

Tip 6: Start A Blog Mailing List

The phrase “the money is in the list” is true in all businesses.
If you want to succeed online, you must start building your own
list of targeted subscribers. You can send your subscribers to
your blog anytime you have new posts.

By the same token, you can also get your blog readers to
subscribe to a ‘blog update’ list which can be used to notify
them when you have updated your blog. REPEAT traffic through
returning visitors is a key traffic strategy and you can
control that with this method.

Tip 7: Publishing Your Own Ezine

You can also provide your subscribers with useful information
in several series with an autoresponder. An ezine is often
called an online magazine. By publishing your own ezine, you
are able to attract readership to your blog when you advertise
it in your ezine.

Tip 8: Pay For Traffic

If you have a good monetization strategy for your blog through
affiliate programs, Google Adsense and a mailing list, you
should consider using paid advertising to drive traffic to
your blog.

Recommended options include pay-per-click advertising, ezine
advertising and huge banner exposures.

Tip 9: Giving Out Free Reports

Give out free viral reports to promote your blog. Providing
useful information in your free reports can trigger readers’
interest to know more about you and your websites. More
information on this tactic can be found at
http://www.MiniEbook.com.

Tip 10: Niche Discussion Boards

Discussions boards or forums can deliver targeted traffic to
your blog. If you have a blog about gardening, try searching
for a related niche forum with huge traffic to participate in.

Most forums will usually allow you to include a signature file
where you can write a few sentences of words. You can invite
people to visit your blog through the signature file by posting
more regularly.

In conclusion, realize that getting traffic to your blog
should not be viewed as a one time effort.

Commit and focus on a long-term strategy in order to succeed.
It is all about gaining the momentum. Once you get a decent
amount of traffic to your blog, you will attract more visitors
to it everyday as you work on it. As time goes by, you will
have an amazing amount of traffic to your blog which you never
thought was possible!

Monday, March 12, 2007

3 Reasons Why All Affiliate Marketers Should Have Their Own Website

Affiliate marketing is widely considered an easy way to generate an income online. Affiliate marketers do not need to set up website, develop any products, write sales copy or provide customer support. They can just concentrate on generating traffic to the product sales page and collect their commission when a sale is made.

However, successful affiliate marketers will go the extra mile to generate more sales. They will set up their own websites to promote other people products. Here are three reasons why you should also have your own websites as an affiliate marketer.

1. Offer Your Own Bonus

If a product is very popular, it will attract a lot of affiliates. In order to capture a bigger slice of the profit pie, you need to convince your prospects that buying through your affiliate link is the most sensible thing to do. The best way to do this is to offer a bonus that is related to the product you are promoting. For example, if you are promoting web hosting, you can offer to build a website for each prospect that purchase through your affiliate link. You have to make sure your bonus complement the product you are promoting. Do not offer anything that is in direct competition. Most important of all, you must deliver what you promise.

After setting up your own website that showcase your bonus, you can direct prospects to your website so that they see your offer first. This way, you are creating more value for the product you are promoting. In addition, you are establishing your own unique selling point and differentiate yourself from other affiliate marketers.

2. Ease of Tracking

When you have your own website, tracking becomes a whole lot easier and useful. Although there are many affiliate programs that offer you tracking capability, they are seldom up to the mark for serious affiliate marketers.

With your own website and hosting account, you can install your favorite tracking program to monitor all your marketing campaigns. Even if you do not use any tracking software, you can still obtain a lot of useful data from your web host log file. These data include the number of visitors that have visited your site, duration of their stay, where they come from and the keywords they used to find your site.

By analyzing the data from the web host log file or your favorite tracking software, you can gain a lot of market intelligence that will help you understand your target market better. In addition, it can also help you refine your offer to target the right audience.

3. List Building

To ensure the long-term survival and success of your online affiliate business, you must have a list of targeted prospects. With your own website, you can add an opt-in form on your home page requesting for your visitors’ name and email address. You will need to install your own mailing list management software or subscribe to a mailing list management service before you can start collecting visitors’ personal data.

Building an opt-in email list is one of the best ways to gather prospects. However, the addition of an opt-in form may distract your visitors from your main offer. You have to decide what action you want your visitors to take and design the home page of your website accordingly.


These are but three of the many reasons why all affiliate marketers should have their own websites. A personal website can definitely help to maximize earning potential when used correctly. The possibilities are endless and are limited only by your imagination and creativity.

By Stephen Chua

 

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