In the early days of the Internet, people believed that if you built a truly great website, this would be enough and visitors would flock in automatically. This may have been true of a web with only a few thousand websites, but with millions of sites competing in a cluttered environment you cannot succeed without a clear plan to first attract visitors – and then keep them engaged.

Insight

To attract traffic to your site, you need to communicate to people when and where they are open to your message. This means finding out which information your target group is looking for on the Internet.

How to apply

Some of the most effective tools to generate ‘qualified traffic’:

1. Google Adwords: One of the most effective communication tools on the Internet. The basic principle is simple; when you search for a keyword on Google, you will see a box appear on the right hand corner of your screen. If you click on this box, it will take you to a site of an advertiser, who has chosen to pay for that specific key word. If people don’t click, you (the advertiser) doesn’t pay.
2. e-Press releases: the web has a number of wire services that enable you to spread the story of your company, your new product or new idea to thousands of people.
3. Search Engine Optimisation: Make sure that your info can be found in the relevant search engines when people search for your key words. You can improve your ranking with a strategy to get sites to link to yours. But we recommend starting with Google Adwords as SEO performance is more difficult to scan and a bit slower to deliver actual results.
4. Portals, ezines, and relevant communities: Find out where this audience is currently surfing and target them with tailored messages.
5. eBay as a promotional channel: eBay is one of the biggest online platforms where products are being sold and bought. It is increasingly being used by companies to promote new products and as a way to get free publicity. BMW launched a new car on eBay. Why not develop an exclusive range of your products, get them signed by a celebrity and sold for auction on eBay – this will get you PR, buzz and visitors.
6. Benefit from the eBay traffic. You are selling something and you’re trying to attract people to your merchant website? Think of moving some products to eBay shop. Their site has millions of daily visitors. eBay offers a wide panel of merchant services (nearly) for free.
7. Decentralize your traffic. Instead of expecting people to visit you, why not consider the other way around? You may look for communities discussing similar matters, and take part in blogs, forums, etc, supplying comments or actual content (news feeds).

Sources & References

What’s an eBay store
http://pages.ebay.com/storefronts/start.html
eBay Sellers Go Back to School: 10 Tips
http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/sep2006/sb20060907_223337.htm?campaign_id=bier_sms.g3a.rsssd33
Google Adwords
https://adwords.google.com/select/Login
Press Release Distribution Services
http://www.e-consultancy.com/about/advertising/press-release-distribution.asp
https://prndirect.prnewswire.com/
http://www.24-7pressrelease.com/

ZN eMarketing Agency can help you find ways to build traffic to your website. ZN is a certified Google AdWords company
http://www.zn.be

Insight 3

Insight 5