The Best Website

Welcome to Flo's Business & Fun Blog

It's storming today .. more shoveling coming up! I've had guests since Christmas .. I'm trying to catch up with my work and mailboxes that are overloaded with mail. I've started going through them but I will be busy for some time now!

Yesterday I posted simple techniques to generate targeted visitors without paying a dime in advertising. Today's article is a different perspective on what website traffic "really" is !!!

Jim is sharing some very straight forward thoughts on how to evaluate any source of traffic you're considering purchasing.

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The Best Website Traffic Sources
- by Jim Edwards
© Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
www.TheNetReporter.com
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Not a day goes by that any serious website owner doesn't wonder how to get more traffic to their site.

This intense desire to generate more clicks makes virtually any online entrepreneur easy prey to many of the traffic schemes and scams that pervade the Internet like conmen on acarnival midway.

Promises of fast traffic and big bucks often separate even the most savvy business person from their money because they want to believe the promises made by these traffichucksters.

However, rather than thinking "complicated equals better" in the traffic game, the best website traffic sources rate extremely easy to separate from the useless garbage traffic.

Fact: "Good Traffic" equals "Targeted Traffic!"

That means the visitors come as a result of desire to find out more on a specific, niche topic, not as a result of "exit" traffic or membership in a "safe" list where memberssimply pitch each other in an incestuous spam fest.

Good traffic comes from people clicking links on topics targeted to their interests and getting directed to a website containing information they want and expect as a result of clicking the link.

Bottom line, when you get right down to it, the best, most dependable sources of targeted traffic come from links that
people click.

So, next time you're considering spending money on a traffic source, understand that unless it involves a targeted link that a targeted visitor can click to get to your website,think twice before opening up your wallet.

To my knowledge, only three ways exist to get a link to your site: buy it, "voodoo" it, or grow it.

** Buy Links**

Buying links actually rates the fastest way to get traffic to your website.

You simply sign up for Google AdWords at Google.com or you open an account with Overture.com.

You then run ads with a link on those sites and any time someone clicks the link, you pay for the click through a relatively straightforward bidding process based on thepopularity of the keyword.

You can also buy links in ezines, newsletters, and on other people's website either on a per-click basis, for a period of time (a week or month), or in exchange for paying them a commission if a sale gets made as a result of a click onthe link.

** Linking "VoodDoo" **

Linking "voodoo" refers to attempting to manipulate the search engines into displaying links to your website.

You can find a large number of automated software programs online at any given time that will claim to help you get more search engine traffic.

Depending on the intensity of competition in a specific market, and the fact that search engines change their rules frequently, pursuing search engine links can quickly turn into the online equivalent of Alice chasing the rabbit downa hole to "Wonderland."

** Grow Links **

I personally prefer this method to get links to my websites: growing them.

The best type of link to get involves one person telling another person, either explicitly or implicitly, they should click the link and visit the site at the other end.

One way to do this is simply to exchange links with another site which targets the same audience as your site.

You can manage this process manually or use one of the many software packages that will mange the process for you.

A search on Google.com for "reciprocal link manager software" yields a good start.

The easiest way to grow links is through using articles other people post on their websites which link back to your website.

The reason articles work so well for "growing" links involves the numerous ways in which articles get distributed online, each of which can create dozens, hundreds, even thousands of different links back to your website bypublishing a single article.

As time goes by, and as the article spreads around, the number of links literally "grows" over time (but unlike a houseplant, you don't have to water an article!).

In fact, the following represent only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to all the places you can grow and expand the links to your site by publishing articles online.

~ Blogs - Your articles can not only appear on your own blog, but get posted by others on their blogs with surprising ease.

The links in these articles can point directly back to your website.

~ Article Directories - Article directories such as IdeaMarketers.com abound online.

They not only provide an easy way to display your articles to allow others to pick them up for posting on their websites, but also in and of themselves attract readerssearching for content.

~ OPS (Other People's Sites) - Popular websites like WebProNews.com attract repeat visitors by offering targeted content to their readers.

Since they can't produce all the content themselves, they publish articles created by others. Links from these sites can bring a steady stream of targeted visitors by giving youtargeted exposure.

~ Ezines - By getting your articles published in other people's ezines, you can get a link on the most valuable real estate online, a targeted prospect's email "inbox."

Many ezine publishers run articles written by others to their targeted readers, and your link in the resource box can bring you a veritable avalanche of targeted site visitors when hundreds, even thousands of people receive your articleat the same time.

Whether you choose to buy them, "voodoo" them, or grow them, getting targeted links to your site posted on the Internet represents the absolute best way to get steady traffic toyour site.

Though not as fast as buying them or as exciting as trying to manipulate the search engines, growing links with articles gives you a long-term, dependable presence online.

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Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how to use free articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted visitors to your website, affiliate links, or blogs...

Need MORE TRAFFIC to your website or affiliate links? "Turn Words Into Traffic" reveals the secrets for driving Thousands of NEW visitors to your website or affiliate links... without spending a dime on advertising!
Click Here> Publish Articles and Get Traffic FAST!
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Have a great Tuesday!