A List of 12 Simple Ways To Get Free Traffic To Your Website/Blog/Lens

Embarking on an Internet marketing campaign doesn't have to be difficult, tricky, or complicated. Here are a few more FREE simple ideas that you can easily implement to get traffic to your site right now.

1) Social bookmark everything - you can bookmark each page of your site and each blog entry you post. While this might seem tedious, it's worth it. You'll see a strong increase in traffic if you social bookmark each page on your site and each of your blog entries.

2) Review: if you can review hot new products or books within your market, head on over to Amazon and start positioning yourself as an expert. In order to do this effectively you'll want to create an Amazon profile and make sure and sign each review with a reference to your URL (your web site). You can also go to Epinions and Revoo to review products as well.

3) Offer a freebie on Craig's List: you'll be amazed at how much traffic you get from a single Craig's List ad. The key here is to send people to a page on your site and make sure they have to sign up for something (like your email newsletter) before they can grab their freebie. That way you're not just getting traffic, you're also building your list.

4) Create a "recommended by" list on your Delicious page – you can do this by creating an account and then tagging articles, blogs and other content you think will be important to your readership. Offer this page as a resource site. You can add a link to this page in your email signature line or on your web site.

5) Speaking of your email signature line... do you have one? If you don't, create one. Believe it or not, people do follow these links. You'll be amazed how many folks read email signature lines. I have one and change it several times a year depending on what I'm doing or promoting.

6) Lend a helping hand: you can be an answer person at Yahoo Answers – you don't have to spend hours on there, but maybe a few minutes a week. Make sure and include a link back to your site following your answers.

7) Set up a social networking site using Facebook, LinkedIn, or Squidoo. It's free and easy to do, just don't forget the all-important link back to your site!

8) Make sure your blog has an RSS feed so if you capture a reader you don't lose them if they forget to bookmark your site or blog.

9) Join relevant groups at Yahoo groups. You'll find everything from groups on growing your small business, writing books, finding your passion, even underwater basket weaving. I dare you to find one that isn't right for what you're promoting. When you do find the right group, join and participate as you can!

10) Start a blog and then once you do, start commenting on other people's blogs, linking to them from your site or adding them to your blogroll.

11) Inbound links: don't squander your time (or a perfectly good link) on smaller low-traffic sites. Instead spend your time going after high traffic, high quality sites. Good sites should have a PR (page ranking) of 4-6 depending on the market. You can find out what a site's page ranking is by downloading the Google toolbar which comes with a PR feature built in.

12) Start an email newsletter: while it may not seem like a newsletter that you email can drive traffic to your site you'd be surprised at the effectiveness of this type of promotion. If your newsletter (like your articles) is interesting and relevant to your audience, you'll find that it has a huge pass-through factor, meaning that it is passed from one email subscriber to another.

While this isn't really a tip, it's still important. If you're going to go through all the trouble of getting traffic to your site, make sure your site is converting this traffic into something. Get folks to sign up for something, your newsletter, the RSS feed on your blog. Whatever it is, getting their email address will help you remarket to them when the time is right. Studies show that visitors landing on a site often don't buy the first time. That's ok! You want to get them into your marketing funnel so you can market to them again and again – not in a way that's obtrusive, offensive or downright annoying, but in a way that is helping them with their own mission. An example of this might be an email newsletter. A helpful, informative newsletter is a fantastic funnel. A blog is another great way to keep people in your marketing loop without bombarding them with "please buy my stuff" email messages. Also, make sure you know what your traffic numbers are before you launch into any Internet marketing campaign. By traffic numbers I mean how many people are visiting your site. You want to know this so you can gauge a before and after view of your marketing efforts.

Best of luck to you,
Mike Filsom