January 4, 2005

Boosting Web Site Traffic Without Paying For It

You know that getting the word out about your business is important. Traditional marketing and advertising has its place - word of mouth, flyers, radio/TV/print advertising and etc. However, online advertising is also very important as more and more of YOUR customers are searching online for the services and products they need.

There's two ways to get more online traffic with search engines. You can pay-per-click to have your advertisements displayed in the paid search results section by using certain key words. See Google's Ad Words or you can optimize your Web site so that it is seen by a search engine as very relevant to a key word and the search results are displayed in the main search results area of the search engine (the "Free" section).

When someone is searching for lamps, you can pay to have your web site displayed on the right or "sponsored" section of a search engine or optimize your web site and for free have your web site displayed in the main search results.

StartupJournal.com writes One drawback to paying for clicks is that only 30% of Internet searchers go to the paid-ad listings. They go to what are called "the natural results" -- the unpaid ones.

But you should consider paying for clicks when you're having a clearance sale. Mr. Levin says he's seen the search phrase "small business" sell for as high as $10 per click.

0 comments