Top 10 Ways for Promoting a Website with Little to No Financial Investment

By Tom Klos

The key to succeeding with your Website is remembering that a Website does not replace other more traditional promotional efforts. It should complement them and work harmoniously with all online and offline marketing to promote whatever it is selling. A Website is not, in itself, a quick solution to business success, although nowadays it is integral. It should be remembered that just as in any other aspect of business, a lot of work and patience is required in order to make a Website work to its potential.

Now that we have been faced with the reality of marketing a Website, a site owner can do much in order to promote his online property with very little investment except for time. The following top 10 ways on promoting a business Website assume that you are starting with a clean and well-designed Website, whether it is only 1 page or 100, and that you have high confidence in the service(s) and/or product(s) you are selling.

An now the Top 10 ways for promoting a Website with little to no financial investment:

1. Put your Web address and email address on your business cards and promotional literature.
a. This way you encourage new prospects to visit your site. There isn't a better visitor than a prospect. Hint: not all visitors are prospects. In fact, most may be accidental visitors. So always be sure to introduce your site(s) to prospective clients. They may not buy anything after talking to you once, but repeated visits to your Website may convince them to make a purchase.

2. Get Email addresses from all of your contacts and make it a habit to always ask for email from every new contact made.
a. This way you will build an permission email list and avoid being accused of Spamming (i.e. sending unsolicited email). When someone you meet voluntarily gives you their email, this is a way saying "I give you permission to send me email."

3. Send out emails to your contacts periodically, whether to inform them of new services or products you offer, or to thank them for services/products purchased, or to send them greetings, or whatever other legitimate reason you can think of.
a. This is one of the most effective ways to keep your site fresh in the minds of prospects and to build a relationship that leads to sales.
b. Be careful not to abuse this privilege, though. That is, don't send out so much email that the person becomes annoyed.

4. Always have a "signature" at the bottom of your emails that includes your Web site address.
a. Duh!

5. Meet other business people? Do they have a Website? If so, then propose to exchange links with them.
a. Building a list of Websites that link to you will gradually increase your site's popularity on Search Engines such as Google.

6. Write articles on your area of expertise and allow other Websites to publish the article on their site free of charge as long as the author's (your) bio and link are included with the article.
a. You can post the articles on your Website and also on article distribution sites such as: http://www.web-source.net/articlesub.htm, http://www.ideamarketers.com/, and http://groups.yahoo.com/group/publisher_network/

7. Add your site to the big 3 Search Engines: Google, Yahoo!, and MSN. Each offers a free site submit form.
a. Here are the links:
i. http://www.google.com/addurl/
ii. http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html
iii. http://beta.search.msn.com/docs/submit.aspx

8. Give away something of value for free on your Website.
a. If you offer something truly of value for free then this will create a buzz and get you more visits.

9. Visit Forums frequented by your target audience and be an active participant.
a. Be careful not to spam, though.
b. Always try to be helpful in your posts and remember to include link to your Website in your signature.
c. This will help you build a reputation as an authority in your field and receive positive traffic.

10. Write a Press Release and submit it to distribution services. Related to this is writing articles related to your field.
a. Many distribution services offer a free option such as: http://www.free-press-release.com/ and http://www.prweb.com/
b. Writing articles will help establish you as an authority in your field and when picked up by other websites will increase inbound links to your site.
c. It's hard to predict the reach of a single release or article. Over time, if it is well written, it may end up on hundreds of news and info sites.

If you follow these methods well enough and are patient, eventually you may be able to drop all other offline advertising and live solely on revenue generated through your site. Some companies have even been able to close the doors to their bricks-and-mortar stores because their online revenue was so great and now this is the only way they do business. But there are no short-cuts, unless you are willing to invest heavily financially.

For more information on how to drive traffic to your website visit Search Marketing Guide.

Tom Klos is a professional Web copy writer, marketer, and developer. Currently he's writing the Search Marketing Guide.

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