Increasing Website Traffic for Free

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If we’re going to talk about how to increase your web site traffic for free, let’s first establish a few truths.

First, I don’t care what search engine you use, at 60%+ of the market Google is king. It’s closest competitor? Yahoo is at around 20% of the market and in the real world of Internet marketing nobody else matters.

Secondly, there is no way to increase traffic to your web site other than earning it. There are lots of ‘build traffic quickly’ scams on the Internet, none of them work for one pretty basic reason … Google (remember, they’re the ones that matter) only hires really, really smart people.

Now that we’ve established the two basic truths of the Internet, building traffic for your web site is really simple.

Step One

Have something relevant to say.

Seriously, there are millions of web sites out there and almost everybody has an opinion. Make sure that yours matters by ensuring your content is valid, effective and helpful.

For example:

If I wanted to run a web site about fishing in the Miramichi, I wouldn’t want to promote myself through my web site (after all, who wants to read about me? Instead, I would write content about the sport of fishing and specifically the type of sport fishing that can be accomplished in the Miramichi.

Step Two

In the real world, a picture may be worth a thousand words but on the Internet the opposite is true.

Let’s appreciate the truth, Google can’t see … it doesn’t have eyes but it can read using text. That’s why the highest ranking web sites on the web are full of text, not graphics. If you want your web site to be at the top of Google, you need to ensure your web site can be read by Google.

Speaking of which, Google reads xHTML not english. Make sure your web site uses properly formatted and standards compliant xHTML otherwise Google will not be able to properly understand your web site.

Do:

• Write content that people care about
• Publish your content using properly coded xHTML
• Include ALT and NAME tags for photos

Don’t:

• Use Microsoft Word to write web pages, the code it produces is not standards compliant
• Build web sites in Flash, Google can’t see anything in a Flash application
• Assume your web site works because it looks good in Internet Explorer, if you want to see what Google sees view the code

Step Four

Think like a search engine. If you really want to market your web site for free, start to think about Google and what the people who programmed it wanted the Internet to be.

Validation

Take the time to ensure your web site functions properly, use tools such as The W3C Markup Validation Service to test your site, http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/ will ensure your CSS is good. Why does it matter? Because computers can’t read content that’s written wrong.

Publishing vs. Design

Websites are not about design, they’re about publishing. Ensure your document is formatted properly from top to bottom. For example, is your web site name in an H1 tag? Are chapter titles in H2’s? Have you made proper use of DIV tags? SPAN tags and TABLES?

Hyperlinks

The web is a collection of hyper-linked documents, if you don’t link to other web sites then you’re site is a dead end on the superhighway. Cul-de-sac’s might be cute but they don’t get a lot of traffic … take the time to help your visitors by linking to relevant articles, news and general interest pieces which support your content.

Step Five

Above all … don’t cheat.

Remember, Google employs thousands of really, really smart developers who are always trying to improve the search engine. Remember, You can make money without doing evil.

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• The dark side of Facebook, how social marketing will go wrong.
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Posted on: Saturday, March 1st, 2008
Posted in Web Site Advice | | Read more