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Promoting Your Site

Eight tips for driving traffic to your pages

Tip #1: Get an easy-to-remember Web address

Registering a custom domain name for your Web site is a great first step in promoting it. The domain name gives you an online identity that your customers, friends, and family can remember easily. It can also give people a hint at what they're going to find when they visit your Web site. When people see an address like "gonamesecure.com" or "trynamesecure.com", they have some idea what they're going to see on the resulting Web page. A custom domain name also brings with it a sense of professionalism. A ".com," ".net," ".org," ".biz," or ".info" domain name tells customers that you're serious about using the Web to communicate. For some suggestions on what Web address might be best for you, see our Naming Guidelines. To see if a domain name is available, type it in the search box above.

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Tip #2: Put your site's Web address everywhere

OK, you've built your killer Web site. You've even registered a custom Web address. Now it's time to make your efforts pay off by letting the world know about your Web site. Include your Web site's address on your business cards and stationery. Put it after the mailing address on all your company's promotional literature. Put it in the signature of all of your e-mail messages. Paint it on the side of your car. Tattoo it on your forehead. There's no such thing as having your site's Web address in too many places.

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Tip #3: Register your Web address with search engines

When people look for information on the Web, they usually start with a search engine. If you want to attract qualified traffic, it's important to register your Web site with search engines.

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Tip #4: Get your Web site linked

Getting registered with search engines is one way to promote your site. But an even better way to generate quality traffic is to get linked by sites in the same business or that have a complementary focus. This will get you visitors that are most likely to be interested in the information on your site.

An informal way to get your site linked is through reciprocal linking. First, create a links page on your site where you link to other sites that you think are useful. (If you're a real estate agent, you might create a page with links to contractors, home inspectors, and mortgage brokers.) Then contact the sites that you've linked and encourage them to do the same. Reciprocal links can boost traffic for everyone involved.

A more systematic way to get links is by joining a Web ring. Web rings are collections of similar sites that are arranged in a hyperlinked circle. Each site in the ring links to two other sites -- the site behind it and the site in front of it.

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Tip #5: Use e-mail to solidify relationships with your customers

E-mail marketing, when executed well, can be of great value to your customers, and can build a strong base of repeat customers for your site. And with the right tool, it's not difficult to do.

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Tip #6: Buy advertising space

Striking deals with Web sites directly is one way to arrange for ad placement. You can also go through an advertising broker. Brokers work with many buyers and sellers and can help match you up with the right types of Web sites.

Creating ads that are successful -- i.e., make people want to click on them -- is a science unto itself. There are a number of Web sites that will give you tips on creating effective advertising banners.

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Tip #7: Join a banner exchange

A no-cost way of getting into the Web advertising business is to join online advertising pools called banner exchanges. When you join an exchange, you submit advertising banners to a common pool. Then you add HTML code to your site to pull other ads from the pool. The more ads that you display on your Web site, the more often your ads are displayed on other Web sites.

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Tip #8: Build a better Web site

Putting up ad banners and registering with search engines are good ways to bring people to your Web site, but once they're there you want them to stay awhile and bookmark your site. Make sure your Web site is well-organized, loads quickly, and displays nicely for everyone in your audience (no matter what operating system or Web browser they use). And be sure to make it easy for your visitors to send you feedback. The best way to find out how to improve your site is to let your audience tell you. For some great Web design tips, check out our Building A Better Web Site section.

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