Starting out in web site promotion?

When you first launch your site, the chances are that traffic will not start flowing immediately, and perhaps never – it’s not just how your site looks or operates that will ensure it’s success or failure. According to numerous sources I’ve come across during my research, the average web site only receives around 3 unique visitors a day!

So how do you get well above this average? A lot of begging and pleading to begin with! Many web masters and site owners leave a lot to be desired in their approaches to marketing and promoting their sites -especially in terms of reciprocal link exchanges.

Reciprocal link requests

Most of us realize that the best way to get traffic while waiting to be listed by search engines is through being linked to by other quality sites. This also assists with increasing SE rankings when search engine spiders do pay a visit. Depending on the search engine, the *only* way to have a chance at a decent ranking is to have other sites linking to yours.

What many new web masters don’t realize is that a request for a link exchange will probably meet with a negative or no response. The reason why is simple – it’s back to the WIIFM principle – What’s In It For Me – the most basic of motivators in the human psyche.

If you approach a well established site to exchange links, there has to be a good reason for them to do so. I have received a number of emails simply stating “link to me – http://www.54534hgg.com”. That kind of promotional strategy gets you nowhere.

Here are a few hints and tips for beginners through to more experienced site owners as to how you can persuade an established site to exchange links with you.

Polite way of reciprocal link requests.

When you send your email for a reciprocal linking exchange, ensure that the tone of it is extremely courteous and not demanding. If English is your second language, run your promotional note by someone who is familiar with the complexities of the language. The way you word your note is the most important factor as to whether another web master will even bother with taking the time to take a look at your site.

Grammar and Spelling

Also very important. Your canvassing note is your official representation – if you don’t take the time to spell correctly, other web masters may believe that your site will be of the same quality, and discard your request immediately.

Webmasters are busy people

Don’t expect an answer straight away and harass the site owner with countless follow up emails. Leave it for at least 2 weeks before second contact and ensure that the second note is equally as polite as the first.

Read the site

Ensure you take a good look over the site you wish to link to you, be familiar with it’s content and mention some of the content in your request for a reciprocal link exchange. Identify the common theme between the sites. If the site has a “Submit your URL” page, ensure that you use it and read the guidelines for submission carefully.

Appeal to the web masters WIIFM motivator

Experienced site owners can pick a new web master or site a mile off, so don’t misrepresent your site or its traffic levels if you propose a reciprocal links exchange. Point the web master to a section of your site where you provide content or tools that are original and would be of use to their site’s visitors.

If you have a banner rotator, you could also offer the site owner an extra few thousand impressions as a sweetener for him in linking to you. Very few web masters will give you a link if they receive nothing in return, especially if they are earning money or gaining traffic from the links they already have in place.

Even just making an offer of extra services, no matter how small, will motivate the web master to at least consider a link exchange – they may not even take you up on the offer.

The best way to encourage other webmasters to link to you is to *already* have their link and a thoughtful description already present on your site – on a search engine friendly page.

The reciprocal link request note

There are a number of template examples of reciprocal link request emails on the Internet, but my advice is that if you are going to use them, ensure you modify them each time they are sent to different sites so they at least appear original.

I receive a certain template note regularly and disregard it as it appears to me that the person sending it has not reviewed my site properly and really doesn’t take the process seriously. If another web master points towards a certain article or section of Taming the Beast.net, it motivates me to review what the web master has to offer my site visitors.

Bearing that in mind, here’s a sample note that you can base your approaches on:

Greetings [Name],

I visited your web site, [Web Site Name Here] and found some great information regarding [Insert Subject Here].

[If you have linked to the other site already, mention it here and give the URL of the link - ask them to approve your link to them or to recommend editing suggestions - DO NOT threaten to remove their link if they don't respond in x days - these kinds of notes usually end up being deleted]

I thought you might be interested to know that we have a web site dedicated to [Your Site Topic - special points of interest].

We were hoping that you might consider linking to us and invite you to review our site at your convenience.

[Depending on situation, insert further offer of reciprocal linking, banner impressions or exchange of services here]

If you determine that a link to our site is appropriate, please add it at your your discretion, or might we suggest the following link and description:

[Your site name and URL] – [Your site description - keep it brief, focused and not too much hype]

If you’d like to discuss this further, please feel free to contact us at [Your contact details].

Thanks!

[Full official signature lines here]

This example is personal and courteous. It respects the other site owners time and intelligence. Remember to modify each note slightly to avoid the “template” stigma.

If you are providing linking code to the webmaster, which is recommended, ensure that your code contains suitable anchor text.

Be prepared for rejection

If you are officially denied a reciprocal link exchange, don’t get too upset – even if the response is rude, as they sometimes can be. If you do receive a nasty email back, be happy in the fact that you went about promotion in the right way, and perhaps that web master was having a really bad day as we all do at times. Leave it for a few months, then try again, outlining some of the improvements you have made in your site that are relevant.

The promotion strategies you put into action from the outset define your standing in the online community in the time ahead – don’t blow it. Be careful in using the hypey marketing techniques offered by some – they may have worked for them, but they may not work for you.

Don’t let dollar signs get in the way of basic human consideration.

Search Engine Optimization or SEO is a term widely used today by many e-commerce sites. For the past few years and the next ten years or so, search engines would be the most widely used internet tool to find the sites that they need to go to or the product or information they need.

Most people that use search engines use only the ten top search results in the first page. Making it to the first page, more so to the top three is a barometer of a sites success in search engine optimization. You will get a higher ratio of probability in being clicked on when you rank high. The more traffic for your site, the more business you rake in.

But, it is essential to grab a hold of that spot or make your ranking even better. As I aforementioned, each day is a new day for all e-commerce sites to make them selves rank higher using search engine optimization. It is imperative to make your site better and better everyday.

So just what is search engine optimization and do you have to use it? The answer to why you have to use it is an easy one. You need search engine optimization to be number one, or maybe at least make your site income generating.

With search engine optimization you can get the benefit of generating a high traffic volume. Let’s just say you get only a turn out of successful sales with 10 to 20 percent of your traffic. If you get a hundred hits or more a day, you get a good turn out of sales already. If you get only twenty to ten hits a day, you only get one or two if not any at all.

So once again, what is search engine optimization? Search engine optimization is utilizing tools and methods in making your site top ranking in the results of search engines. Getting yourself in the first page and better yet in the top half of the page will ensure that your site will generate public awareness of your site’s existence and subsequently generate more traffic, traffic that could lead to potential income and business.

Search engine optimization requires a lot of work to be fully realized. There are many aspects you have to change in your site or add as well to get search engine optimization. These will include getting lots of information about the keyword phrases that are popular in regards to your sites niche or theme.

You may also need to rewrite your sites contents so that you could get the right keyword phrases in your site without making it too commercial but light and informative. There are certain rules and guidelines to be followed with making your site’s content applicable and conducive to SEO optimization.

You will also need to collaborate with many other sites so that you could get link exchanges and page transfers. The more inbound and outbound traffics generated by sites among others are one of the components search engines uses to rank sites.

Try to search the internet for many useful help. Tips, guidelines and methods for search engine optimization are plenty to be found. Read many articles that can help you optimize your site in search engine results. The more knowledge and information you gather the better. This will all help you in getting those high rankings. This may require a little time and effort in your part but the benefits will be astounding.

If you can part with some money, there are many sites in the internet that can help you in search engine optimization. There are many sites that help in tracking keyword phrases that can help your site. There are also some content writers that have lots of experience in making good keyword laden content for your sites that have good quality.

Act now and see the benefits garner with search engine optimization. All of these will result to better traffic and more business for your site and company.