How do I advertise my site for free?

One method you could try is to create a screensaver for your website using a free screen saver maker tool. You can then submit this as download to the tens of thousands of software download sites on the web. In order to do this, you'll need to get familiar with the PAD file format that software developers use. However, this method does work and it's free.

I'm currently thinking about developing a product that will turn a video into an .exe file that can be submitted to software download sites as a product.

Hello,
the obvious answer to this is social networking, spread the word that way.
There are many sites that offer free backlinks.
Just look at my signature for an example.

I love the idea of a screen saver, I will look more into that and regarding social networking, Is a great idea, but most of the time, sometimes we do not find the people of the target that we are looking for, but is a free way of doing it.... Thank you guys!! Does anyone else have more ideas?

You could try IMAutomator.com. They have a free social bookmarking service (up to 10 backlinks a day). Very simple to use.

Sue

I would suggest writing informative articles on the topic of your website and submit them to ezinearticles.com and link back to your website in the resource box.

Social networking is of course a very good method for free traffic, I also like the idea of the screen saver never heard of this method before. I also never heard of IMautomator, I will look further more into them and see how there service works and if it produces results. All the best.

Guest posts! Find blogs in your niche and email them to ask if you can post an article with some links back to your site. this gives relevant backlinks and hopefully some traffic.

Never thought of the screensaver tool, great idea. I have been playing with making some free wordpress themes with a backlink to my site.

Google just sent me (and to my wife) $100 adwords credit offer. I love it... See if you get something like that - perfect to test waters

Gleb

You can write informative articles and post them to article directories like ezinearticles, GoArticles, articlebase and many others. Remember to add links that will point back to your website. Also join relevant forums where you will include your signature. Participate by making good contributions that help others.

Best way is to rank for a highly searched key word or many lower searched keywords (but less competitive) you need to do SEO work on your site:

First, on page SEO (represent %20 of the effect):

>> keyword in the title, in the first 100 words of your article or so and two or three more times in the body of the article.

Second, off page SEO (represent %80 of the effect):

>> Most important factor is the backlinks you need links more than your competition, so use a backlink checking tool like backlinkwatch.com and analize the 10 pages on the first page of google for your keyword and build links more than them.

Write some articles. Submit to Ezine Articles, and then to the other big directories.

One thing that nobody's touched on here - what type of website is it? Does this website provide quality information? You can send all the traffic in the world there but if people get there and don't find anything useful, they will move on.

There are many free traffic generating methods out there like :
Article marketing
Social Networking
Backlinking
Link building
Social Bookmarking
Blogging
lists can go on but these are the basic and effective ones you should be doing daily but make sure your contents are relevant.

Best Wishes!

article marketing will be great...^_^

To all the people who have added information to this post, I would like to say thank you because your info is really helpful for all of us. In particular, would like to ask medosabry if you could provide me with further information about effective article marketing with keywords, as this is something I am looking into.

One thing I would add, as small as it is I have found this helpful, there are a lot of free directories on the internet and some will give out free trials of premium listings with search engine optimisation. One of these I negotiated a free trial for a period of 3 months and have managed to continue said free trial for over 6 months now, and the site is providing organic front page listings for several keywords. This can really boost your site while you are building up your own search engine optimisation.

Also, there are a lot of free press release sites on the internet as well that you can take advantage of. If anything is happening at all with your business (and don't forget this part either- look for any promotional opportunity, for example charitable event, cross promotion with another related business) write a press release with links back to your site and submit to various places. Do a search for free press release in your country/area and you will find tons of places that you can submit to. If you are going to do this, do some research on writing a press release though, as there is a certain method for writing press releases and you do have to make sure that the item is newsworthy (ie. not just advertising copy).

Can't add anything else, everyone else has already added anything else I would have said!

i would make a youtube video and make it personal...let them know who you are and what your site offers. Next i would write articles and submit them to the top 5 sites with a link to your video. this will cause your video to rank well and you can put a link in your video to your website...also make sure to tell them that they can find that link to your website in the youtube description box below the video.

make sure you choose the right keywords for your video title and you will have a winner!

ken

If you want free and reach to thousands(or even millions) would be social networking. Try Twitter and Facebook - so far they are the most popular but there a lot more out there. Write articles and build links or exchange them with other sites.

Try this tool. Its free:

How to get Ten Thousand Hits Absolutely free

No signup. Its a viral tool, but works pretty well for getting hits.