All You Need Is Traffic...

Getting traffic has been difficult for me, mostly because I've been relying on such free methods as article writing exclusively. These methods may be effective, but are very time-consuming and don't yield good results even after a short period of time.

Recently, I've read pay-per-click yields results sooner rather than later. I don't know. One author heartily supports a given method, while other doesn't. It doesn't get any more confusing than that.

I just consider my circumstances and goals and ask myself if a given method would be doable for me at a given point.

What if your copy doesnt convert, you pick a bad product, or you dont target properly? Then, all the traffic in the world will not save you.

Traffic is not all you need. In fact, it isnt evn the first thing you need.

Product Research
Market Research
Competitor Research
Keyword Research
Write Copy that converts
Drive Traffic
Tweak your copy
Tweak your copy
Tweak your copy

SEO is too complex for most new marketers... step one is always 'choosing a profitable niche' if you pick a niche where nobody is buying you won't make money period

Maybe Im being a little biased because some newbies don't even know what an anchor text is. But def. if you learn SEO, i think it's the most powerful traffic source because it's free and you can optimize for anything you want.

@Zues66 good point... I guess I should have defined it more as picking a niche & or keywords based on what will be profitable for your business model

Thats a nice run down on the order of monetizing a website.

You are certainly right saying that webmasters need to focus on getting the traffic to their websites first before thinking about monetizing through Adsense and other affiliate programs.

The best way to get traffic is to rank highly in your niche by ensuring you meet the engines on page and off page criteria, ie, enough keywords in your content and inbound links to your site.

This type of traffic is also the best, because its organic, as opposed to traffic that has come via ads and banners. Organic traffic gives you high CTRs and this is what you need to aim for.

I like to ensure I meet both on and off page criteria and the traffic just snowballs in. =)

You know what beats SEO traffic? List traffic. As long as you take good care of your list members, you'll get more conversions and build loyal repeat customers, many for life. I'm sick to death of Google and its ever changing rules and rankings. I think most marketers would be wise to divest themselves of so much reliance on Google rankings for their traffic. Find ways to get people in your niche on your email list, then turn them into loyal customers. Think about offline businesses. Don't you go back to the ones that provide the best products and services over and over again? Same concept online, but far too few of us embrace it.

John

I heard a great marketer say once, that free traffic isnt really free.

You pay with time, and your limited - the potential for growth is not the same.

You can outsource it, yeah, but then your back to dealing with paid traffic.

yeah..i completely agree...SEO and PPC campaign is the best driving traffic method..But SEO is quite complicated...My blogs have been banned for no mistakes..And PPC campaign is excellent...but it's expensive for newbie with tight budget like me...
thx for sharing..

SEO stands for search engine optimist

Let someone else learn SEO and PPC then you find them and make them a deal to send you their used traffic.

And all traffic is used

The only way to get traffic to any site is to convince someone else to redirect their traffic to you. So let someone else do all the hard work then bribe them in some way to redirect their traffic to you

Robert

PS: the last thing you need is traffic... Get the sales process right first

Sending traffic to a site or page that doesnt convert is why most people give up and cry foul.
sending traffic to an unresponsive sales process is like pissing into the wind.

You only get your own back

Lots of traffic is only important if you have a poor click through rate. It is the shotgun method used by most Internet Marketers because they have to put their product in front of so many pairs of eyes before they get a sale.

On the other hand if you have a good product and market it correctly then you can make very good money with very little traffic.

For example we have one site that only gets about 400 visitors a month but the conversion rate is about 1 in about 3 so we make around 100 sales a month at around 2 to 300 a sale is a nice little income.

Could we get a lot more traffic?

Of course - however the cost for that traffic increases a lot and the conversions do not change that much.

You see lots of people use a shotgun method. Get lots of traffic and hope for the best.

We are snipers and go for converting traffic. You will never get as much but you will also spend a lot less time getting it and after all arnt we going for lifestyle not another job.

So concentrate on conversion first and then traffic.

Quentin

This is an interesting thread because it jumps to the heart of what many new IMers believe will make them rich.

There are several misconceptions in IM that are responsible for lots of confusion and frustration, one is that once you have your own product you'll make money, another is that with enough traffic you'll make great money and the other is that building a list means you'll make great money.

People have already said it but I'm going to repeat it - None of that stuff works if you're targeting the wrong people.

You can 1000000 people to your site but you're selling sausages and they're vegetarians - you're not going to sell a sausage.

If you get 5 drug addicts to your cocain site - you've got 5 repeat customers. (I know that's a stupid example but you get the point).

People get filled with this generic "it's a numbers game" crap that misguides them into thinking lists and traffic are what building a business is all about.

That's BS - admittedly popular BS that's told by many people, but still BS.

This is where I like what mr Puddy is all about - he knows this better than anyone - it's about selling stuff, not stroking your ego about the numbers of people that come to your site. Until you sell something - nothing else matters (if it's a profitable business you're trying to build).

SEO - Irrelevant.
PPC - Irrelevant.
LISTS - Irrelevant.

Until you are clear about how you are going to effectively provide someone with a solution they want to buy...........

You don't NEED to understand anything about SEO to make money online.

You don't NEED to understand PPC to make money

You don't need a list to make money.

Those are things that you do AFTER you have your business clear - they're activities that support and scale your business, but if you have no business - they're just irrelevant distractions. As Rob said - SEO without a business is Search Engine Optimism.

This is a really important thing to consider.

There are a lot of deluded people who will tell you that you NEED a blog, a list, ppc, rss, articles, press releases, links, etc.. etc...

Those things are nothing to do with your business - they're tools and strategies for growing your business - they're not your business.

Most people are aware that if you're intending people to find you on the internet that you need to factor-in what they're searching for - because those searches and the way and places that they do them DEFINE how you need to take action to be find by them. If your market are all using Youtube and not Google then you're wasting your time on seo.

Yes - you CAN do many of these activities and 'hope' that you get some results - but that's gambling not business.

People selling you information to appeal to your desperation for success will tell you whatever they think you need to hear in order to buy their stuff. You think articles are the answer to your problems - there are people lined up to sell you stuff. You think SEO is the answer - the line of sellers is even longer.

Those things are like gold diggers shovels - and there are a lot of shovel vendors.

The thing they're not telling you is - they don't care whether you know where to dig or not - that's not their problem.

Yes, you might strike it lucky and happen upon a good place to dig - but if you use the right tools to do your research BEFORE you buy your shovel, so that you know what you'll find when you start digging in a particular place - the shovel is just an obvious part of your plan which you need to get your results.

Without your plan/map - you'll be buying shovels all year and not finding any gold.

IM is full of these misdirecting tactic/strategy/tool related focuses - that completely miss the point that the tool is only as useful as the job you can do with it and your understanding of how you can make money doing that job.

There is NO 'all you need' answer to your business - and everyone's business is different, so even if someone else has one for their business - it's probably not right for yours. The shovel that finds gold for them may not find gold when you dig somewhere else with it.

Andy

I think we have a problem here since neither SEO nor Adwords are really something where you could quickly start out without indepth knowledge.

Adwords is VERY complex and for the typical newbie affiliate the math simply doesn't work. And also SEO needs a lot of knowledge and work.

I think a newbie would do good simply spend some time learning SEO, i think it has overall the best benefit since a highly ranked site is just the best thing ever. But for starters i would rather recommend article marketing and similar, or simply start thinking out of the box.

(Buy banners, buy links on videos on youtube, etc....craigslist marketing)

I also want to STRONGLY oppose that adwords is "the best way to drive traffic" (i wouldnt say this if i wouldnt have done adwords for about 2 years myself)....you need to spend TONS of money and do split-testing and tweak a campaign until it becomes lucrative. You need to understand keyword research, quality score and much, much more.

The chances are 90% that Google will pull money from your pocket and you will lose money, the remaining 10% who are successful w/ adwords are the professionals who did extensive split testing and tweaking, keyword research etc.

I agree with the former but not with the latter point about AdWords. AdWords is a 'nice to have' for most people who may not be able to afford even a few £$£$ hence why they go down the organic route.

Still very good points which I agree with you on though.

"Chicken and Egg"

All the traffic in the world is no good of the product does not sell. A great produt will always sel lthough even if it is just from owrd of mouth. So I kind of disagree with the OP.