Internet Marketing for the New Guy - How to Start for Cheap
I am a complete newbie at internet marketing, but in the last 38 days, I have learned a few things that I can do cheaply to spread the word about my website, and help the site grow exponentially. For other newbies, you might benefit from these steps. Please note, however, that these are not the most advanced tactics, and probably won't drive 100,000 visitors to your site, but it will help you get jump-started and learn the ropes.
Step 1. Outsourcing
Fiverr - Fiverr.com is a site where you can pay people $5 to do a task they specify. There are literally thousands of gigs to choose from, but it is important that you do not waste your money when you are on a budget. For instance, if you are going to pay $5 for a social bookmarking gig, your best bet is to pay the guy with a 100% rating who will submit your site to 25 sites vs. the guy who will submit your site to 3,000 sites and has no rating. I have given these people a chance, and the five bucks isn't worth it - ever.
Furthermore, if you are going to pay someone $5 to recruit people to your Facebook Page, be very careful about who you pick to do the task. You might get 100's of fans overnight from someone, and give them a great review - until you actually start going to your fans' profiles and realize every single one of them is from india, or none of them ever respond to your comments. I have spent $30 worth of great tasks on Fiverr, and that $30 was worth more than the $120 of free advertising I had on AdWords. If you can't find exactly what you're looking for on Fiverr, but you CAN find something similar, message the person and ask them if they'd be willing to do your specific task for $5. They usually will be.
Next, be weary of anyone with 100's of positive reviews, and before they complete the task you have purchased they offer you a bonus of some sort to just go ahead and give them a good review. Remember that the original offer seemed like a good enough deal for $5, don't take the bonus, and keep the ability to give them a negative review if it must be done. A lot of people get roped into this.
Finally, don't limit what you purchase to actual marketing tasks. Some people on Fiverr will offer custom website marketing advice (i.e. a guy who is an IM veteran) to you for $5. Or you can purchase a custom website logo for $5. You will be surprised what you can get, but choose wisely.
Step 2 - Targeted Advertising
I personally believe that Targeted Advertising is better than broad match Advertising. For instance, I would prefer to run an ad on a competing site for my own website, and receive 1,000 impressions, than to run my ad through AdWords and receive 1,000,000 impressions from all over the internet. I completely understand that you can pick and choose websites with AdWords, but for some reason, I always seem to waste my money away on low converting traffic when I use them. The one plus side to AdWords is that if your ad is very enticing, people might remember it, and your web branding skills will pay off when they come to your site without clicking on the ad later on. So, I suggest buying cheap advertising from complimentary or competing websites. You can buy good ads on many blogs, and Reddit ads are cheap as well and convert A LOT of traffic because they are targeted to the audience.
In my opinion, unless you are an AdWords guru, you will get more bang for your buck by using cheap outsourcing and specific targeted advertising. $100 worth of advertising, for me, on specific sites of my choice, have converted what I calculate to be over $3,000 worth of traffic from AdWords. Since I'm new, have a very low budget, and don't really understand every detail of every program I get into, saving money is paramount to my success - and probably to yours as well.
Step 1. Outsourcing
Fiverr - Fiverr.com is a site where you can pay people $5 to do a task they specify. There are literally thousands of gigs to choose from, but it is important that you do not waste your money when you are on a budget. For instance, if you are going to pay $5 for a social bookmarking gig, your best bet is to pay the guy with a 100% rating who will submit your site to 25 sites vs. the guy who will submit your site to 3,000 sites and has no rating. I have given these people a chance, and the five bucks isn't worth it - ever.
Furthermore, if you are going to pay someone $5 to recruit people to your Facebook Page, be very careful about who you pick to do the task. You might get 100's of fans overnight from someone, and give them a great review - until you actually start going to your fans' profiles and realize every single one of them is from india, or none of them ever respond to your comments. I have spent $30 worth of great tasks on Fiverr, and that $30 was worth more than the $120 of free advertising I had on AdWords. If you can't find exactly what you're looking for on Fiverr, but you CAN find something similar, message the person and ask them if they'd be willing to do your specific task for $5. They usually will be.
Next, be weary of anyone with 100's of positive reviews, and before they complete the task you have purchased they offer you a bonus of some sort to just go ahead and give them a good review. Remember that the original offer seemed like a good enough deal for $5, don't take the bonus, and keep the ability to give them a negative review if it must be done. A lot of people get roped into this.
Finally, don't limit what you purchase to actual marketing tasks. Some people on Fiverr will offer custom website marketing advice (i.e. a guy who is an IM veteran) to you for $5. Or you can purchase a custom website logo for $5. You will be surprised what you can get, but choose wisely.
Step 2 - Targeted Advertising
I personally believe that Targeted Advertising is better than broad match Advertising. For instance, I would prefer to run an ad on a competing site for my own website, and receive 1,000 impressions, than to run my ad through AdWords and receive 1,000,000 impressions from all over the internet. I completely understand that you can pick and choose websites with AdWords, but for some reason, I always seem to waste my money away on low converting traffic when I use them. The one plus side to AdWords is that if your ad is very enticing, people might remember it, and your web branding skills will pay off when they come to your site without clicking on the ad later on. So, I suggest buying cheap advertising from complimentary or competing websites. You can buy good ads on many blogs, and Reddit ads are cheap as well and convert A LOT of traffic because they are targeted to the audience.
In my opinion, unless you are an AdWords guru, you will get more bang for your buck by using cheap outsourcing and specific targeted advertising. $100 worth of advertising, for me, on specific sites of my choice, have converted what I calculate to be over $3,000 worth of traffic from AdWords. Since I'm new, have a very low budget, and don't really understand every detail of every program I get into, saving money is paramount to my success - and probably to yours as well.