Website Traffic Sources
No visitors to your website? Free resources are listed
here! If you need a jump start to getting quality traffic
to your website, whether it be an affiliate site or your
own site, start by signing up with each of the traffic
exchanges and safe lists listed below. Do they work? Let's
put it this way, they are a great learning tool if you're
just starting out. However, if you want to use them
effectively there are some tricks you'll want to know. I am
putting together a guide to using safelists and traffic
exchanges to maximize results. If you want to receive a
free copy when it's complete send me a note through my
contact me page and I'll get it
to you as soon as it's complete, free of charge!
Traffic exchanges work by you surfing other websites in
the network to gain credits to either have your site or link displayed within
the network. I have had very good luck with these exchanges and they do generate
quality targeted traffic. It does take time to build your credits but the time
is worth the effort. I spend anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour a day surfing
traffic exchanges and this gets me a steady flow of targeted traffic and a
reasonable conversion rate. I subscribe to four traffic exchanges and since all
work on a timer per site basis, I open four browser windows and arrange them on
my desktop so I can click on each one when the timer says it's ok to move on.
This allows me to not only optimize my time spent surfing, but also gives
me chance to see what the competition is up to. If you have more money than
time, all of these exchanges offer paid subscriptions and/or credits for
payment. See the Traffic Exchanges section
below for my top picks.
Think of safelists as a double opt in email group of
people that share their offering. In other words, you agree to receive email
form everyone else on the safelist and in return you get to send email to
everyone on the list. You may
think
that this is just marketers marketing to other marketers, but safelists can bring quality
traffic. Think of it this way, you are marketing to others with
similar interests. Lot's of people work more than one online opportunity and most
are always looking for the next big thing that comes around.
A couple things to remember if you're going to
use safelists, do use rules to separate your incoming email as the traffic on
these lists can be substantial and you may end up spending a lot of time trying
to find your real email from the list emails. And most do not like
aol mail, yahoo mail, or hot mail. If possible, get an alternate
email address for the list traffic. Check with your internet provider to see
about getting at least one more email address and use it to sign up. You always
want to have a "throwaway" email address to use for signing up on various offers
on the net. This way when it gets so overwhelmed with spam you can simply get
rid of it and get another. I prefer to have an email address for each list
to be able to easily write rules in my email client to put each
list's email into a separate folder and get them out of my inbox.
However you can get by with no additional email addresses and simply write
rules based on the from address of the list as well.
Most safelists have rules about how many emails you can send over a
given period of time. Some work on a credit system where you actually have to
visit a site or participate some other way in order to qualify to send your own
emails. And all have paid plans for those of you with more money than time,
as always wouldn't you know it? :) See my picks for
the very best safelists available.
In addition
to the traffic exchanges and safe lists listed here there
are several other free ways to generate traffic to
your affiliate programs and/or websites. Some that come immediately to
mind are blog sites, article submission sites, newsgroups (usenet), banner
exchanges, and simply by adding a sig (signature) to the bottom of
your normal emails. In
addition, there are hundreds of ways to advertize your site at low cost. Some
include, e-zines, PPC search engines, and CPM banner ads. There are thousands of ways
to drive traffic to your site(s) but start with the free ones
listed here to get the ball rolling. Most of them allow you to
upgrade to a "pro" account and get even more website traffic.
TrafficSwarm
Trafficswarm is one of my favorite ways to get free traffic.
It works by going to your surf site url or you setting your home page to that site
and then clicking on other people's links to get points towards having your
links displayed. I spend about a half hour a day surfing
Trafficswarm (simultaneously with the ones listed below) which in turns gets me 100-200 clicks
on my 5 advertised links. This may not sound like much but I've gotten over
a 5% conversion rate on some of my campaigns. This is very worthwhile. Also I
find that you can test ad copy for places like Google Adwords since the text
links are very similar. If you find one doing really well here you can nearly
bet it's going to be fine on Adwords. Plus since you know the click-through rate
and conversion rate you can then have a pretty good idea of what you can bid on
search terms in Google adwords. I also like to look through the ads to see what
the competition is doing. Highly recommended! Click on the banner to get your
free account! 
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InstantBuzz
This one really works! It does what it says and gets
people buzzing! I have had much success with this exchange and love the fact
that they have three different ways to advertise. It does require a small
download which is an add-on for your browser but I have been using it for a long
time and have not had any trouble with it at all. The nicest thing about it is
that you earn credits even when your just doing your normal web surfing. You
don't have to visit sites along with timers and all that. But since it's added
to your web browser you actually earn credits while surfing the other traffic
exchanges. Not bad, two for the price of one! You earn credits by surfing,
sending emails, or by displaying a link on your site(s). You can earn more
by referring others to join. Click on this banner to get your free
account and download. 
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TS25
I really like the way this one works. It shows your
website (or the website your promoting) in a rotation. After the timer has run
down you are able to click on a number to go to the next site. It insures your
site is shown for a set amount of time. Trafficswarm, by comparison, shows links
to 8 sites at a time and allows the surfer to choose one or to see the next set
of 8. The surfer may not click on your link but your credits go down
because the link was displayed. As I stated earlier though, I have had very good
luck with Trafficswarm so don't let that discourage you from using it.
But TS25 is another great traffic surf/exchange program and I highly
recommend it as well. Click on this banner to get your free account. 
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Hit Safari
This one works just like
TS25 only the timer between page views is a little longer. If you follow my
instructions on surfing for traffic however, it won't pose much of a problem.
This is a 2:1 (free membership) surf ratio so you do have to spend a little time
surfing to get hits. On the upside, the hits are usually good quality and your
time is well spent. Click on this banner to get your free Hit Safari account. 
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123Clicks
This one is not free but there are several
inexpensive plans to choose from. It starts with the basic plan (BasicPro) for a
one time $19.95, then there are advanced plans that go for $5, $25, and $50 per
month. This is advertised as the world's largest and fastest growing paid only
pro link exchange. I have not used this one myself but have heard nothing but
good things about it. I would suggest that you sign up for the free account (you
can only promote not use the system) and then login and check out the different
plans. The Ultimate Gold ($50 per month) plan for example gives you 1,000
advertising credits per month plus a 1:4 surf ratio (visit one site get 4
credits!) The plans in between look very good too. I will probably add this site
as one of my traffic generators soon. Click the banner to get started with your
free account and at least check out the plans.
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Business World List
This safe list is very high quality and gets results. This is my #1
pick. It is a medium volume list with over 60,000 subscribers. I can't say
enough good things about this list. The free membership only allows you to send
to 200 list members every other day. The Pro and Pro-Plus memberships
allows to to send to the entire list every other day. They are very reasonable
at $12 and $19.99 per month. 
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SafeLister
This
list has a membership of over 20,000. It runs on a credit system where it takes
one credit to send an email to one recipient. If you are a free member you can
gain credits by playing "bingo" which is clicking on a link within each email
you get from the list. You will recieve a random number of credits each time you
do this. I have not received less than 500 credits at a time and once received
20,000. This is a very high volume list so you really need to create a new
folder and a rule in your email client to move emails from this list out of your
inbox or you'll never find your personal emails. The quality of this list is
good and I've done well with it. 
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