The five issues mentioned in David’s article are:

1. Guarantee of #1 placement
2. Volume discounts (PPC)
3. Submissions to thousands of Search Engines
4. Promis of hundreds of links back to your website
5. You are dealing with an Inside Man

But, first…

Before you begin trying to get traffic to your site, you need to do your keyword research first. The reason this is so important is that you are going to be building content and traffic sources for specific keywords. This means it’s critical to select your keywords properly.

A couple things to keep in mind when doing keyword research:

• Are the keywords you’re interested in attainable? Take a look at the “strength” of others websites (and how many) are already targeting these keywords.
• Are these “buying” keywords? Certain keywords are good for generating a lot of visitors who don’t buy anything. You want to generate visitors ready to buy.
• Another thing to think about is affiliates. Generating your own customers is great – having other people do it for you is even better. So, it’s important to also target affiliates in the keywords you go after.

This is critical to your business, but it takes a lot of time and effort. Experts are expensive and don’t guarantee results. Which is why practically none of your competitors will do this! The smartest marketers use a website traffic software to automate this and other aspects of their business. This way you get this critical step done fast and done well.

Once you know your keywords…

Once you’ve done your properly keyword research, you’re now ready to start targeting these keywords to draw in visitors.

Powerful Traffic Tactics:

• Something you may not have ever considered is Surveys
• “Traffic Traps”
• Video

Surveys

People love filling in surveys. You can use this fact to provide “sticky” content for other website owners. It’s a win-win. They get a great perk on their site and you get a link back to yours. This allows you to get a free website traffic from other people’s sites! This is a sneaky little idea that most people never even think of. Just make the question interesting enough that people will want to share it with their own visitors.

“Traffic Traps”

Sites like Yahoo! Answers allow users to ask and answer each others’ questions. Once again, the main reason for this site is not the reason you’re interested. You are going to generate traffic, leads and sales from them. Of course, the process of digging through these sites and pulling out the content info of leads for your business is very time consuming. So, if you’re smart, you’ll use website traffic software to do it all for you. This allows you to do the things in your business that can’t be automated and let the software just give you the leads.

Video Websites

No doubt you’re aware of YouTube and other video websites. These sites generate massive traffic and people watch over 2 billion videos a day on YouTube alone . If you’re not taking advantage of this rich source of website traffic, then you are really missing out.

And don’t worry if you don’t have any idea of how to make a video. It’s really easy to just start with an article or something you’ve already written. Then simply record yourself reading the text and you video the screen with a simple screen capture program. I’ve even seen software that will automatically convert an article to a video!

Summary

Getting traffic is not that difficult. Just be a creative and think outside the box a bit. Plus, there’s lots of great software out there to help you.

Get started right away:

• Step 1 is researching your keywords
• Set up some viral surveys
• Take advantage of the “help” sites
• Capitalize on video!

More info on website traffic…

One of his most interesting quotes is:  ”A lot of people talk about ‘content is king. content is king,’ says Wheeler. “With ‘mega SEO,’ structure is king because without structure, your content won’t even be discovered.”

Those of us to who SEO for online properties can really understand this statement.  Interestingly enough, structure of the website, blog, or other properties always require a good structure. Without it, how can you manage your website and it’s recognition by the search engines?

While Microsoft doesn’t have to really worry about being “punished” by Google for slow-loading, low or no traffic pages or broken link, the authority status of Microsoft proves what we have always known.  Your job as an SEO specialist is to crete the authority recognition from search engines that will build traffic and good search engine positioning.

Read the article: An Inside Look at How Microsoft Handles SEO Across its Massive Site

Chesa Keane
www.computergoddess.com

If your business is seasonal, then you know how competitive your market is. Getting the attention of your target audience will require concentration on your best keywords and linking those keywords on your website, blogs and social media to your money pages — the pages that convert your traffic to $$$$.

We have often talked about our strategy called Multiple Points of Presence and this is a perfect example of how using your Multiple Points of Presence to build your brand and expand your companies online awareness will bring you traffic and affect your bottom line.

Here are some important considerations:

• Think in terms of keywords that will be used by your seeking audience and concentrate on long-tail keywords rather than overly general keywords identified by your industry
• Focus your optimization on your webpages, not your website because there is no way your can build your site’s popularity and authority thinking only in general industry terms
• Monitor the results of any activity you undertake — if your traffic is not converting to sales, rework your content and keyword focus
• Now is the time to consider Pay-per-click either through Google AdWords or Facebook Ads – your popular season is when the seekers are out there, so wave your flag
• Ramp up your social media activity — if you have not embraced the whole social media trend, your business will not be competitive and your chances of surviving as a viable player in your industry is unlikely

While the overall market may be down, you must be aware of the seasonal opportunities and attract as much traffic as you can by outsmarting your competition.  Getting the biggest share of a smaller market will guarantee that you can survive the down cycle and be on top when the cycle turns.

Chesa
www.computergoddess.com

Now you might think this is not such a bad thing, but Angwin as a journalist felt stuck in the past and her work as a longtime media and technology reporter was not shining or showing up well-positioned for a search on her name.  Frankly, this one article wasn’t representing her career very well.

This issue is a prime example of someone who wants to change or enhance their reputation online.  However, this isn’t the worst issue I’ve come across, but annoying for Angwin just the same.  And she decided to go about changing her online reputation and her story is outlined clearly in an article, It’s a New Me (As Seen on Google) in The Wall Street Journal | Personal Technology.

The really interesting thing about this article is that it follows the strategy we use in our business to change, enhance, subdue, or repair reputations online.  While she did the work herself, she had some good advice and she followed it well.  Read her whole story about changing her online Google image for the details.

Then contact TAO Consultants if you need help changing your online reputation.

Chesa
www.computergoddess.com