Has this ever happened to you? You design a killer web site with awesome graphics and great offers for your customers. You publish it then wait and wait and wait for visitors to show up, but nobody does? It used to happen to me. And if youre doing business on the internet you need traffic to your web site. Zero traffic means zero sales. But what is the BEST kind of traffic for your web site? Free, of course. Paid traffic sources tend to be more targeted and can in many instances be more effective but cost money. If youre like me you just dont have a lot of money to invest in advertising. So I will be highlighting some of the best sources of free web site traffic.

Submit Articles

My number one recommendation is to write and submit articles to article directories. By including a resource box at the end of the article with your name and a link to your web site you will receive traffic when your article is published on other sites. Just be sure your article is relevant to the content on your site. Another advantage of including your link is that it creates backlinks from the publishing web sites to yours. The search engines really like backlinks and this improves your site rankings which can lead to more visitors being referred by the search engines.

Traffic Exchanges

Traffic exchanges require you to surf other member sites to earn free credits for your sites to be shown. The problem with exchanges is the other members are mainly interested in earning credits to show their ads, so you need to reach out and grab their attention. The best way to use traffic exchanges is to advertise a lead capture page where you offer something of value in exchange for the person giving you their email address and opting in to your email list. Once they are on your list you can pitch many different products or business opportunities.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search engine optimization is critical to getting free traffic. It is the science of making your site attractive to the search engines to increase your site ranking which results in your site being displayed before other sites in the search results.

Brad Callens SEO guide is an excellent free resource if you want to try to SEO your own site. If you dont have the time or know-how SEO software is another excellent resource. There are several programs available to do the job.

Another option is to hire a company specializing in SEO to do the job. This can cost plenty of money so do your research on the companies before signing up. I have not taken this route so cannot make any recommendations.

Classified Ads

There are numerous sites where you can post a free classified ad for your site which may result in more visitors or, at least, more backlinks. There are too many to list but my favorite is called Adlander Pro. It combines social networking and classified advertising and can be very effective. Another benefit is you can email your friends who are people looking for opportunities. For other sites just google free classified ad.

Forum Posting

Posting to forums can be an excellent source of backlinks by including your link in your signature. Additionally, you may learn something by reading others posts. Of course there are zillions of forums. The Warrior Forum is my favorite. When using forums you dont want to blatantly advertise. You need to post questions or answer questions from other members so you can become known as an expert or someone who wants to sincerely learn from others. In other words you need to build a relationship with other members, otherwise just blatantly advertising will turn them off and may get you kicked out of some forums.