A is for Advertising

People talk incessantly about - gaining more website traffic - but they rarely mention that a site really needs targeted website traffic. The only way to have a successful site is to court targeted website traffic — or people who keep coming back to your site, visiting one page after another.

Targeted website traffic includes people who are actually interested in what your site offers. They have been -targeted- for that very reason. For example, when you look at a book ad on Amazon.com, they show you books other people bought who also liked the one you were looking at. That’s because it is reasonable to assume that if you’re interested in the first one, you’ll be interested in others like it. They are targeting a fantasy fan for their fantasy books, instead of trying to sell them to random people. That is what you need to do as well.

Now, targeted website traffic doesn’t mean guaranteed traffic — just a strong possibility of more website traffic. You don’t want to lure anyone and everyone to your site. Internet loiterers take up space.

Randomly luring people is the difference between displaying magazines for people to leaf through or snagging a loyal customer who returns to buy each month.

Keywords are the building blocks when it comes to traffic, whether its paid or free traffic. Because searching on the internet is driven by people typing in what they are looking for, they have to use words to describe what it is they want. They can’t use their hands or facial gestures, it has to be words. For example, if they wanted big furry dice that they could hang in their car, they will type associated words into their preferred search engine to seek out what they want.

This is why you’ll often hear internet marketers talking about ‘getting inside the head of the prospect’. What would they type into a search engine in order to find fuzzy dice? Would it be “car dice”, “furry dice”, “soft hanging dice”? Or some other variation that you’ve never thought of? Picking the right keywords is about improving your chances of success.

So what else are you selling along with your fuzzy hanging rearview mirror car dice? You can’t get targeted website traffic if you don’t know who you’re targeting, so figure out just what kind of site you have. Should car dice should be sold at a car accessories site, a weird gifts site, or a kitsch site? They should be sold on a site that has other merchandise that will appeal to the fuzzy dice people-like fuzzy steering wheel covers, or even animal print clothing, if it’s a retro shop. That approach will get you more website traffic.

Getting people to visit your site and buy what you’re selling is similar to playing the stock market: You can make some educated guesses, but it’s all a risk and a gamble. That doesn’t mean you should ignore trying to improve your odds, though — targeted website traffic will definitely help. When you tempt people who want what you have, they’ll buy.