Suggestions for building traffic for new site - Pinnacle Deals

Here's some tips:

• Trade links with other sites that are similar or accompany your site's topic. Make sure they link back, and come through on your site, too.
• Optimize your site for search engines. Use meta tags and submit your search engine into the big search engines like Google, Altavista, and Lycos.
• Make sure your site has a strong, specific focus. If you just say "my site's a search engine", people won't come. They need a reason to, you need a unique site. So try to make sure your site offers people stuff they can't find any where else. "Build it and they will come" is not true. Hope this helped!

Promotion isn't easy, but it pays off!

Unfortunately, search engines really haven't done anything for me. I don't really think that deal sites is something that people really search for, it's really more of a niche.

I really don't want to trade links with other sites, as I'm worried about the site looking unprofessional. I would, however, consider a banner exchange with some other sites.

Thanks!

People do search for keywords such as "coupons", "computer deals", etc. It's always a good idea to concentrate on search engines no matter what your sites about. Next step is to trade links with similar sites or sites that have similar subject matters. You may also want to look into banner exchange programs. LinkExchange worked great for my first web site.

I've been using Link Exchange and I haven't received one click even from like 800 impressions.

I haven't used them for many a year... I have no idea what they are like now. There are other similar programs though.

Do you know any other banner exchange sites besides link exchange? I think I heard of one called freebanners or something like that but i can't remember the name.

thanks!

Try bxmegalist.com I haven't looked at this site in detail but it appears to list 350+ banner exchange programs. A friend sent me the link a few weeks ago.

heh i was actually just looking at that site, i found it through a search engine

I used worldbe.com for a while, it got some nice traffic from them!

hrmm i'm signing up for worldbe.com now, hopefully it will help. thanks!
does anyone know of a good graphics designer to make an effective banner for me for link exchanges?

giambona,

I think your web site needs to be more like a directory. Say for instance if I were looking for computer deals it would be great to find a category on your web site called computer deals. This would give you an opportunity to optimise a web page just for the key word computer deals which I found out was searched for on GoTo.com over 1300 times last month. You could do this for all categories increasing your visibility on the search engines. If you want to learn how to optimise the design of your web site so that you maximise your visibility on the search engines send a blank email to tams5day@sitesell.net

I think viral marketing will be your big gun. Go to http://www.recommend-it.com and sign up for their recommend-it program. Check it out. It works. I use it in our monthly newsletter and regularly get 14+ subscribers referring our newsletter to others.

Stay away from banner exchanges. They don't work and they make you look unprofessional.

Stay away from reciprocal linking. They make you look unprofessional. Let me tell you from experience. If you have a unique, interesting and beneficial web site people will automatically link back to you. You don't even have to ask. I do use reciprocal linking on my personal web site. Check out my unique way of handling reciprocal links go to...http://www.advancedwebsitepromotion.com/sponsors.htm

Don't worry it will take time. Rome was not built in a day.

Gavin

I don't think it would be possible to do separate pages for each kind of deal b/c we only get a few new deals each day. We do have many pages for coupon codes, but they are data-driven so I don't they would picked up by search engines.

I'm not really clear as to how Recommend-It works. I already have a page on my site for people to refer their friends.

thanks!

I've advertised in UK magazines (being a UK site) and although I got traffic I never really got much feedback. I'm looking at the best way to use search engines right now.

What has worked amazingly well for me is htmail.com. It's direct e-mail on a worldwide scale who pay targeted people to look at sites. You also get VERY useful feedback. Direct mail usually has a 4% click through rate - my campaign so far has 16% with 14% being unique. They aren't expensive either and I would recommend them to anyone.

Failing that....check out my site. You can buy traffic from existing sites. I won't go on, I don't want to incur the wrath of any moderators!

htmail sounds very interesting, but I am really trying to spend little or no money on promotions (as a recent high-school graduate, I really don't have any money )
besides, $20 for only 100 leads sounds kinda expensive to me.

have any other suggestions?

I bought a list of 400,000 emails about two weeks ago and supposed to be African American emails that are opt in addreses.i downloaded software to send them and started to send them at 20,000 a day for a week.my sales skyrocketed for a Michael Jordan watch that I sold for $15 dollars and I had a html page that took them right to the product.I got 5 to 8 sales a night on these watches but this week i got a letter from @home cable network saying they had got some complaints and i could get kicked from the service.I immediately stopped the emails and im still getting some sales but not like before.I sent them a email telling them the situation but haven't got anything back so i don't know what they will do.i guess i got duped on the list but my goodness i couldn't believe how fast i got sales using that list.i think im going to look for a way to still use the list but letting someone else send them.i sent 120000 emails and i got back 12 complaints. my new email is geoflem_2000@yahoo.com

i definitely can't do something like that, i've already received a "warning" from my cable modem company.

Use HTmail.com

They mail for you, it really is 100% opt in as well.

Can't you just use yahoo's smpt server? You cable provider can't check that!

Hi, you guys should stay away from spamming. It works for the short term but in the long run it will kill your business. It takes time to make money on or off the web.

Gavin

Actually the warning from my cable provider was for posting a few ads to relevant newsgroups. The newsgroup moderators complained.

i think its horrible how the big portals kill the little guy with a medium that started off as being a sorta equalizer for small business.now big money has taken over the game and makes us pay them to get some of their hits.it seems like we are fighting over the left over crumbs and having to be more innovative everyday.

I agree 100%. Opt-In mail ISN'T spam though. If you can get a good list from a reputable company then I would say go for it. I have been offered 64 million names for £117. The vendor always skirts around the issue of whether they are opt-in and the site looks shabby so theres no way I'd buy that list BUT a decent opt-in list will get you good results and feedback.

Spam is a no no. Opt In is fantastic.

These people who "opt-in" forget easily and never heard of you before. Therefore they will more than likely accuse you of spamming them, report you and you could lose your mail server. The only safe form of bulk email I consider not Spam would be:

1. Newsletter and mailing list subscribers who sign up at your site.

2. People who downloaded or purchased products from you recently.

3. Email addresses of businesses collected from the web so that you can joint venture with, partner with, and even reciprocal link with. (A one time email campaign)

Gavin

gavin what you say is true but i tell you this it seems like people are so afraid of the privacy thing that they rarely give out email info even if they could win a sony playstation2 .i got a lot of guys to my site with the so called spamming but either they bought something or just looked and went elsewhere.

I disagree. Some of these people use opt-in programs because they get paid to read the mails so they aren't likely to 'forget'. Yes, that detracts from some of there validity but should they report you then surely you just point the ISP to whoever sold you the list?

I would rather just stay away from "for sale opt-in lists". We have been selling real estate online since 1996 and would like to continue selling way into the future. We are past the search engine phase. If the search engines were to fold up tomorrow our web site would still receive a substantial amount of traffic. Using a for sale opt-in list will only hurt our credibility.

Gavin

If you look for banner exchange networks, here's a compare list including 20 of them:
http://www.dansquickshopping.com/2412.htm

That is fantastic for you personally, every site would love to be in that position where you don't need directories. It really signifies a strong brand name. For those starting out who need to build that foundation first, opt in mailing from a reputable company is a good way to go I think.

AltaHit.com,

Like I said it takes time lots of time. When I started out promoting our web site I used to spend many hours surfing looking for places to post our web site link. I'd say I spent almost a whole year doing this. Now that people know we exist I don't have to go on "link hunts" anymore. New web sites add our link to their directories automatically.

I would never consider buying an opt-in list. There are so many other safe ways to publicize your web site and it's free.

Gavin

Gavin,

Two points I'll clarify:
1 - opt-in e-mail is 'safe' as long as you use a reputable company
2 - I'm not suggesting you should use e-mail

I agree it takes time to build a reputation. I long for the day when I don't have to trawl through pointless sites to find one site adding my link to. The fact you don't need to anymore is a credit to you which you should be commended for. I feel that for new companies wanting feedback and to generate an amount of targeted traffic, opt-in e-mail isn't a bad way to go. Far from ideal but not a bad way.

Hi I do hope these few points are helpful

1) To get click thoughs, don't use graphical banners
people click on blue text links and clickable HTML
stuff. Normal banners are averaging 0.13% or 13 in every
thousand, so use stealth banners they work much better
as high as 1 and 2% in a couple of cases. one day I got
9% from the jedi banner.

here are some example's I've put up, so you can see
what I'm talking about. http://www.systemsinplace.co.uk/stealth.html
Imagine they are on a white background.

2) I'd recommend using the following banner exchange program
for these reasons:-
1:1 impression exchange
Competitor exclusion
Easy to install
$15 sign up gift
Comprehensive stats
Free to use.

But the main reason is this:-

5 tier affiliate program offering 10% impressions for all traffic in your downline, and no limit to the width of first tier affiliates.
http://www.systemsinplace.co.uk/viralbanner/
I get a phenmonial amount of free impression just from a handful of high traffic sites I introduced to the program.

3) Test your responses always test the responses to banners
or newsletter ads, I use ROIbot, but there are many systems
available to do this.
ROIbot AdTracker

I hope these few pointers help : )

Success

Paul

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