The internet has opened up the global market like never before. Thanks to ecommerce businesses can expect clients from all over the world and consumers can expect quality products or information without being restricted to the local market. This has made the ‘virtual’ business world even more competitive than the ‘real’ world. More and more businesses are seeking solutions to increase the traffic flow to their sites.
Internet marketing is the answer to traffic generation. Just having a great website is not enough. You have to let people know about it to attract customers. There are several tools and methods you can use for internet marketing. They are banner ads, affiliate marketing, seo, pay per click programs, e-mail marketing to name a few. Banner ads are virtual hoardings advertising your site on another website. They use graphics and text to attract the user enough to click on them which takes them to your web page. The placement of your banner ads is crucial to its success. The best place to put your banner ad would be on a website that is related to your product.
Affiliate advertising means paying a commission to an affiliate who uses his website to promote yours. The affiliate redirects traffic from his site to the merchant’s. Payment to the affiliate is usually based on results. Several affiliate marketing sites like Commission Junction exist to bring together merchants and affiliates.
Search Engine Optimization or SEO web marketing is probably the most popular marketing tool used today. It starts with you registering your website on the popular search engines and paying them to link your site with relevant keywords in your content. When the user searches for information based on these keywords the search engine spiders can easily pick them up while scanning the site for rankings. The higher the ranking, the more traffic you can expect.
Pay per click marketing is a comparatively new area of internet marketing. In this you only have to pay when your advertisement is physically clicked on. When visitors click on your advert they are taken to your website or sales page.
E-mail marketing is considered to be one of the most cost effective marketing methods. You begin by harvesting email addresses from your customers at every opportunity and then sending email newsletters to them. These newsletters should bear some unique things of interest, promotional offers or product recommendations.
A combination of these methods works best when promoting a website.
