There are many free classified ads websites out there but the
best is Craigslist (http://craigslist.org/). Craigslist is built around communities, with localized sites for 450 cities
worldwide.
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
Average monthly page views of this website amount to over 9
billion, with traffic sources from all parts of the world. This is
such a powerful website that eBay has thrown out its money to
acquire 25% of the equity in Craigslist.
You will see how great it is when you start using it for your
business. Over 80% of the Craigslist audience is from 18 to 49
years old. Here you will find a number of ad categories that are
relevant to different niches and products.
When posting on classified ad sites, you need to understand the
rules of those sites to avoid your account being suspended due
to violation.
Above is a screenshot of a local Craigslist page. It may not look
that attractive to you, but it is an unlimited source of solid traffic
you ever wish. Craigslist gives you an access to global traffic!
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Robert B. Ingalls
Tips for posting classified ads: teaser style, short and sweet,
straight to the point, with attractive headlines. Don’t post a long
sales letter there or nobody is going to read it.
Other classified ads services you can register to include:
- ClassifiedAds.com
- USFreeAds.com
- AdLandPro.com
- INetGiant.com
They are all FREE to use!
Method #2: Article Submission
The concept of using articles is similar to that of creating a free
product. An article is a free information source that web surfers
are keen to explore.
A well-written article earns you major credibility points. It
enhances your expertise in the eyes of your potential customers.
It also drives tons of traffic and creates quality backlinks to your
landing page and pulls it up in the search engine listings.
The most popular article directory is Ezine Articles
(http://www.ezinearticles.com/). It has millions of quality contents on almost every topic. On average, over 2,000,000
visitors to this site are from the US every single month.
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
If you own a good piece of content, people can pull it out to place
on their blogs. Other article directories also retrieve high quality
contents from Ezine Articles and post them back on their sites.
This enhances the backlinks to the content owner’s website.
People always say: content is king! Great content will last for a
long time. It will spread all over the Internet to bring unlimited
traffic to the webmaster.
So, what do you need to do now?
Register an account at Ezine Articles.
Produce a couple of good contents related to what you
are promoting.
Remember to use the keywords in the title, the
introduction, throughout the article and the tag box.
Post your content
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Robert B. Ingalls
Keyword density: Only 2-5% of the whole article.
Post your author information in the resource box, with a
link to your landing page.
Remember to check the terms and conditions before you post
your first article on this directory.
By the way, you don’t need to be a good writer to produce good
content. You can extract information on other sources over the
Internet and modify it into your own unique article. You can also
outsource the writing at Elance or Fiverr at low cost, or use PLR
articles. Just remember not to copy and paste plainly and, more
importantly, make sure to include your keyword in the articles.
After your article is approved and published on Ezine Articles,
you can go ahead and post it on your blog and other article
directories to multiply incoming traffic.
Below are some popular article directories that you can
consider:
- ArticleBase.com
- GoArticles.com
- ArticleAlley.com
- Amazines.com
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
Method #3: Yahoo! Answers
Yahoo! Answers is an online community where you can post
questions and answer people’s questions to help them solve
their problems.
You can quote the link to your landing page as the source of
information you are referring to in your answer. Just make sure
that it is not an affiliate link. Otherwise your account will be
suspended.
If people find your answers great and relevant, they will contact
you for more information and you can pick up from there for
your direct promotion.
If your answer is rated to be the best, chances are that many
people will continue to see it over time when they search for the
questions. This is real and solid traffic!
Again, you should browse through the terms and conditions to
understand what Yahoo! likes and what it doesn’t.
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Robert B. Ingalls
Method #4: Press Releases
An online press release is simply a traditional press release that
is distributed through online channels. This is a fantastic way to
create buzz, increase online visibility, and drive website traffic
through inbound links to your website. Writing a press release is
different from writing an article. It has its own format and
writing style. The beauty of press release is search engines love
them!
Components of a press release include:
Title/ Headline
Subtitle
Introduction
Body
Company bio
Ending
Contact information
Below are some basic press release guidelines:
1. The information you present must be newsworthy. You
don't want your press release to sound like an
advertisement, but it's fine to announce your web
presence or the launch of a new product. A good press
release should be informative only, and not a sales pitch.
The object of the press release is to provide specific
information regarding your particular business, product,
or site.
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
2. Target your readers: The audience, when reading your
release, should understand why this information is
relevant to them. Give them a reason to keep reading.
3. Use the best possible lead-in headline you can come up
with. Then, keep it simple, incorporate the headline into
the first sentence of the main body of the press release.
4. Make it clear who you are. Always lead with the
announcement, and follow with the source.
5. Your copy should help the reader connect and relate.
Explain “why”, “how”, “when” and “where”. Include a
benefit.
6. Write in an objective tone of voice. You can convey import
or excitement, but avoid using too many adjectives or
fancy language. Stay focused on facts.
7. Make sure you include as much contact information as
possible. This means: The name of the person to contact
regarding the press release, a phone number, fax, snail
mail address if applicable, email address and website
address.
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Robert B. Ingalls
8. Check your press release over several times. Have a
friend or relative proof-read it as well. Correct spelling
mistakes. Make sure your release offers something of
substance.
Below are some free press release distribution services that you
can leverage on:
- PRLog.org
- I-Newswire.com
- Free-Press-Release.com
- PR.com
Method #5: Video Marketing
People love videos. Search engines love videos. That’s why video
marketing is considered as the massive traffic generation tool.
This is a high converting method but it is still underused at this
point of time. As of now, the most popular video sharing
platform is Youtube (http://www.youtube.com).
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
Founded in 2005, Youtube has now become the most visited
video sharing website over the Internet, attracting more than 2
billion views every single day. It reaches over 81 million of US
viewers monthly. Youtube was bought over by Google at $1.65
billion in 2006.
Let me share with you some interesting statistics about Youtube:
An average viewer spends at least 15 minutes per day on
Youtube
70% of all Youtube traffic comes from outside of the US
Youtube is localized in 23 countries, with 24 different of
languages
More videos are uploaded on Youtube in 60 days than the
combine efforts of all 3 major US networks in 60 years
Youtube videos are embedded in tens of millions of other
websites over the Internet
(Source: viralblog.com)
How can you tap on this powerful platform to drive massive
traffic to your website?
Create a video related to your niche. Again, you can
outsource or use PLR materials.
Post the video on Youtube, with keywords in the video
file name, video title, description and tag.
Put your website URL in the description box.
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Robert B. Ingalls
It is even better if you can create a clickable overlay on
the video that links to your website.
Besides, you can submit your files to other video sharing
platforms to multiply traffic to your landing page. Below are
some quality websites:
- TubeMogul.com
- Veoh.com
- Metacafe.com
- Dailymotion.com
Method #6: Forum Participation
Online forums are the places where people hang around every
day to search and share information. On forums, you will get a
chance to interact with many real and new people every day.
I’m going to show you how to start forum marketing effectively:
1) Searching for popular forums relating to your niche (on
Google or ForumFind.com).
2) Joining the forum and saying hi in the welcome room so
that people notice that you have just joined.
3) Including your website URL in your profile.
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
4) Actively participating in the forum to get rapport with
people, also to learn from others about the topic you are
promoting.
5) Up to a certain point of time, including the link to your
landing page in your signature.
Again, you should understand the rules of the forums to avoid
account suspension.
This method needs a little bit of hard work, but it significantly
pays off eventually. You will not only increase traffic to your site,
but also convert and retain some customers as well as enhance
your branding! Moreover, as I mentioned, participating in
forums is one of the best ways to improve your knowledge and
expertise in the niches you are promoting.
One golden rule about forum marketing: Never post affiliate
links anywhere in any forums! Most forum moderators hate that.
Method #7: Social Networks
Currently, Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/) and Twitter (http://twitter.com/) are the most popular social media websites on the Internet. They provide excellent
interactive platforms for their users.
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Robert B. Ingalls
These are the great sources of viral traffic and it’s a waste of
resources if you miss out these channels.
Let me share with you some facts and figures of these powerful
social media platforms, to see how powerful they are from an
Internet marketer’s perspective:
- Launched in 2004
- Launched in 2006
- 500+ million active users
- 106+ million accounts
- 41% login every day
- 27% login every day
- 30% login via mobile device
- 37% login via mobile device
- 12% update their status every day
- 52% update their status every day
- 70% are located outside the US
- 60% are located outside the US
(Source: bplans.com )
Besides,
you
can
also
tap
on
to
(http://www.linkedin.com/) to approach the professional segment, especially if you are in the investment and Internet
business niches.
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
Coming up next, we are witnessing the rapid growth of Google+.
This could be a great platform because it is owned by Google and
will be loved by Google search engine.
Squidoo
and
HubPages
(http://hubpages.com/) are search engines’ favourite platforms and traffic attraction hubs day in day out. On these
two platforms, you can post a series of quality contents related
to your niche to share information and promote your affiliate
products. Again, don’t forget your keywords!
Method #8: Social Bookmark
Social bookmarking sites, also known as content aggregators,
allow users to submit and share their favourite URLs. They also
allow members to vote for their favourite links.
Social bookmarking is all about information sharing. If your URL
receives votes from other users, it will receive greater visibility
from the search engines and web surfers.
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Robert B. Ingalls
That’s why social bookmarking has become such an important
component of Internet marketing that nobody should ever
ignore the power of it.
There are many social bookmarking websites out there. Below
are the best places to get started:
- OnlyWire.com
- Digg.com
- Delicious.com
- StumbleUpon.com
- Reddit.com
Method #9: Document Sharing
When this method was first invented, people just considered it
as a platform to share and distribute documents over the
Internet. Now it has gone beyond that function and become a
powerful platform for Internet marketers to drive viral traffic to
their sites.
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
Document sharing websites allow users to share their files in
doc, pdf, ppt and many other formats. Most of the files uploaded
will be visible and downloadable by the public, unless an author
chooses to privatize his files. Usually, marketers will embed
hyperlinks to their landing page or affiliate offers in the
documents.
If you want to create a good document to attract great amount of
views, pay attention to the following components:
- Attractive title
- Nicely structured content
- High converting visual aids
- Relevant keywords
- Good author profile
This method is, in fact, still underused at this moment in time.
You can make use of it once you get started.
Here are some authority document sharing sites that are loved
by the search engines:
- SlideShare.net
- Slide.com
- Scribd.com
- Calameo.com
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Robert B. Ingalls
Final words…
As an affiliate marketer, you should take note of the following:
o Trust building is important. Don’t let consumers think of
you as a scammer. You need to be sincere in the way you
communicate, and turn up as a knowledgeable or
experienced person in the niche you are promoting. If you
are not an expert yet, you can pick it up fast during your
promotional activities that I introduced above.
o Don’t promote any products that come along your way.
Only promote good products. Many marketers make this
mistake and ruin their own branding; so I just want to
make sure that you are on the right track.
o Give the customers what they want. Don’t promote
irrelevant stuffs or you will be blacklisted. People will buy
from you if they trust you. If they buy from you once,
there is high chance that they will return and buy from
you again in the future. But if you create bad impression,
they will say farewell to you!
o Don’t promote products that are too competitive. Be a
small fish in the big pond is always the best strategy.
o Most importantly, remember NOT TO SPAM!
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Three Paths to Internet Wealth
Income Path #2: eBay
Why eBay?
People come to eBay by the millions. Thus, eBay is so far the
world’s largest online auction company and one of the highest
traffic attractions on the Internet. The company’s revenue is up
to $10.77 billion in 2010. And it is the Top 21 most visited
website at the time of this writing.
You can find almost everything that you’d want to purchase on
eBay, from used cars to a pepper grinder made from a stuffed
raccoon.
eBay has become the world’s largest and the most diversified
marketplace. From high class and high priced to trailer trash
chic selling for pennies, anything you want is at your fingertips.
eBay is the owner of PayPal, the world’s largest digital payment
solution provider.
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Robert B. Ingalls
How to Monetize with eBay?
1) Selling Your Own Products
It can be anything in the house that you don’t want anymore. It
can be something that you buy at a low price from the
pawnshop. Just make sure that you don’t make a loss on your
trade. I have seen many people waiting for super sales periods
such as Black Friday sales in the