Best way to make a new site popular? Hi, I have just started a new site, http://www.marketground.com I have designed it to be a Free Online Classifieds Forum. My question is, do I stand any chances to ever make it big, and become popular? If yes, what search engine marketing strategies would you recommend? Thanks a lot!
for that kind of service 1st thing you need to do is SEO. use overture inventory and look for popular searches that don't have too much competition and pay for directory submission with that search as anchor text. Also pay for blog posts like the ones that "Cheap Seo Services" is offering. After SEOING a little, post a lot and include your site in your sig in many forums. And since you are offering free classifieds, post your ad in other free classifieds websites =)
Best way is to market to targetted customers, the ones that will really stick to your site be it with search engine ranking or offline marketing.
Get creative and figure out a way to stand out from the crowd. You're entering a very crowded space, you have to get above the noise somehow.
For online classifieds you should spam...I mean market on Craigslist. The articles stay live for 45 days.
You move at a very hard fighted area. I whould take the advice from Lexiseek, and spam. Also i whould try to offer something unik and may lager my field of offers to get also recomends from other sites (hard but very effektive). How you find forums is google? From Posts like this one.... To have a god SEO for a Forum means text text text did i already say text? Saludos
You should have considered those factors before you started the site. Each site is different, hence there is no standardized method that can be used to make a website popular. It depends large on your target audience and the category the site is based in. Your site is very broad, and doesn't specifically target a niche, thus increasing the difficulty of boosting it's traffic, due to the bulk of competitors you face. If possible, I advise you to rethink the idea behind the site and target a specific audience. You're practically attempting to compete with Ebay (If ofcourse I fully understand the true concept of this site), which would be a very very costly, time consuming, difficult and almost impossible task.
I think it should work well for offline advertising.You can try distribute flyers in your local area to tell them that they can use the website to post their stuff.
Whew, I'm not the only one who was thinking this! Why would anybody start a site without first researching it? Developing a business plan for it? Without clearly identifying their target market and yes, identifying exactly how they are going to promote it? A ton of planning goes into a site before building it. This stuff doesn't come afterward! It's like a 13-year-old buying a car and then saying, "shoot, how do actually use this thing though?!" LOL ... maybe should've planned that out before buying it, eh? How can a person possibly identify a good way to market or advertise a site, without first knowing who their audience is? It's impossible. Start at square one, and your path through marketing & promotions will actually become quite obvious. Good luck with your new venture!!! It is always fun to launch a new site. Bailey
I agree with the suggestions here on the importance of knowing and researching a web site's target market and audience before launching it. However, in most cases you'll never know if there is a market for the site unless you launch it first and invest some time and money promoting it. Your category appears to be rather broad. Try to find a niche. Look at your competitors and their own marketing efforts. What mediums are they using? What is their site's USP? Get on their mailing list. Analyze their advertisements. Where are they in the SERPS for the keywords you're targeting? Competitors can provide invaluable information for new businesses and web sites.
I think sbongo had a very simple an nice idea. Offline advertising. Many people like to vorgett this. I advertise some of my pages constantly offline, the response is great and sometimes cheaper than Web advertisment. You spent 10 dollars to advertise with a little blog in the local newspapers, print 10.000 Flyers, and throw them around your City, Now you may spend 100 Dollars. Check out the response if it is worth to go on with thath.
I like your idea, but I fear you are wasting your time. The big boys have a good few years start on you. Having said that, I have an e-book site that does very well and I was told the same when I started. Good Luck, hope it works well for you.