My partner and I have just started a business. The majority of sales will be from our website. Can you suggest some ways to advertise for cheap? Thanks
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How cheap are you talking? I'd say adwords, and putting ads in other search engines, but you know about that already. Do a search for sites that has traffic that may like your site, and pitch them an offer to place an ad. Use compete.com to roughly see how many monthly hits they get, to see if they are even worth contacting. It's not accurate, of course, but it gets you in the parking lot of the ballpark. Advertise in enough cheap sites, and it will add up for you.
Apart from buying ads space, you can tried getting paid reviews for your business. Depending on what your business is all about, you can give trial service or free products for bloggers of the similar niche to write a review for your business. This are pretty effective considering the fact that blogs are great communication tools nowadays.
It does kind of depend on your business. You can submit to directories for free at addurl.nu. It allows you to put your website in a category. If you're planning to advertise locally, then go with Craigslist which is also free. However, you can only advertise one object in one location on craigslist. In other words, you can't advertise the same thing more than once in two different locations even if you changed the wording a little. Craigslist will blacklist you. I once put in a classified ad thru myspace, and I got a notification the next day. Try that.
I guess it all depends on what you're selling. Though free directories can't hurt - good ones at least (there's dozens of posts with lists of them here) The only problem with that is that it's probably one of the most tedious things you'll ever do in your life and the returns aren't always great. It's quite possible that you'll end up sending out dozens upon dozens of submissions and maybe only end up with two links. Find lots of related blogs - dofollow blogs - and start posting there and be sure to put a link to your own site when you do. Start your own blog, on whatever the related subject is, and start syndicating your RSS feeds, set it up with services like feedburner & yahoo pipes, as well as various blog directories and sites like mybloglog. Set yourself up on the most popular social networks and also become an "expert" on squidoo. Set up with Ebay also, and start selling through there. Finally let's not forget this place for post signatures
How effective is blog posting now adays, as it always something new happening in the internet world...... Does adding a Bookmarking options to a particular seciton of a site would help to reach to a wider audience on the internet world.
It can do. It's always a good idea to put an "add this" button on every page/post. This can be done automatically on most blogging platforms now as a plugin and is also easily done on regular HTML pages, just by inserting a bit of code. In other words, it takes a couple of seconds to add one so why not do it? Results can vary, obviously, depending on the content. You really need to have something people will be interested in bookmarking in the first place and writing specific "Digg-bait" might defeat the purpose of what you want your website to do - i.e. to SELL, rather than inform or entertain. To come at it again from the opposite angle you could always write articles, signing up at someplace like Ezine articles. You write the article and place your own signature link at the bottom (with a little bio perhaps) People can then use this article on their own site/blog/etc - *provided* they place your signature at the bottom, including your link. Depending on the niche you've chosen the results will, again, vary - but, once again, it's free.
do some free giveaways that get the buzz out there also go to a tradeshow for your niche everyone hosts there tradeshows in Vegas
I don't think there's such a thing as "cheap advertising". Either it's not effective or in other words just a waste of time. Adsense should be your best bet and since you are selling products, the cost of advertising should already been factored in to your selling price.
how about some roboblogs keyword targeted to drive traffic onto your site. adwords is well worth a look as is affiliate marketing. there are a growing number of affiliate networks who have very low setup and monthly charges which makes it a very cost effective medium. whats the product?
As for me the best way is to get links from the related sites that have high PR. But it will be only SEO optimization. You should make marketing research and find out where your competitors get traffic from. Learn from them and try to make your own advertisement campaign
You can do free classifieds. I have had some luck with that. Craigslist is also a good place but you have to know the rules and follow them. There are a lot of places on line to learn how to post to craigslist. It does work well. Forums are another great place. Free advertising really takes being consistent and persistent.
Articles are a good way. Use the resource box. I've just started a new site myself www.blitzguides.com that lets users write quick How-To-Guides on a variety of products while at the same time including their name and info in the included resource box. I personally use resource boxes alot on article ezines to get my site names out to the public
When an advertiser spends less than, say, $500 a month, lycos, that is cheap advertising. There are plenty of sites that sell space for that much, and much less.
It depends on your definition of cheap and what niche you are in, but if you want to establish an internet presence you can always start on social networks.
I wouldn't say that you necessarily have to spend any money to advertise effectively, guerilla marketing is a case in point- there are a lot of people out there coming up with really clever and imaginative ways to promote their name or brand with little, if any, budget. But having said that, the general rule is the more exposure you want, the more it'll cost.
There is no need to pay for advertising.Use free marketing methods.Write articles, blog, comment on other blogs to get back links, social media and so on.