The virtual world of internet is huge beyond comprehension. There are thousands of people visiting the net every day and there are millions of web pages trying to draw their attention.

In this vast virtual landscape how do you ensure that people who may be interested in your web pages actually arrive there? How do you ensure that your web pages will score over similar pages targeting those same visitors? And then how do you convert those visitors to willing subscribers or customers?

That is the essence of online internet marketing – the skill of traffic promotion to flood your web pages with interested visitors and convince them to accept what you have to offer.

Whatever marketing strategies you plan can be divided into following stages:

1. Presentation of products and services being offered
2. Traffic promotion to draw targeted visitors to see your offer
3. Getting favorable response from the visitors

Let us look briefly at each of these stages.

Presentation:

The content and appearance of your web pages form the presentation. Both these parts are equally important – content as well as appearance and layout. You could have your own website or affiliate pages to show, but the same general rules apply.

When a new visitor comes to one of your web pages he will be prepared to invest only a few seconds before he moves on to other pages. Within those few seconds the page should load and show something of interest to him so that he is inclined to stay longer to look around. Your page should create enough interest for him to repeat his visits and hopefully convert him into a subscriber or a customer. The content of the page should not only give narration of products or services being offered, but should also give other useful and relevant information. New content should be regularly added to keep the visitors and search engines happy.

Pre-selling is an essential part of marketing. The customer needs to be convinced, and rightly so, about the product or service before he decides to purchase. The landing page where visitor arrives first could be used for pre-selling before he is sent to the sales page. The reputation of the person making the offer is often a strong factor in pre-selling. In fact the credibility of the marketer is one of his biggest assets.

Traffic Promotion:

Once your web pages are in place you would like people to see them. You have to get the word out that you have something to offer. There are several ways of getting targeted, regular and high volume traffic to your web pages. Some of them are article promotion, participation in forums, press release and, on top of them all, search engine traffic. Internet marketers have reported varying success with these methods. But they are all excellent advertising channels and you have to see for yourself which of them works better for you.

Article Promotion: You can send your articles for publication to various ezines and article directories. At the end of the article you are allowed to give your resource box in which you can include URL of your web page. When your articles are published by ezines, they are picked up by other ezines and webmasters for republishing on their web sites. Every time your article is published your resource box goes with it. The distribution of your articles can have a viral effect as this process continues. Your articles get published for weeks, months and some times for years after your first submission. This assures regular traffic to your web pages.

Forums: Forums can help you to reach most targeted people who are interested in your offers. If used properly, forums can by themselves give you all the marketing you need.

Another big advantage of forums is that you get to learn a lot just by hanging around them.

In the context of Internet the forums are websites meant for exchange of information. One person initiates a topic by asking questions or giving some useful information or maybe by giving his personal views on a subject of common interest.

In the parlance used in the forums this initiation of a new topic is known as starting a thread. Any one interested can respond to this message by posting his comments thereby adding to the thread. As other members add their views the thread grows.

Where does marketing come in? With each message posted the members are generally allowed to add a signature line which can be linked to the website where they want to send their visitors. This small byline does the marketing for you.

The forums help you to promote yourself along with your site. By regularly visiting and posting in the forums you establish your credentials, earn trust of other members and get steady stream of interested visitors to your site.

In addition you learn a lot from other people.

Press Releases: There are agencies which will distribute your press releases for you and their distribution network is quite large. You need to follow their guidelines in preparing your message which are generally more stringent than guideline for submitting articles to ezines. But you have the advantage of fast and wide distribution of your message.

Search Engine Traffic : As you know most of the time people go to search engines when they seek some information on the net. When someone initiates a search for any keyword the search engine displays the web pages with relevant information. In addition, many search engines also display pay per click advertisements for that keyword.

The web pages which are listed on the first page of a search result will most likely get more traffic from the search as compared to web pages appearing on page number 2,3 or more. Naturally every webmaster would like to see his web pages appear higher. There are many factors by which search engine decides the sequence in which web pages are listed. Following factors are believed to have great influence on this decision:

1. “Optimization” of the web page for particular keywords
2. Number of back links
3. Frequency with which content of the web page is changed

Remember that the traffic generated by search engines does not cost you anything. But it is not an easy task to obtain and maintain high ranking for your web pages and blogs.

There are other methods by which search engines help you. Your articles published by other ezines are likely to get you more visitors when they find your articles in search engine searches. Similarly your postings in forums and your press release are likely get visitors from search engines.

The traffic promotion methods I have talked about here do not cost you anything. And there are many more methods for drawing traffic to your website. Among the paid services solo ads and pay per click are widely used. In addition there are several methods by which you can get un-targeted traffic which are not mentioned here.

Getting Visitors to Respond Favorably:

It is very unlikely that your visitors will become your subscribers and customers in their first visit. You may be able to convert them by regular contact. Your visitors may return to your web pages, but you can do better by reaching them from your side. You can contact them by sending them permission based emails at regular intervals. But first you will require their contact information. This can be obtained by placing a web form on your web pages in which your visitors will give their contact information in return for something. This process can be automated by autoresponder which will store the contact info and will send message to them at pre-set intervals.

The future of your net based business is dependent to a large extent on the list of your subscribers. The more you are able to maintain good relations with them and help them resolve their concerns the better response you can expect from them. It will pay dividends to enlarge and maintain your list without expecting any immediate return. The return will eventually come when you have won their trust and you are able to sell your recommended products to them repeatedly.

Ultimately marketing is the art of understanding people and getting them to respond to you favorably. This is true of any field where human interaction is involved.

Sanjay Johari contributes regularly to various ezines. To get complete marketing solutions for your needs, visit his blog: http://sanjay-j.com/trafficpromotion/