Step 3 - Getting Visitors To Your Site - Part I - Pay Per Click

This step focuses on ways of getting traffic to your newly created web site. With literally billions of web pages out there, how can you get noticed? Read on and find out how....

Build it and they will come.....No they won't!

Unfortunately, even though you've created the best web site the world has ever known, it is unlikely that you will receive any visitors without some sort of site promotion or marketing. There are now more web pages on the internet than ever before, with millions more being created every day. The chances of your site being found without some sort of help are remote.

So what's the solution?

Search marketing. People find web sites through search engines - Google, Yahoo!, MSN, Ask. It is probably how you found the link to this e-course. The quickest way to get traffic to your site is by appearing in the search engines when someone types in a keyword related to your web site, for example - someone types the word "mp3 player into Google" and your site appears in the results because your site is all about mp3 players.

There are two ways to appear in the search results:-

1. Organic Listings - These are the main list of results that appear either on the left hand side in Google or beneath the top results in Yahoo! or MSN. To appear in these listings costs nothing, but to appear in these listings on the first page, is quite difficult without some specialized knowledge (see next weeks lesson!).
2. Sponsored Listings - These listings appear on the right hand side on Google, and at the top of Yahoo! and MSN. These listings cost money, but it is the quickest way to get good targetted traffic to your web site.

Why Pay For Traffic?

PPC or pay per click marketing is the easiest and fastest way to get traffic to your web site. It works by bidding on keywords such as 'mp3 player', the higher you bid, the higher you appear at the top of the page in the search results. This means that anyone can appear on the first page of the search engines. You only pay for the advertising when your ad is clicked on.

Paying for traffic is always a good idea when you are starting a web site. I waited almost 3 months for a visitor that wasn't a friend or family. Then I decided to give pay per click a go, and I started receiving visitors the very first day I set up my account. The two main players in paid search are Google Adwords and Yahoo! Search Marketing (MSN is busy developing its paid search as I write this).

• Yahoo! Search Marketing - is the easiest to learn of the two. Basically, whatever you bid on a keyword determines your place on the page, Google's version is a lot more complicated (see below). Currently, when you bid on a keyword, an advert for your site appears on Yahoo!, MSN, Altavista and many other search engines. I recommend using Yahoo! when starting out, because of its ease of use. Another good reason is that they are giving away $25 worth of advertising at the moment as an incentive to sign up. Find Out More Here!
• Google Adwords - is more complicated, but offers more options. Google works out your bid price according to how much you bid and also how often your ad gets clicked on. If your ad does not get clicked on as often, it costs you more money per click. Google's strong point is that you have a lot of control over your ads and keywords and you can have your ads showing in minutes, whereas Yahoo! has to approve your ads and keywords first. You can find out more about Adwords here.

Paying for traffic is good, but be careful.....

When I first started using PPC to get traffic, I didn't read any books, help files or guides. I just blundered in and tried to suss it out on my own. Now certain things in life allow you to do this, PPC isn't one of them. I wasted 100s if not 1000s of dollars on useless traffic becuase I didn't know what I was doing. My best advice to you would be to get a book on PPC and read it thoroughly before you dip your toe into the world of paid traffic. The book I ended up buying was The Definitive Guide To Google Adwords by Perry Marshall. This is the best selling and most informative book ever written about Google Adwords. The money I paid for the book I made back in savings within 2 days of reading Perry's book. If only I had read it sooner, I would have saved myself an awful lot of money. Don't make the same mistake I did, if you're venturing into the world of Google Adwords, you'd be a fool not to buy this book. You can find out more details here.

That concludes today's lesson. Next time I'll be showing you how to get visitors to your site and it won't cost you a penny!

Until next time, be careful with the PPC - buy the book!