I have been answering a lot of emails and questions on forums about beginning a new website promotion strategy. One of the biggest problems that I am seeing is people getting overwhelmed with trying to get the numbers of traffic that it takes to be successful.
Don’t freak out
Part of the problem is people seeing that they need hundreds or thousands of back links to get high search engine rankings. Or, they think about the hours of work that it will take to set up a proper social networking campaign. The thing about it is, you may need all that, but you don’t have to do it all at once. What you need is a consistent plan of action to take every day.You can develop your own plan, or follow the advice of a proven expert in the field.
As I am writing my new ebook on True Article Marketing Exposed (which will soon replace my Traffic Formula), I really started thinking about all the ways people overwhelm themselves. That’s right. The first thing you have to accept to get past being overwhelmed is accept this simple fact:
YOU ARE DOING IT TO YOURSELF!
Step back, take a deep breath and control yourself. The best way to overcome this is by planning your strategy. One thing that I tell people is that consistency is more important than quantity. Develop your new website promotion plan to fit your schedule.
Now, I am going to shoot myself in the foot once again by giving you a plan that you can use,(and I am not even going to charge you for it, not even an email adress). Adapt it to fit your schedule, and how much time you have to spend promoting your new website.
First, look at where you want your links. Personally I go for a diverse structure including a few article directories, Web2.0 sites, blog commenting and guest posting, social bookmarking, and other sites.
Rather than looking at days of building backlinks, set a daily goal for the number of backlinks that you can comfortably build. This can be a few or a lot. I have one friend that does 20/ week. He works 2 jobs, while building up his sites, so he doesn;t have a lot of time to spend on promotion. His sites are starting to take off, and he has even said if it stays consistent ( which it will if he does), he will quit one of his jobs, if not both of them later this month.
Your New Website Promotion Plan:
Start out by writing one article. Now, you can spin this article. Submit it to 5 article directories, and 5 web2.o sites. That sounds much simpler than submitting it to hundreds of sites doesn’t it?
Now, while you are on the social sites, go through and post 5 comments on related pages within the community. Stop by the forum, and leave one or two comments there. You don’t have to spend a lot of time on this, but by being involved in the community, you will increase your standing there, and you will get traffic to your pages on their site.
Next, i would go through a list of RSS feed submission sites. Submit your feed to say 5 sites/ day, which should take about 15 minutes.You can even outsource it here if you really want to. ( not an affiliate link, but I do highly recommend his service)
Make 5 blog comments on ComentLuv enabled blogs. This will help you get your site found quickly.
Thats it. now, you could do more, or less, depending on how much time you have. You can also outsource the article writing and submissions to more sites. This will increase your exposure, and give you a better chance at ranking well for your keyword.
Remember it is not about quantity it is about consistency. If you have more time on your hands, do more, if you cant do all this in a day, then do part of it one day and the rest the next day. Develop your own plan and stick to it.
Don’t overwhelm yourself with your new website promotion.
This post was written by...
James Pruitt – who has written 234 posts on IMRelations Media.
I Started my internet marketing journey in 2008, as I began building simple affiliate sites. Through the years I have worked as a freelance writer, publishing my own blogs and websites, written several ebooks, and now work mainly to help others build their online business through my marketing consultations, personal coaching, and relationship building.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Jeez, you must have been reading my mind with this post! Submitting article after article is all good, but you still need the time to get everything else done, so thanks for putting it all together so nicely!
Your welcome Chris, and thanks for stopping by. managing your time is one of the hardest things to face online. I try to schedule myself, so that I can see exactly what I need to do each day.
For example, I got overwhelmed earlier today, because I suddenly had an explosion in my writing service. I got several new clients, and I have taken on several big jobs. In order to make everyone happy, and still have time to promote my website, I went to the whiteboard, listed out everything I need to do for each client, and my own promotions, and prioritized, listing out how much time I will spend each day, on each project. This way everyone gets their work done, and I can still find time to promote my own stuff.
a little planning goes a long way, and will save you hours of aggravation later.
This is great advice. Do you know if there is any statistics on how well each promotional method performs?
Thanks for the info James on what steps to take, because you can sure feel over whelmed at times! Keep up the great work!
@ Victor. the thing is, I have 10 different sites, and the results vary from niche to niche. there are many variables that go into any promotion strategy. keywords, quality of your articles, adds that distract your readers, and other factors will make things vary widely.
however, the most consistent one that I have seen is from guest posting on other blogs. I look for blogs that get some traffic, but not necessarily so huge that I have trouble getting in. For example in the marketing niche, I would probably have to fight to get on ProBlogger, or Mashable, but I have posted on several lesser blogs that bring me 200-300 visitors every time i guest post.
I have seen similar results in other niches. Sometimes those visitors don’t buy right away, but they come back later, or they subscribe to my list. Right now, this is the only niche I am in that i don’t have a list started in, and I am working on changing that.
There are so many variables it is hard to track what will work. This is why I do a shotgun aproach, doing a little of different methods. Then, once I see what is working to bring me traffic with a specific niche, I focus more attention on that.
I have one blog that 80% of my traffic comes through rss feeds, so I focus on syndicatiing that feed wherever I can to boost that traffic.
it all comes down to something I say, and people mock me for. Test things for yourself. when you see what works for you, focus on that.
Thanks for coming by Josh. Getting overwhelmed is the biggest factor I think that stops a lot of people. I try to help people find a way to get past the overwhelming feeling. I know what it is like. I still get that way sometimes myself.