For the first Marketing Tips Newsletter of 2002, we have put together a special issue with seven powerful traffic-generating ideas to help you explode your business and profits in the New Year. Here's how you can attract thousands of hot prospective buyers to your site.

Strategy #1 -- Start Your Own Affiliate Program

You have heard me talk about affiliate programs time and time again and I will tell you one more time... if you are serious about doing business on the Internet then you MUST have an affiliate program! Why should you do all of the promotion yourself when you can have a virtual army of salespersons sending traffic to your site day and night?

No matter what you are selling, there are other netrepreneurs who will eagerly promote your product for you on their web sites and in their e-zines in exchange for a "piece of the action." By simply placing a link on their web sites to your sales site, affiliates can earn commissions without any of the "work," such as shipping, help desks, inventory control, and chargebacks, that normally come with operating a business.

To learn more about how you can set up your very own affiliate program, be sure to check out the 50+ pages of killer articles that you'll get when you click here now. Find out why your own affiliate program is going to be one of the hottest, fastest ways to explode your traffic and sales in 2002.

Strategy #2 -- Start Your Own Newsletter

Visitors to your site remain hot prospects, even if they don't buy on the initial visit. They may not have the cash or credit available at the time, might not yet feel confident enough with your company, or any number of other factors.

Stay in touch with all of your visitors and customers with your very own newsletter. A newsletter is one of the most effective, most cost-efficient ways for you to build rapport, announce special offers and keep that profit pipeline filled with a never-ending supply of sales.

If you would like to get some great ideas for quickly growing your opt-in e-mail list, we suggest you click here now to read a special article that shares "Seven Easy-To-Do Action Steps For Attracting Hundreds Of New Subscribers And Growing Your Opt-in E-mail List."

Strategy #3 -- Pay-Per-Click Search Engine Listings

One of the fastest ways to let thousands of potential buyers know you are "open for business" and attract these hot prospects to your site is by purchasing traffic in the pay-per-click search engines. While Overture continues to be the most highly-trafficked pay-per-click search engine, others that you may want to consider purchasing traffic from include:

http://www.findwhat.com
http://www.goclick.com
http://www.payperranking.com
http://www.kanoodle.com
http://adcenter.epilot.com
http://www.searchgalore.com
http://www.search123.com

With the right bidding strategies, you can pull in exactly the type of targeted visitors you want for only a few cents per keyword. To get the maximum traffic from the pay-per-click engines with minimum expense, we recommend that you read:

1. "Increase Your Site Traffic With The Pay-Per-Click Search Engines And Guarantee You Always Profit Using These 3 Simple Formulas" Click here now to read this article...
   
   
2. "Scoop Up Inexpensive & Neglected Traffic Streams In The Pay-Per-Click Search Engines With These 3 Simple Bidding Strategies" Click here now to read this article...

Strategy #4 -- Buy Advertising Dirt Cheap

The weak economy has lowered the price of online advertising to such an extent that you can now purchase a "guaranteed" 250 new visitors for your site for as little as $39... and you can purchase 10,000 targeted hits for $100.

The key points to get the most bang for your advertising buck are to: (1) carefully select where you place your ads; and (2) hone your message specifically to your target Internet community.

Your advertising options include:

1. E-zine Ads -- Contact the e-zine owners who share your market and ask for information about the size of their subscriber base, their advertising rates, the location within their publication where your ad will be published, and formatting requirements such as length.
   
   Also, if you have your own newsletter, consider swapping ads with other publishers. Many netrepreneurs will be open to these shared beneficial arrangements.
   
   When searching for e-zines that serve your potential buyers, you'll find the following resources helpful:
   
   http://ezine-universe.com
   http://www.ezinehub.com
   http://www.newsletteraccess.com
   http://www.zdnet.com/filters/email
   http://gort.ucsd.edu/newjour
   http://www.nwwsubscribe.com/foc36
   
   
2. Banner Advertising -- You can advertise through wholesalers who buy millions of impressions on the major portal sites and then resell these "views of your ad" in smaller allotments.
   
   (Use the free tool we share with you at the end of Strategy #5 to help decide whether or not a particular site is worth purchasing ad space on by learning how much traffic they receive, how many links are pointed into their site, their contact information, and much more.)
   
   
3. Classified Ads -- The best and fastest tool for placing classified advertising is software called Power Submitter. It places your ad in more than 1,000 classified ad databases and on over 100,000-mirrored classified sites in a matter of seconds with the simple touch of a button. Click here now to learn more...

Strategy #5 -- Form Strategic Partnerships

Forming strategic alliances with popular web sites in your field is one traffic generation technique that you cannot afford to ignore. You gain in three ways:

1. Increased rankings in the search engines. As other sites (related to your site's theme) link to your site, the search engines will rank your site higher and move your site closer and closer to the top.
   
   
2. Increased contact with your target market. Since visitors to the other site are likely to be in the same Internet community as your buyers, you will be reaching an audience that is already familiar with the need for your service or product.
   
   
3. Increased credibility... and sales! A recommendation to visit your site from a webmaster they know and trust will go a long way towards establishing your credibility and making visitors more receptive to your offer.

Once you find potential partners, phone or e-mail them to discuss how it would be in their (and their visitors') best interests to link with you. Make sure you are familiar with their site and their newsletter. Don't talk about your plans or ambitions but instead show them "what's in it for them."

If you are wondering which companies you can form alliances with, all you need to do is consider which products and services your customers need both before and after they use your product or service.

For example, let's say you sell wine online. Prior to making their selection, your buyers might want to learn about wines, so you could align yourself with sites that sell books and courses. Your visitors would also be interested in visiting wineries in places like the Napa Valley, so you may be able to swap hyperlinks with travel agencies that specialize in tours to wine growing regions.

Each link you secure could send you new buyers for years to come. That's why it's really worth the effort to do your research and approach one webmaster at a time.

Strategy #6 -- Secure Top-10 Search Engine Listings

The top 23 engines generate 80-90% of search engine traffic, so obviously a top ranking position in these major engines will be a key factor in increasing the traffic to your site.

You have three choices when submitting your web site to these search engines:

1. You can submit your web site to each of the search engines manually, one by one.
2. You can hire a search engine consultant to design a search engine submission campaign for you.
3. You can use special search engine submission software that will submit your site automatically.

Of course, the search engines change their submission rules on a regular basis, and this means that before you decide how you're going to submit your site, you should educate yourself with the following two articles:

• "Learn The 'How To's Of Getting Your Web Site Listed In The Search Engines... And Secure The Top 10 Ranking You Need" Click here now to read this article...
  
  
• "Even More Tips For Getting A Top 10 Search Engine Ranking And The Secret For Keeping Your Competitors From Stealing Your Spot!" Click here now to read this article...

Strategy #7 -- Write Free Articles And eBooks

One of the best ways to introduce yourself and your web site offer to the Internet world is by writing free content for other web sites, e-zines, and newsletters. Writing articles and eBooks will allow you to establish a reputation as an expert in your field, driving more visitors to your site when readers click on the links in your bio and within your written material.

Once you have written your articles, you can offer your words of wisdom to other webmasters at sites such as:

http://list-resources.com
http://www.web-source.net/articles
http://ezinearticles.com
http://www.ideamarketers.com
http://www.mediapeak.com

Final Thoughts:

Don't feel like you need to implement all of these strategies at the same time. Be focused, choose a single idea, really "go for it," and then, once you've maximized your profits using that one particular strategy, move onto the next one. Take advantage of all (or most) of these seven strategies, and you can make 2002 the "Year of The Profits."