"Where's all this traffic coming from?"
By Jim Daniels

Thus far, June 1998 has been one of my most productive months ever. (Who says summer is swoon time for small businesses?) Although my final server stats are not in yet, based on sales increases and new gazette subscribers, bizweb2000.com visitor numbers will approach 100,000 for the first time this month.

Time to take a hard look at why...

As promised, I will do this from time to time and reveal exactly where my web site traffic is coming from.

My faithful readers will then be able to learn what works for me and what doesn't. In turn, you'll be able to copy my most effective methods and spend less time on the stuff that's marginal.

I won't go into deep detail on all the statistics, just the bottom line stuff. I don't want to bore you, I want to get to the "how I'm doing it" as quickly as possible.

As I mentioned, this month has been busy at bizweb2000.com. In the last three weeks over 800 new subscribers have joined the gazette. (Welcome newcomers!) This is nearly double the usual signup rate. These new signups are the best way I get a grip on where the traffic is coming from. Nearly all who subscribe, fill in the form revealing exactly where they learned of us. No server log can do that!

So, here are the results. What's hot and what's not...

Direct email: A few weeks ago we mentioned that we'd had great results with the www.jokeaday.com email list. So, this month we tried a few more. Here are the ezines that yielded the best results:

An oracle humor ezine ad http://www.oraclehumor.com/ brought in about 60 new subscribers and a healthy surge in sales.

Kevin Needham's A.I.M. Ezine produced a landslide of subscribers (over 100!) with their new press release feature. http://www.inetexchange.com/inet-mailer.htm

Oh yeah, while we're on the subject of direct email, I must mention my own zine, the BizWeb Gazette. It's my best direct email tool - I use it every week! Anyone who is serious about doing business online should start their OWN house list and contact it regularly. Need help getting started? Visit: http://www.bizweb2000.com/contact.htm


Article submissions: This month many ezine editors published recent articles I wrote about my cybermarketing experiences. (Thanks Y'all!)

Just last week, an article I submitted to InternetDay was used the very next day and resulted in 80+ new subscribers and a rush of site traffic. http://www.internetday.com

If you are not already writing and submitting articles on your area of expertise, I suggest you start! There are literally 1000's of zines on any topic imaginable. To find ezines related to what you are writing about, visit: http://www.meer.net/~johnl/e-zine-list/keywords/

Consider arranging your articles at your site for ezine editors and webmasters. See my "free content" page at http://bizweb2000.com/articles.htm   for an idea of what works. Ezine publishers always need good copy!


Strategic Links: A steady 25% of my visitors come from strategic links we've gained over the last year. Every webmaster needs a strategy to get links on related sites! Although there are lots of ways to get links, three specific strategies work best for me. You can read about them at: http://bizweb2000.com/linking.htm .


Word of mouth: A steady 15% of all new gazette subscribers and customers I receive tell me that a friend or associate informed them of my site. Even on the internet, word of mouth is a powerful marketing tool. You get these referrals by doing things right. Help as many people as possible and offer lots of free information at your site. Word of mouth referrals will then begin to steadily flow your way.


Heating Up... - Link-O-matic: Based on a recommendation from fellow internet marketer Jim Wilson, who's VirtualPromote Gazette has been a favorite of mine for over a year, I joined Link-O-Matic. This is an innovative way to get links at 400+ sites (NOT search engines). I've only used it once so far and it has already paid for itself. Now I have 15,600 more links to activate whenever I want. I plan to use this every week until I run out of credits.

They also offer an innovative way to earn money. A real professional resource AND opportunity.

For a short time, Link-O-Matic is running a special offer. When you sign up to use the Link-O-Matic service, instead of the usual 10,000 link submissions, you will get 16,000.


*Not Hot* - Newsgroups: I spend less and less time in newsgroups these days. When I do visit them, I see lots of posts recommending my site and my book. What I don't see are subscribers and customers telling me they found me through a newsgroup. Only a handful each month come through this door. I have a strong suspicion that newsgroups are a fading internet marketing resource. Think otherwise?... If newsgroups are working for you, come put in your $.02 at the Cyber Marketing InfoBoard: http://bizweb2000.com/wwwboard/

*Not Hot* - Search Engines: "What's that Jim? Search engines in the "Not Hot" section?" That's right! Although I still receive many subscribers and customers telling me they found me though a search engine, the percentages are down. Is it because I've lost a bit of interest in the search engine ranking battles?... Perhaps. Or perhaps there are more effective cybermarketing methods.

Now don't get me wrong here. I still recommend building web pages with proper meta tags and keyword rich content to give yourself an advantage in the engines. What I do NOT recommend is letting search engine ranking consume you. The fact is, the *hot* items above work FAR better than relying on search engines for all your traffic.


Well, there it is, straight from the horse's mouth. Now that you know where all my traffic is coming from, go get YOUR share!

*Note: Be sure to stop by our page while you're here.
There's lots more help where this came from...