FREE Traffic? The Honest How-To Guide

Siaram

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@ John

Not sure how it would work on a forum. It would depend on the forum itself and the admin panel settings. I would start though at looking into the test option. Maybe you could set up numerous test accounts with different names and have them all forwarded to your email address. If not and yu can't find a way, then you would have to do it the hard way.

Make 10-20 new email addresses all very similar like myforum1, myforum2, myforum3 etc...And then make your 10-20 accounts on your forum and have them all talk and post on the forum looking like real members. Or just go to a bar and make a lot of new friends. lol

Another option is to post hat you need a couple Moderators. People LOVE to be Mods. It makes them feel important giving them some authority. And once you assign a couple they will possibly feel obligated to bring in new members to show off that authority. ;) So in this way you will be helping yourself get free members to help you grow.
 

pvendetta

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You can generally set up forums so that you can have multiple members on the same email address.

And Siaram, nice guide.
 
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NaHoW

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Can't you just make all the addresses forwarding to one account?
 

hamsn

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Very good statements made, and good points covered.
Can use this as a guide.
Thanks
and it was really good!!
 

Soki

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Thanks a bunch! :]

Really set goals for others.

Th internet never runs out of people. :p
 

Siaram

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Thanks everyone for the kind words. I'm glad this little tutorial may help some people.

On that note, I am always looking at new ways to get more members and started to utilize a new source to gain traffic. It's referral/recruitment links.

How it works: Basically, every single member on the site has their own unique ID code embedded in a link. They use this link and place it where ever they want to get new members for you and you reward members for it. For example, in my game, I give players gold when their recruited members reach certain levels. At level 3, you get 300 golds. At level 6 you get 600 golds. When a recruited member reaches level 10, you get 1200 golds and after that you get 1% of ALL gold that a recruited member makes as a bonus.

In this respect, it deters cheating since the good rewards come when they are higher level and at the same time, it is a numbers game. One recruited member doesn't make you rich, but 20-30 of them and you are now a SuperPower making excellent golds everyday so members like it.

It's a form of viral marketing I guess, where both parties benefit. You get new members, and the players get richer and want to spread your link some more to others where ever they can. Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, Meebo, forums and chats....it doesn't matter. It helps you and you reward the productive members for it.

Just for reference, I started using this a few days ago and since then it has brought me 20 members or so. Now that is not a lot really, BUT every one adds up and as I stated before, EVERY member is important. A new member has lots of friends and someone just the other day that I greeted when they joined has already brought about 5-7 friends and a couple of them are now Premium. ;)

Never stop looking at new free ways to get people to visit you. There are great ways to get new members and some haven't even been explored yet. Find them, play with them, create them and get people where they need to be....ON YOUR SITE! :)
 

Siaram

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Another thought about good advertising? If you find a site that is good to advertise or promo your site on, then check that sites partners or affiliates. Often the affiliates will be good also OR will be owned by the same base company which means their partners they list will be good to advertise with also.

For example: You have a site about "vintage clothing" and you find a good site where they allow you to place your clothing site URL/address as well as a brief description of what your site has to offer. So you place a "VOTE for us" button on your site that members can click to help place you higher in the advertising sites list. As more members vote for you, the higher you climb on the ad sites list of vintage clothing and hence the more visitors you can expect daily.

If after a while you find that you get good quality hits from one of these ad sites, then try some of their partners or affiliates also. Birds of a feather stick together. If a site is a scam, then chances are their affiliates will be a scam also. If a site offers good quality hits, then chances are that their partners will be of high quality as well.

This is really good news for you since it is hard enough finding even one good ad site out of the hundreds or even thousands to choose from, so finding a good one with good affiliates is awesome!!!!

And don't be shy with your members. People are LAZY! If you don't ask them to vote for you, then chances are, only a small percentage will. But if you send a message to members asking them politely to take the 10-20 seconds to vote and support you, you will be amazed at how many actually will. ;)

Here is an awesome site I found to place an advertisement for FREE and so far it has given me over 700 hits in just a few short weeks:

http://www.toponlinerpg.com/index.php

Notice how my site is on the FIRST page in 6th position for all to see and I didn't pay a penny to advertise it there. :) The votes are low now as they just reset at the beginning of the month but you get the idea. This site is a goldmine for me!!!! And you can find places like this to advertise your site for free also.
 

TPI007

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Seriously, if you want traffic to your site and don't want to pay or have no money to pay, then you can still generate lots of traffic. Follow my tips and you'll be fine. Ignore them and you can keep posting here forever with desperate pleas to help you achieve what we all ultimately want- More traffic/Visitors/Buyers/Players/Members etc...

Tips:

1) Make the site worthy and user friendly. People are very finicky and if the site doesn't grab them right away in some form, then you're done and your bounce rate is sky high and then Google won't like you and then you will never get a good page ranking. BOUNCE RATE is very important. Look into it!

2) It's a lot of hard work people. At first you must always be putting out your link, asking friends, joining forums, making signatures for your emails, finding free quality places to advertise like Oggix.com etc...There is really know easy road when it's for free.

3) Forums are probably by far the best way I found for quick members. Join every one that is very similar to yours (Hence people have the exact same interest which means targeted visitors to your site) If you don't find an appropriate place to post a thread, then usually the Off topic will do. Bookmark them all so you can go back later and respond. This will keep your ad or promo at the top which means more views.

4) Watch out for negative promotions. Link exchanges and credit systems usually fail because people just click and leave right away without truly visiting your site which in turn hurts your BOUNCE RATE with Google. An example? You join a banner exchange site. They promise that for each link you click, they will send you someone to click back right? What good does that do you if you click 79 links in less than a minute and the people visiting you do the same. USELESS! Forget about it. And who's to say that the people promising credits to your site for advertising theirs are even sending you members at all? Do you even have a traffic monitor program on your site to tell for sure what is going on?

5) Get a Traffic Monitor program so you see where the majority of hits are coming from and focus on those places. Google knows the web and search engines better than anyone so why not go and place Google Analytics on your site. Trust me, it sounds big and complicated but it is really simple and easy. I have almost 900 members to my game in under 2 months since I launched it so I know it helps.

6) Stay away from Traffic promoting sites that offer lots of visitors for money. Most of them just send bots which once again hurt your BOUNCE RATE which in turn kills your page rank. Others send untargetted traffic. What good does it do you if you have a site about hunting and the visitors coming by are interested in comic books???? Exactly, it doesn't!

7) Make the web and other sites work for YOU! Go to Yahoo Answers for example. If your site is about comics then ask a question like "DC or Marvel? Which do you prefer?" and let yahoo send that question for 10,000 people to view. And of course you have the link to your comic site in the post. And when people get to your site, make sure to have the same question as a poll. ;)

8) Be friendly and greet EVERYONE you can personally. I have a generic message I made for my site and an admin option to view all members online. If/when I see a new member is online, I instantly send them a nice greeting message with some tips to my game. Not only does it personalize the game more, but I have had numerous people thank me and within a day or two they have already purchased a premium membership and money is ultimately what we all want.

9) LOOK BUSY! How you ask because you only have 2 or 3 members? Well then MAKE members yourself. Before my game went public I made about 100 bots or non player characters (NPC's) to make the game look like it already had great interest on the day of launch. No one wants to join your site on Macintosh computers if it only has 6 members and the other forums have thousands right? So do what your wife does and fake it! haha

10) Don't be lazy. Stop sitting on you butt watching SouthPark or the new Batman movie and wondering why you still have only 2 new members in a week. Get creative and find your own ways to advertise.

11) Word of mouth. By far one of the greatest ways to get members on any site. How did you suddenly join Facebook or youtube??? Because people started mentioning it to you right? Youtube didn't pull your name out of a hat and say "Yeah, lets email this lucky guy today and see if he'll join" So encourage friends to promote you even if they don't like your site themselves. Honestly, about 20% of my members are from word of mouth. That is about 165 people out of 900 and guess what? Probably about 12-17 of them are premium members which means more money every week for me. ;)

12) Don't reinvent the wheel. A site will only grow if it is somehow unique and different from others. It doesn't matter how. Maybe the color scheme or the layout or functions or whatever. Just make sure to have something different or your membership will goto all the competetors who are busy making lots of money.

13) No mess and Spam and clutter! Don't throw ads everywhere hoping to get rich fast. Your 3 members won't help. Ads are a numbers game. If you have 50,000 members then you may make ok coin, but don't distract or annoy visitors or potential members when starting out. I have ZERO ads on my site because I hate them and they're ugly. I haven't had 1 complaint begging me to add some so apparently nobody misses them.

There are a lot more little tips, but that's it for now and if I helped a few people get a few more members, then it was worth it. Goodluck peeps and get busy! :)

Great tips! By the way, you spelled "no" wrong... you spelled it "know" lol.
 

Siaram

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Ya I caught that after the fact, but since I have no edit option, there is really nothing I can do. :)
 

Siaram

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Well, was just thinking that since this thread has the most views and is quite informative, maybe it could be stickied? Most new posts just relate to "Get more traffic by visiting my site!" Seems kinda lame to me. Anyhow, as you wish. Would be a shame to see a good thread die by way of attrition.
 

datumon

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A very useful and informative guide...
Thanks a lot for the help - I think X10 may already have stat counters for visitors in CPanel anyway, as you suggest in step 5
Get a Traffic Monitor program so you see where the majority of hits are coming from and focus on those places.
Thanks again.
 

ichwar

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yeah, the point on sites that offer to send you visitors but just send bots or untargeted traffic was good. :thefinger
 
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Siaram

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A very useful and informative guide...
Thanks a lot for the help - I think X10 may already have stat counters for visitors in CPanel anyway, as you suggest in step 5
Thanks again.

Yes, we have the CPanel stats, but I also like to have Google Analytics anyhow. Better to have two then one. That way you can compare to make sure the stats you get are accurate or if one is off then you know you have a problem.

@ ichwar - Not sure who those fingers are pointed at. Are they at me because you disagree with my anti-linkshare ideals or at the sites that send you bots?
 

Siaram

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Glad you found it informative. I have some new thoughts, but want to make sure they haven't been posted already before. My internet was down for a bit so...just catching up.
 

spottybutterfly

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Thanks for your guide, its been helpful im me thinking how to get traffic to my friends forum (that im a admin on). We have 1 real member so far, everyone else is just our multiple accounts or friends.
 
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