Many of my clients have been asking me for free marketing techniques to bring more targeted traffic to their web sites.

There are quite a few methods to spread the word about your web site for free or inexpensively. However, I recommend that you first decide WHO you want to bring to your web site. This will make a big difference on how you apply marketing techniques later on.

Once you have decided who your target market is, you need to use online marketing techniques to drive your target market to your web site.

Here are my favorite online marketing techniques. All three of them are free to use to bring traffic to your web site:

– Article Marketing. Article marketing consists of writing articles that your target market is interested in reading. Once you have created these articles, you need to submit them to article directories.

Every time your article gets published in an article directory, or it gets re-published on other people’s blogs and web sites, it gets published with a link back to your web site. Thus, every single person reading your article can click on the link and visit your web site. This will help you get more web site traffic.

Read articles on Article Marketing: https://www.avocadoconsulting.com/articles/articles.html

– Business Blogging. Blogging is really big now, and this is because lots of people are now either blogging or reading other blogs, or both. Blogs are also popular because you can use them to communicate with current customers and attract new customers to your business.

Start a blog that is of interest to your target market. Post to it often. Make sure that your blog is listed in blog directories and that you optimize your blog posts for search engines.

Read articles on Using A Business Blog To Market Your Business: https://www.avocadoconsulting.com/articles/blog.html

– Search Engine Optimization. A lot of people are using search engines to find what they need. Make sure that each page on your web site is optimized for search engines, so that people who are looking for the information available on your web site can find it.

Read articles on Search Engine Optimization: https://www.avocadoconsulting.com/articles/seo.html

Biana Babinsky

One of the most important things that you can do to make your business successful is to build your list. When you have a large list of potential clients, you are able to sell more products and get more one-on-one clients.

So, how do you start and build your list to get more clients? Here are some of my articles to help you do just that:

– How To Use A Newsletter To Get Clients, an overview for starting and publishing an effective newsletter.

– Two Things You MUST Do To Build Your List, many business owners overlook these two things and are not able to grow the list as much as they would like.

– How To Get More Web Site Visitors To Subscribe To Your Newsletter, turn MORE of your web site visitors into subscribers by using these tips.

– How To Grow Your List, an article on growing your list and getting more subscribers.

Biana Babinsky

About Biana: Biana is the online business expert, who teaches coaches, consultants and other business owners how to build a large newsletter list and use it to get MORE clients. Get her Grow Your List Home Study Course at https://www.avocadoconsulting.com/rlinks/znews for more information on building your list.

Here is a conversation I’ve had with more business owners than I can count:

Business Owner: I created a great new product that I love, it is going to do great! I just need some help with getting the word out about it. Once people hear about it, this product will sell itself!

Me: That’s great, so you surveyed your target market and found out they everyone in your target market needs this product?

Business Owner: Hmmm, I didn’t survey anyone.

Me: Ok, so who is the target market for this product?

Business Owner: Everyone! This is a great product, and everyone needs it!

Me: So if you haven’t done any market research, have you created a marketing plan to promote this product?

Business Owner: Hmmm, no. But I think once I get the word out about this product everyone who hears about it will want to buy it.

…..

I have had these conversations with business owners too many times. The issue is that the business owners are so excited about the products they are creating, that the product creation takes up all of their time.

Marketing is forgotten about, or the business owners think that the product is so great that it will sell itself. The truth is, nothing sells itself. Behind every successful product there is a good marketing plan, good marketing people and lots of marketing and promotion.

So if you want to bring a product to the market and make it into a best-seller, here is what you should do:

– Find a target market for your product. And “everyone” is not a target market. A target market is a group of people who want, need and can afford your product.

– Do market research. It is not enough that you think that your product is going to sell great. Your target market has to want your product if you want to make money with it. Do research and survey your target market to find out if your product is going to sell.

– Spend the time and money on creating your product ONLY if there is market for it. Don’t spend time and money on creating something if you don’t know if it is going to sell. Only bring the product to market if there is enough demand for it.

– Create a marketing plan for the product BEFORE you actually create the actual product. If you want to make money with your product, marketing should be one of the first things you start doing. So create a marketing plan and start promoting your product BEFORE you even have the product for sale.

It is no secret that having more links leading to your web site will increase the traffic to your web site. Having more links will also help you get more traffic from search engines to your web site.

So which links are best at helping you get more search engine traffic? When you exchange links with other web sites, those links will help you if the web sites are quality web sites and if they are in a professional space similar to yours.

For example, if you have a business coach, exchanging links with other coaches is going to be beneficial for your business.

Don’t exchange links with link farms, web sites that only exist for exchanging links and that don’t serve any other purpose.

However, the links that are even more valuable for your search engine rankings, the links that you really want to get are one-way links. A one-way link happens when a web site links to you, but you do not have to link back. One-way links will help you more with search engine rankings.

The best way to get these one-way links to your web site is by writing articles and submitting them to article directories.

When article directories and web site/blog owners reprint your articles, they reprint them with your Resource Box. Your Resource Box contains links to your web site, so every time someone reprints your article, you get more one-way to your web site, which translates into better search engine rankings.

In one of the sections of my FREE report, “How To Get Clients Online”, I talk about how to use articles to get one-way links to your web site. You can get the report FREE at
https://www.avocadoconsulting.com/free_report.html

Biana Babinsky

Since I have been teaching teleclasses for a long time, I get questions on a regular basis on how to get started teaching teleclasses. I love teaching teleclasses – it is very rewarding to teach them and they provide a lot of information and value for my students!

If you are starting out with teaching teleseminars/teleclasses/teleseries or webinars, here are three points that should help you create an effective (and popular!) class:

– Find a topic for your class. The best topics are topics that your target market is interested in learning more about.

– Pick one of the topics your target market wants to learn more about and create an interesting, effective class around this topic. Decide on how long your class will be, what the format of the class is going to be, how much material to include, etc.

– Market the class so that you can get participants for it! I usually recommend creating a marketing plan for promoting your teleseclasses/teleseminars. That way you will have a marketing template every time you want to teach your teleclasses in the future.

Your marketing plan should include different venues for reaching people in the target market and promoting your class to them.

My clients usually have the most trouble with the third action item, promoting the teleseminars/teleclasses and getting more participants for them. Here is how to promote your teleclass to get more participants:

– Publish a newsletter for your target market and use your newsletter to announce your teleclass to your subscribers.

– Some of your target customers visit your web site. Use your web site to announce your teleclass to your web site visitors.

– Are you using social networking web sites? Some of them allow you to post your teleseminars and events for other members to see. Announce your teleclass to these groups and watch your teleseminar attendance increase!

– Use article marketing, search engine optimization and other online marketing techniques to get more newsletter subscribers. Once you have more subscribers, you will have more people to promote your teleclasses to.

It is extremely important to have a clear marketing plan when marketing your teleseminars or any other classes. When you have a marketing plan you will be more successful and you will be able to get many more people to attend your classes.

Learn more about promoting your coaching business in this FREE Tutorial: How To Market Your Coaching Business

When I did an informal survey last year on why many business professionals are still not blogging, many business owners told me that they don’t feel they can find the time to commit to blogging.

One of the responses I heard was: “I don’t think I have another 40 hours/week to dedicate to blogging.”

Truth is, you don’t need to spend 40 hours/week on your blog. You don’t even need 15 hours/week.
If you organize your blogging and if you know what you want to talk about on your blog, blogging should not take that long. Here is how you should organize your blogging:

– Decide on how often you will blog. I blog 2-3 times a week and sometimes even less. You do not have to blog 3-5 times a day for your blog to be successful and bring in clients.

– Create a list of blog topics that you can use. It takes a while to come up with a good blog topic, so if you do not have any topics lined up, your blogging can take time. Instead of searching for
topics when you actually need them, create a running list of topics. Every time you read or hear something that may make a good blog topic, add it to the list.

When you need to actually write a blog post, go through the list and pick a topic you feel like writing about. Having a topic list will save you hours every time you need to write a new post.

– Re-print other people’s articles. If you like an article that someone else wrote, contact them and ask permission to post it on your blog. Posting someone else’s article won’t take very much time at all.

Don’t overdo this, as your blog readers would like to hear from you. But reprinting other people’s articles once in a while will help you build relationships, offer a different perspective to your readership and save time on blogging.

Many times my clients ask me how defining a target market has helped my business grow. I have been working with my target market for a long time. My target market are service professionals – coaches, consultants, virtual assistants and other service professionals. I help them get more web site traffic and more clients online.

Defining a target market has been extremely helpful and profitable for my business. Once I knew exactly who my target market was, it became much easier for me to find my target market online, network with it and bring my target market to my web site.

Here is some advice for you if you are struggling with defining a target market or a niche for your business:

A target market are people who need, want and can afford your products and services. Remember, all three have to hold — they people you want to work with have to need, want and be able to afford what you offer.

I have seen many business owners making a mistake by using two out of three — they find people who need and want, but can’t afford what they have, or they market to people who don’t necessarily want what they offer, even though they need it.

Another consideration I recommend looking into are the people you like to work with. Look at your past clients and see which clients would you like more of.

These are usually the clients who you enjoyed working with, who got results from working with you and who had no problem paying your fee. These are usually the clients you want more of. So start
looking at them — are they a part of a specific group?

Where can you meet more people from this group? How can you market to people from this group? Once you answer these questions, you will have a target market, and some ideas about marketing to it!

Need more help defining your target market? Get my How To Find A Profitable Target Market For Your Business Audio Recording at https://www.marketingsalad.com/niche.html

Biana Babinsky

I just finished reading Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely, a professor at MIT.

Since I tend to read everything from a marketing perspective, it was interesting to see that many of the things he discussed were applicable in business and online business. For example, one of the first examples that he discusses was how different choices for an online subscription will influence buyers’ decisions.

Other discussions that I found interesting were that many people would prefer something that is free (versus something better, but not free), why we are willing to spend a lot of $$ on a cup of coffee, and why paying more money for pain medicine will make you feel better.

A very interesting look into why consumers behave the way they do. Check out the book at Predictably Irrational

Biana Babinsky

I have heard many business owners say: “I want a nice looking web site for my business.”

They find a web designer and the web designer delivers exactly what the business owner asked for – a nice looking web site. The business owner really likes the look and feel of the web site, but after a month or so the business owner notices that nothing is happening with the web site. No one is using the web site to find out about the business and contact the business owner about his products and services.

It seems that when a business owner says: “I want a nice looking web site”, what the business owner really means is “I want a nice looking web site that brings in clients and markets my business”.

Once the business owners realize that their nice looking web site does not deliver clients, many opt to hire another designer for a re-design. I have talked to quite a few business owners, who have had their web sites designed and re-designed many times, all without producing the desired result (services and book/product sales).

The truth is, having a nice looking web site is just not enough to get sales. In addition to having a nice looking web site you need to heavily market it – optimize it for search engines, have a newsletter list, write and publish articles, start a blog and more.

Getting a web site designed is just like getting a brochure made for your business. It is nice to have a brochure, but until your potential customers see it and decide to buy your book, nothing will happen.

Exactly the same is true for a web site. Until you start getting your target customers to come to your web site and stick around long enough to buy your products and services, nothing is going to happen either.

Some web designers may include some marketing into their design package, but many don’t. This means that it is up to you to get your web site marketed. Here is what to do:

– Make sure that you know who your target market is. Your web site should speak to your target market, so your first step is knowing who your web site will be speaking to.

– Design a marketing plan for your web site. Yes, you may not have a web site yet, but knowing how you will market it will help you in the long run.

– Decide what you will need on your web site in order to market it properly. This may include a blog, pages optimized for search engines, articles, etc.

– Now, talk to web site designers and pick the one that will help you not only with design, but with marketing of your web site. It is very important that your designer is aware of your marketing plan, and will be able to implement the web site-related pieces of the plan.

Need help creating a marketing plan for your web site? Join my online business mentoring program to discover how to create a marketing plan for your web site.

Biana Babinsky

About Biana: Biana Babinsky is the online business coach, expert and author who teaches coaches, consultants and other business owners how to get more clients and make more money online. Join her online business mentoring program at https://www.MarketingSalad.com for online business coaching, support and masterminding with other members.

You may have noticed this phenomenon as well. Many years ago it happed to a client of mine. My client joined an online networking group to promote his expertise and get clients. This was a group frequented by his target market, so it was an ideal spot for him to network and promote his expertise and his business.

He jumped right in and was fairly active in this group from the very beginning. He posted messages every other day, answered questions and networked with many members. He really enjoyed talking about his subject matter and it showed through his messages as well. He became seen as an expert almost immediately and he became to reap rewards.

As a result of his actions, he started getting traffic from the group. Every week he would check his web site statistics and tell me that he was getting a nice amount of traffic. The traffic brought him sales as well – he did two consulting projects with people who met him through this group. He sold his e-books and got quite a few people from the group to attend his seminars.

But as more new clients and commitments came his way, he did not have time to participate as much. Some of the things he was doing had to be cut from his schedule, so he decided to cut back on his social networking. He started to participate less and less in the group.

After some time he reported that he was getting much less web site traffic from the group, now that he participated less. Once he stopped participating in the group, he stopped getting any traffic from it.

Things like that happen to business owners all the time. We get busier and stop participating in social networking groups, and stop getting the traffic from them as a result.

But there is a better way! You can continue to receive benefits from a social networking group, such as leads and sales, long after you stopped participating in those groups. To do that, you need to actively promote your newsletter while you are still a member of the group. That way, some of the members of the group will get on your list and you will be able to keep in touch with them long after you leave that group.

I still get sales from people who met me in groups that I haven’t been to in years. And one of my new one-on-one mentoring clients this year is someone I met in a group that was closed down four years ago. This person was on my list for many years, she has been to my teleseminars and now she is working with me one-on-one.

So if you want to keep in touch with people you meet through social networking for a long time, make sure you promote your newsletter! Promote it in your profile, link to it from your signature, post a link to it from your “About” page, etc. The more visible you make your newsletter, the more people will get on your list, and the more people you will be able to keep in touch with even if you stop using some social networking groups.

For more help with getting clients from social networking, join me for the How To Create Social Networking Plan That Gets You Clients Teleseminar at https://www.marketingsalad.com/social-networking.html

Biana Babinsky

About Biana: Biana Babinsky is the online business expert and author who teaches coaches, consultants and other business owners how to use social networking to get clients. Join her for the How To Create Social Networking Plan That Gets You Clients Teleseminar to discover how to use social networking to get newsletter subscribers and clients for your business. You can learn more and register at https://www.marketingsalad.com/social-networking.html