9 replies to this topic

[000]

Besides SEARCH ENGINES & DIRECTORIES what was the most productive source of VALID traffic for you site...
eg:
printed letters with your URL in trade publications,
review of Website by heavily trafficed site,
radio ads etc...

Edited by Jill, 23 August 2003 - 11:47 PM.

[IAN]

I have a couple reviews in offline newspapers archived online that have done ok- but only for sites with permanant free archives

[deborah2002]

We have a bunch of links, some are okay, some ROCK. Out of the multitudes, we have one in particular that goes on and on about how great we are.....the response from those people is phenomenal!

deb

[toprank]

Getting mentioned in email newsletters has brought us great, quality traffic especially when back issues are saved to the web. I don't mean sponsorships or paid listings either. Just comments on our service from customers.

We also get some decent traffic from belonging to some associations and marketing organizations.

[AussieWebmaster]

Associations are always a good way, any networking situation can be good for traffic.
Writing articles can also act as a good traffic driver especially when they are archived. I have seen stuff from 1996 still sending me traffic.

[toprank]

Actually, now that I revisit this question, it's hands down: word of mouth. There is no substitute for referrals traffic. Problem is, it's much more difficult to track.

[air-dog]

I agree with that toprank,

Word of mouth and cold calling has been my only source of work. I have a full client list nowadays so I no longer bother with the cold calling, It makes me feel 'sooo dirty'

It does work though if you have nerves of steel, a good pitch, patience and, for me, plenty of cigarettes.

The pleasurable feeling you get from word of mouth isn’t that you have just scored a fresh new client it also reassures you that your doing the right thing and clients are happy with your work.

Edited by air-dog, 16 September 2003 - 07:18 AM.

[SearchRank]

I too would have to say word-of-mouth referrals from either clients or partners. I did alot of cold calling, letter writing, faxes, etc. back in 97 and early part of 98 but now we have a large list of clients and a growing list of web design and conventional advertising agencies we partner with.

I have learned that if you provide a quality service to your clients and partners, are easily accessible and quick to respond when you are not and will bend over backwards to remedy any problems, they will tell people about you. It has worked beautifully for us as I cannot remember the last time I had to go out and "look for" a sale.

Referrals from search engines and directories is just icing on the cake!

[seo]

I had been getting great traffic from About.com but as of today
PRIMEDIA Inc. has reached a search
and contextual advertising agreement with Google, includeing a
four-year distribution and revenue sharing agreement for PRIMEDIA's About.com
as well as the sale of its Sprinks unit to Google.

Also, it appears from some news sources that Google will be public in 2004.
Will this affect the quality of their SERPs?

[Cygnus]

I get the best traffic from my affiliate program, and since I pay $50 per funded-application instead of $7.50 per lead like I used to, I'm gauranteed a positive contribution margin...yes it's a smaller piece of the pie for me, but it mitigates the inherent risks of affiliate programs by being more fraud proof.

Cygnus