One of my favorites has been said by some not to be effective. The reason for this is that it takes people away from your site. I do not believe this. Although it does direct people away from your site for a time, if you have an effective website with good content, I guarantee these people will come back for more information.

The promotion I am talking about is exchanging links. I consider this to be a very effective way of advertising your website and at same time providing your visitors with resources and information. That is one of purposes of your website, right?

When I see a url in an ezine or email that looks like it might be complimentary to mine, I go check it out. If I like site and find it to be a useful resource and not just a duplicate sales site, then I will email webmaster for a link exchange. Check to see if they have a link page or resource section that would be appropriate for your link. You can also do a search for websites complimentary to your own. Check each site out thoroughly before you email webmaster.

The email to webmaster would go something like this:

******

Hello Webmaster, ( I would use their name which you should find on their site)

If you spend $50 on advertising and it generates more than $50 in net profits, that's a good investment.

Simple right? Well, through use of proper testing and a "scientific" approach to advertising, there's no reason you can't turn your original $50 ad into millions of dollars in profits. It's just a matter of developing a system that creates a profit, and then reinvesting your initial profits back into your business in order to further expand your advertising.

Assume that through proper tracking of your website traffic you're able to determine that 1 out of every 100 visitors to your site buys "Product X". Let's also assume that on sale of every Product X you make a $50 profit. Do you see that any ad you buy which delivers more than 100 visitors to your site per $50 spent is a profitable investment?

Promoting a site should be approached with this type of a scientific or mathematical attitude. Any advertising you do is either profitable or not, and you need to know which it is so you don't waste time and money.

Here's a somewhat simplistic strategy that you could use to get started:

1. Use a combination of free or low-cost strategies to promote your web site, generating initial traffic which will serve as a starting point.

2. Through proper tracking of your site, determine exact "value" of a visitor in terms of dollars and sense. This is absolutely critical.