By Richard Zwicky

Back in old days of Internet - in 1993, - there were 284 locations on entire World Wide Web. According to Bill Clinton, only 8 of them ended in .com or .net when he was sworn into office. As of January 1, 2003, there were 171,000,000 domain hosts in use. In 1995, largest search engine database was Altavista, and it had most of Internet categorized. Today Google and FASTsearch own largest databases. Yet neither one of them has even 10% of Internet covered. It's estimated that more than 8,000,000 web pages are added to Internet every day. None of search engines are able to keep up to that pace. So how will your website stand out? How will it acquire traffic it needs to succeed? There are many ways to approach issue of marketing an online business, but for sake of this article, we'll concern ourselves solely with online tools, and ways to expedite success. In that vein, we'll concern ourselves with Pay for Inclusion and Pay for Placement (or Pay per Click) advertising.

Some engines, such as AltaVista, Inktomi, Looksmart and FAST, use a pay for inclusion model. What this means is that to be guaranteed to be found within that specific search engine index, website operator must pay a fee to be listed. It's similar to fee a business pays for a Yellow Pages listing. These fees vary from monthly to annual. Looksmart charges a listing fee, plus a fee of $0.15 per clickthrough.

Engaging a Pay-for-Inclusion service does not come with any placement guarantees. If your website is not properly optimized, but you paid an inclusion fee, it is guaranteed to be indexed and listed somewhere within that search engine. If you want to ensure success with a Pay-for-Inclusion search engine, then your website must still be optimized. Without proper optimization, which includes an analysis from perspective of all factors that search engines look for, a pay for inclusion service will not deliver desired benefits to website operator.

When properly matched with a comprehensive Search Engine Optimization regimen, a Pay for Inclusion program will result in powerful results: Qualified Traffic, Customers, and Relevant Traffic.

Pay per Click advertising is process by which a web site operator can arrange for a website to be placed in a pre-defined position within certain search engines, such as Overture.

Search Engine Placement is always a Pay-Per-Click solution. While advertising websites are only permitted to buy advertising in search queries that are relevant to their content, they are not sorted by relevance but rather purely based on bid value.

Pay per click services allow advertisers to bid for each visitor directed through to their web site, based upon number of clicks ad receives. Pay per Click search engine placement should be realistically viewed for what it is - an online auction. Advertisers bid against each other for a fixed position within a list of search results. The advertiser who bids most is given top spot in list. Each advertiser bids according to their budget, and has to know his or her Return On Investment (ROI) to determine how much money should be spent on acquiring new customers.

Richard Zwicky

Most Internet marketing methods are risky and many will not have any affect on traffic to a web site. Some online marketers will sell you anything from banner impressions, to mass email campaigns (spam), to popup ads. All these marketing tools can work, but they are also extremely risky. Some people I know find pop-ups and spam so annoying that they will never purchase anything from a business that uses them. These plans are probably not best customer acquisition strategies, and more likely they are a total waste of money. So why would anyone bother risking money on marketing strategies that probably will not increase traffic to your website? Why not concentrate on what does work? - The search engines.

Have you ever been contacted by online marketers who promise to deliver a "ton of traffic" to your website" ? I get these emails every day. Here's a quote from one I used to get 10 times a day (until I automatically filtered it to trash):

"Hi I visited www.metamend.com, and noticed that you're not listed on some search engines! I think we can offer you a service which can help you increase traffic and number of visitors to your website.

I would like to introduce you to thispromotioncompany.com. We offer a unique technology that will submit your website to over 300,000 search engines and directories every month.

You'll be surprised by low cost, and by how effective this website promotion method can be.

To find out more about thispromotioncompany and cost for submitting your website to over 300,000 search engines and directories, visit www.thispromotioncompany.com. (...)"

Have you ever received one, and wondered why they were contacting you? First off, how did they find your web site? What search engines are they referring to? If they really could deliver on their promise, then they would have so much repeat, and word of mouth business, that they wouldn't have time to be calling or emailing you. Lastly, how many people actually believe that there are 300,000 search engines?

While it's true you need traffic from search engines, you don't need to use spam techniques to get it. You need real results, and not false hope.

Increase Web Site Traffic,.. Naturally It is true that best way to obtain lots of targeted traffic (customers) is to acquire it based on relevance, via search engines. Various studies show that anywhere from 83% to 92% of first time visitors to a web site find it through search engines. That's an incredible statistic. If you are not acquiring those customers as a result of a relevant query, then they will be disappointed. They may be disappointed with search result, but more likely, they will be disappointed with your web site.

In online world that's your first impression. We all know how important a first impression is. You can never get a bad one back, and a good one will carry you a long way. You have to make sure that search engines are sending you visitors that are looking for your products or services. If your web site matches their interests, they will remember it, and come back, even if they do not make a purchase on that visit. If they find it irrelevant, they may have subconsciously formed a negative opinion of your online business, through no fault of your own.

Search engines provide a continuous stream of targeted visitors to your website, and for most part, it's free of charge. Some engines do charge a listing fee, but most do not. The only thing search engine asks is that each web site operator makes an effort to provide relevant and good information to web surfers for a particular search phrase. If a web site does so, search engines will reward site with increased good quality traffic.