Lately, people have been quick to shout that Google Plus has mostly inactive users, and I’m here to say, “yeah, so?”. One of these shocking pronouncements came about in August 2011, when Bimeanalytics put out an infographic that swept the tech news and had everyone shouting that 83% of Google Plus users are inactive, or on the flip side, only 17% are active. Bimeanalytics later withdrew this stat from their infographic, mentioning that it might not be accurate enough. Still, it wouldn’t surprise me to think it is accurate. Or at least as accurate as these things ever are. But I still say, “Yeah, so?”

In any case, every time someone releases stats about some social network, in regards to active users, there’s a great hubbub about it. I think everyone reading about these stats needs to do two things:

Take the numbers with a mountain of salt. Most of the stats presented will be guesstimations at best, and possibly so far wrong, that it’s simply a load of [place your favorite "load of x" word here].

Remember that a low instance of active users is the norm for any social group – online or offline – past or present. People join things, and then fail to participate. It happens. Raise your hand if you know anyone who has joined a gym, only to stop going soon afterwards. If you want some stats to visualize this real-world group activity, various reports over the years have declared that 40% of people who join health clubs stop going soon afterwards, with 90% stopping within the first 90 days.

People Are Lazy

Pick any activity online or off that requires any effort at all, and you’ll probably find a statistic that claims a large percentage of participants are really inactive.

People tend to jump on things they think they might enjoy doing, and then quickly fall back into their previous routine. Face it. People are lazy and most people may be comfortable following or lurking but rarely lead or even participate in the smallest of ways – in anything.

Historically Speaking

So before you condemn Google Plus or any other social network that may be involved in the “Stat of The Day”, keep in mind that the same kinds of things have been shouted about every other social network – even those that are popular. Let’s take a quick look through the short history of Twitter, just to lay the foundation.

• In the summer of 2009, Hubspot reported (pdf) that about 55% of 4.5 million Twitter accounts had NEVER TWEETED, and nearly 53% had NO followers.
• In January of 2010, Marketing Pilgrim informed us that according to a study put out by RJMetrics, the percentage of active Twitter users was 17%. (There’s that 17% number again – just like the one recently thrown around about Google Plus).
• Just two months later, in March of 2010, Mashable reported that a study by Barracuda Labs showed that only 21% of Twitter users were active and 34% had never tweeted even once.
• That same month, Business Insider reported that of 175 million accounts in February 2011, 56 million Twitter users followed no one, and 90 million had 0 followers.
• Skip ahead to August of 2011, and an infographic reveals just 5% of Twitter users create 75% of the content but 52% of Twitter users update their status every day, so the active users have seemingly risen to more than 52% – possibly much more.

We could probably all find many of these same types of stats on nearly any popular or once-popular social group, but I think this is enough to make my point.

Stop jumping on every hyped-up stat that someone throws out about how many active users Social Network X has or Social Network Y doesn’t have. The shocking numbers are probably just more of the same load of [place your favorite "load of x" word here] that you’ve seen umpteen times before.

Yes, Social Network X has mostly inactive users. So does Social Network Y, Local Community Group Z, and School Groups 1, 2, and 3. All the noise about this news is not news. It’s just noise.

Stats That Matter

1. What stats should you really be concerned with? Your own.
2. Which social networks make the most difference to you as an individual, and which makes the most difference to you as a solo or small business owner?
3. Where are the conversations taking place about your niche or product?
4. Monitor your stats. Set up search alerts to inform you of brand or niche mentions so you know which social networks have the most active users that you specifically care about.
5. Then realize that even the non-active users might still be influenced by your participation there, either directly or indirectly, so be active where it makes sense for you personally, and ignore all the rest of the noise.

When you’re done with that, go lurk somewhere. You know you want to!

Yes, I realize the title of this post is a tad bit misleading, but it was designed to be that way to make a point. Oh hey, be sure to connect with me on Google Plus, Twitter, and Facebook. There’s a good chance I’m an active user at one, some, or all of them, at one time or another. Maybe even 17% or 83% of the time.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2011. | Permalink | 49 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Google Plus, social networks, stats, Twitter
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

In the beginning…when blogging and social networks such as Twitter and Facebook first became a part of our lives, it felt like this:

And Then We Caught The Need For Speed

I think it’s obvious to everyone that it’s getting harder and harder to keep up with everything these days. We are able to see it all streaming past us, and we recognize that much of it is forgotten within a second because something else is flying past us, looking to catch our attention. It now feels like this:

Personally, I’m finding this difficult for two reasons:

1. I can’t stay focused as well as I used to be able to do.
2. I can’t get YOUR attention as well as I used to be able to do.

Now, that second point will come off as just another marketing person whining about being unable to capture attention – and that’s ok – because that’s what it is! However, I strongly suspect that I’m not alone in this. I believe it’s becoming more and more difficult – verging on impossible – to capture the attention of the audience that anyone in business might be trying to reach.

Your Turn To Speak

What do you think? I’m keeping this post short because I want to hear your thoughts. I’d love to see this post become a real conversation, rather than me spouting off and you simply absorbing it – or more likely – forgetting you read this 2 seconds from now. Of course, that in itself would speak volumes, right? LOL. Anyway, I open this up to you – and your ideas – on ways to deal with the ever-increasing stream that we all find ourselves in. Your turn…comment below.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 17 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Facebook, Marketing, social media, social networks, Twitter
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

The process reminds me of a post I wrote a while back entitled, Big Signs Can Send Big Confusing Messages. In that post, the large size of the sign’s message didn’t help clarify its meaning to me. Keep in mind that just because you’ve shouted your message loudly, doesn’t mean that everyone understands it. In this case, it really isn’t the size that matters.

Find the clarity of meaning in your message first. Once the message is clear, focus on the best way to share it.

Here are some more wise words from ’round the web that help expand upon this topic. The first link points to a great infographic that focuses on sharing the message, and really must be seen to get the full depth of it. The second hones in on the “how-to” of making sure your message is clear.

The Science of Word of Mouth

Communicate clear and shareable message

>> Follow Dave McClure

What Is Your Marketing Message?

To be effective, your message must get the attention of your clients by telling them how you can solve their problem. If you focus on what they will get as the result of doing business with you – your message will be memorable and useful.

>> Follow Michelle Neujahr

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Dave McClure, marketing message, Michelle Neujahr, social networks
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

Then I changed my mind. Instead, I’m going to ask you this:

Do you even HAVE a “field” in which you might like to be considered an expert?

Before you can be an expert at something, you need to know what that something is. So the first step is to determine what field you’d like to be involved with. I especially want to emphasize the broad generic word “field”, rather than a narrow, specific title.

You see, the average person is perfectly capable of becoming an expert merely by engulfing themselves in the subject matter.

There are some limitations to this, however. For example, let’s say you decide to answer the above question too narrowly. You might say, for instance, that you want to be an expert saxophonist. There’s nothing wrong with having that as a goal, unless of course you have no musical talent whatsoever. Talent does play a part in our decision process. That doesn’t mean however, that you can’t extend the concept from a narrow one (saxophonist) to a broader one. What if you became the leading authority on the lives of the most talented saxophonists of all time? Or what if you were known as the expert in tracking the still unknown, but extremely talented saxophone artists of our time?

That’s the kind of thing I’d like to challenge you to think about. So many people have interests, but believe that they cannot pursue an education or a career within that interest, because their talents don’t extend far enough. I say baloney.

1. Consider the broad topics that interest you.
2. Determine your ability to become an expert of some part of that topic. Don’t limit yourself to the obvious aspects of the topic. Think as broadly as necessary – or as outside of the box as you can – to find a portion of the entire “field” in which you can contribute.
3. Once you’ve determined what your “field of expertise” will be, simply learn it.

Don’t run away screaming! Learning it is probably a lot less difficult than you imagine. The Internet gives each of us vast resources to pull from. You can get a free education from MIT, Berkeley, John Hopkins, Stanford, or any number of amazing universities around the world if you’d like. A formal atmosphere such a a university course may not be what’s needed at all, however. You may just need to immerse yourself in the many blogs, podcasts, videos, or articles that abound on the web. Whatever paths you take, if you spend an hour per day reading about the topic, you’ll be amazed at how much you learn. Once you’re sure that you really want to become the expert, then just immerse yourself in the topic. Participate in social networks or forums. Find mentors. Communicate with those who are involved. Become a part of the field.

Sure it will take some time. It won’t be instant. But think about this: Two years from now, you may wake up to see your name in an important journal or site that proclaims you to be the expert in the field of [you fill in the blank]. How cool would that be?

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: expert saxophonist, John Hopkins, MIT, saxophonist, social networks, Stanford
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

Anyone can slap up a web page that says, “I am an expert in …”, but saying it doesn’t make it so. And even if it is the truth, the mere fact of stating it won’t make others believe it. Belief is the key component of credibility. Let’s take a look at the definition of credible:

1. capable of being believed; believable: a credible statement.
2. worthy of belief or confidence; trustworthy: a credible witness.

Your assertion that you are an expert or authority in a subject matter should be believable. You can establish much of this trustworthiness by sharing your knowledge on your site. The articles you write on your web site should back up your statement that you are expert in your field. The very act of conveying your knowledge through informative articles, tutorials, and FAQs is often enough to convince others that you are indeed an expert.

In addition to conveying your knowledge, you should be prepared to back up the assertions that you make in the articles you write. Your expertise is deemed more credible when you show proof of what you state. Don’t hesitate to link out to other sites or other experts that help demonstrate that proof. Even something as simple as a link to the definition of a word (as shown above, when I referenced the definition of the word ‘credible’) can help make your case.

In some situations, however, even sharing your knowledge extensively, and backing it up with reference links, isn’t enough to establish your credibility. You may need to have others agree that you are credble. If you are a relative newcomer to the field (and newcomer doesn’t imply that you aren’t an expert), your name may not be well-known amongst the other experts in the field. If they don’t know you, they aren’t likely to acknowledge you publicly as an expert. However, if one expert acknowledges you, your credibility achieves a tremendous boost, so one of your goals should center around establishing name recognition within that circle of expertise, and then to become recognized as a peer of those experts.

Some ideas for achieving that goal include:

• Find the communities in which the experts hang out and hang out there as well
• Participate in discussions with the experts
• Don’t always be a yes-man. Debate the experts, but do so without coming across as a troll or adversary.
• Give the experts knowledge they didn’t already have.

Even the most expert of experts is missing knowledge. Perhaps you’ve run some tests or ran a poll that generated some interesting statistics about either your topic, or the people who are interested in your topic. There’s a good chance that other experts in the field did not run similar tests, and would likely be interested in the statistics you’ve gathered. Or perhaps there is a standard, tried-and-true way of doing something in your field, but you’ve found an alternative way of doing it that has some additional benefits of doing it that way. Sharing that information with other experts, as long as it isn’t detrimental to your business, is another way of being recognized with the community as a member of the “experts class”.

Obviously, you don’t want to give away all your secrets to other experts. Your business may rely upon keeping some of your knowledge to yourself. But there is much that can be mutually gained by leaders sharing knowledge with leaders.

Once you’ve achieved the goal of being recognized by other leaders in the field as someone with expertise as well, you can use that to help establish your credibility within your own site. Reference remarks made by other leaders about yourself. Link to pages on other sites in which you’ve held an intelligent, interesting debate with another expert. Include quotes from recognized authorities that mention you in a positive way. These types of references should also be included in your online press kit as well.

In short, you can establish credibility as an expert by:

1. conveying your knowledge through informative articles, tutorials, and FAQs
2. backing up your knowledge with proof, including links to outside references
3. becoming a peer of other topic authorities, and then referencing that relationship on site

Establishing credibility should be a constant theme running throughout your presence as an online entrepreneur. Whether adding content to your site, participating in social networks, or interacting with users and clients, you should strive to maintain your status as an expert by proving yourself credible.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2008. | Permalink | 11 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: credibility, online entrepreneur, online press kit, social networks
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

Let’s say you are an expert in mountain biking. No, you didn’t take courses in biking, and you never owned a bicycle factory. You simply have been an avid mountain biker over the last 10 years, and that experience has led you to an understanding of the sport that enables you to be considered an expert. You know much about great trails, bike safety, which bikes are best under which conditions, etc. You get questioned often about the topic, as young enthusiasts want your advice.

Now, you decide you want to spread your knowledge worldwide, so you set up a web site to do so. You’ve done your homework, you’ve made the site search engine friendly, you’ve obtained some nice backlinks to the site, and you’ve begun to see some traffic trickling in. You’ve decided that what you really need is to be recognized as an expert, so you tackle the following tasks:

• The “be everywhere” task, in which you participate in as many relevant online mountain biking communities as possible. During this task, you strive to be as helpful as possible, answering questions freely, and being generous with your time in giving advice and tips.
• The “get published” task, in which you write articles for syndication, write guest posts on outdoor enthusiasts blogs, blog frequently on your own blog, and even get published in a few offline publications, such as local newspapers and magazines.
• The “have your voice heard” task, in which you become a guest on podcast stations, and eventually even do guest spots at your local radio station.
• The “have your face seen” task, in which your head shot is your avatar, and that avatar becomes associated with your name in all the places you visit.

After a few months, you realize that you’ve got a pretty solid base of “proof” that you are indeed an expert in mountain biking. You’ve built up a nice collection of articles, blog posts, podcast interviews, etc. that all point to you as being an authority in the topic. The only people who haven’t yet heard of you are the ones you want recognition from the most – the Influencers.

The Influencers are the A-list bloggers, the well-known journalists, and the highly respected publications that reach the masses. If even one Influencer claims you are one of the world’s foremost mountain biking authorities, you can rest assured that it won’t be long before EVERYONE thinks that of you. At that point, every journalist and blogger who has a story about mountain biking will be wanting your comments, your opinions, and your quotes for their stories. And each of those influencers will likely call you an expert, or an authority, or a guru as well. But what if you haven’t been able to get that one Influencer to get the ball rolling? What do you do?

Get their attention (which doesn’t translate into becoming a pest, btw). You can make contact with them, offering your assistance to them in some way. (By giving of yourself to them, rather than asking something OF them, you become an asset and not a liability). You should be doing this whenever it makes sense to do so (again, always keeping in mind that you do NOT want to be a pest or a stalker). There are probably hundreds of influencers you can contact, so you don’t need to make a pest of yourself with any particular one. Make sure that a link to your site or blog is always in your email correspondence with these Influencers. They are curious just like you and I. At least a few of them will certainly click your link just to find out more about you. Simple curiosity can bring you right smack onto their radar. If your correspondence was helpful to them in any way, rather than asking something from them, there’s a very good chance that they will be drawn towards wanting to know more about you.

While you are attempting to get someone’s attention, you should be creating a path that leads straight to you. You see, when a journalist has a story to write about mountain biking, he will probably do the same thing you or I would do if we needed information about a topic we were not already knowledgeable about. We would google it. That journalist might even go so far as to search for “mountain biking expert”, or “mountain biking authority” or “mountain biking guru”. What if your name showed up in the top 10 search results for any of those phrases? How much would you bet that journalist would be trying to find a way to contact you to get your thoughts on his story angle?

You see, you can begin working towards being recognized as a guru in the search results long before the Influencers recognize it. Did your cousin win the local bike rally after you gave him a few pointers? How many social networks does your cousin spend his time in every day? What if he were to link to your site in each of those communities, using “Mountain Biking Guru” as the link text? Did you help your boss decide which bike to buy for his kid for Christmas? Could you persuade your boss to have his kid mention your name when he blogs about how cool his new bike is … using “Dave is an expert in mountain biking” as the link text perhaps? See where I’m going with this? In many areas, it wouldn’t take much to turn a few links into a top 10 ranking for “your specialty guru”.

Now, whether you’ve managed to get the attention of an Influencer or not, you’ll at least get their attention when they google for the experts in your field.

Let’s sum this up:

1. Recognize that you are an expert in whatever you are an expert in.
2. Spread your expertise far and wide using the various tasks described above.
3. Attempt to get the attention of an Influencer (without making a pest out of yourself).
4. Work towards a top 10 ranking for “your topic guru”, “your topic expert”, or “your topic authority”.

We’ve almost come to the final chapter in our journey towards positioning ourselves as authorities within in our niches. There is one final step that you should take, and we’ll cover that next time. Until then, make a list of the top 20 Influencers in your field and begin your journey to Guru-ness.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2008. | Permalink | 3 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: authority, Christmas, expert, guru, journalist, online mountain biking communities, search engine, search results, site search engine, social networks
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

My days and nights have become one long string of never-ending distractions. I end up doing so many things in one day, that nothing ever REALLY gets done. Projects started don’t get finished. Excellent ideas get pushed aside to make way for the distraction of the moment. I look around me and see a great plan that isn’t being carried out. That’s my fault. And that’s all going to change, starting today.

First things first. My new assistant brain, Sandy, has been given my new schedule, with instructions to send reminders of each task I must tackle, at the time I need to tackle it. (I spent several hours today creating this schedule, determining what needed to be done, creating a slot of time for each task, and determining how often it needed to be done. Some are daily, some weekly, etc).

Keep in mind that:

Creating a schedule is one part of the solution.

Having someone (Sandy) keep me on schedule is another part of the solution.

But the glue that holds this solution together is going to be the unplugging of the distractions.

During set hours of each day, I will unplug from the world. No IM. No Twitter. No forums. No email. No phones. No distractions of any kind, with the exceptions of true emergencies (i.e. somebody better need me to take them to the emergency room).

For several hours each and every day, I will focus solely on whatever task Sandy has reminded me of. Nothing else. No one else. Just That One Task. Get.It.Done.

Several hours will be devoted to times when I can be distracted. Communication will be turned back on. I’ll visit forums. I’ll participate in social networks. I’ll tweet, message, email, and phone. But when Sandy says it’s time to turn it all off…the switches will be flipped, and the time for uber-focusing will begin.

I’ve got a big master-plan brewing for 2008, and I’ll be darned if I’m going to let distractions get in the way. I decided to share this in case you needed to take a look at your own juggling act.

Are you doing so many things, that you aren’t doing anything?

If so, take some time to reconsider the juggling act you’ve got going on. It might be time to make a change.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2008. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: assistant, social networks, Twitter
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

One of the things that happens once you start participating in a few social networks is that you start to form what I call Friendship Pockets. As you befriend people on each network, you see that you have lots of overlap. The same friends you have on one network may also show up as friends on another. The best way to illustrate this is with some sort of graphic, so I’ve quickly made one (below). I’ve only used 3 circles, but of course many more could be added.

A one-person icon represents people who are only friends with you in one network, two-person icons represent friends who exist in two networks, and three-person icons are in all three networks.

So who cares about these friendship pockets anyway? Well, I think they do matter, because the pockets represent your strongest networks. Those people who befriend you in several overlapping networks are generally the ones who you can depend upon the most. These are the ones you can rely on to help you share your sites with others, the ones who will come to your aid when needed, and the ones who will reciprocate when you help them out.

If you don’t already know these friends well, make an effort to get to know them better. You obviously all share some common traits, and together you can grow each others’ businesses faster than you can alone. The tighter your friendship pockets become, the more strength they collectively have. Take a little time to develop these pockets further and your site will only benefit.

(Note: This is no way means you should be spamming the friends in your networks. It’s all give and take. Don’t be just a taker.)

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2008. | Permalink | 24 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: few social networks, friendship pockets, pockets further and your site, social networks, strongest networks, Twitter
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

Online success will almost always be more easily achieved if you master the art of the explanation. Whether you are selling information or selling toothpicks online, explanations are very often a necessary part of the informational flow. If you can help someone understand something, in simple, clear terms, without making that person feel demeaned, you will have gained a happy reader, user, or client. You will have established your authority of the subject and proven that you care enough about others to share your knowledge with them. In return, you will gain a loyal following, and very likely, increased income.

So, what is the art of the explanation? Explanations need to be easy to understand, clear and precise. Although I highly recommend using pictures when appropriate, I suggest you practice the art of explaining by only using words at first. This will force to you learn how to vividly describe a process so that the reader can “see” it, even without pictures.

My challenge to you is to practice the art of explaining by describing the process of something you’ve done recently in as clear and simple a manner as you can. If you are explaining the process of changing the oil in your car, list the tools needed and the steps required to go from start to finish. Try to imagine someone who knows nothing about the workings of a car is reading your explanation. Will they get it? Could they take your instructions and successfully change the oil?

Test it and see. Give your explanation to a few different people. Ask them if they understand it. Find out what is confusing to them. Use that information to make the explanation even simpler and more understandable. This process of taking just one activity, breaking it down into clear, simple steps, and then refining it from user input will go a long way in teaching you the art of the explanation.

Take the knowledge you gain from this exercise, and apply it to some process related to your site’s topic. Sell kitchen faucets? Explain how to replace an old faucet with one of your new hi-tech ones. Blog about horses? Explain how to muck a stall or groom a horse. (Hopefully, I used appropriate terminology there. I know nothing about horses. Care to explain it to me? )

Once you have content that clearly explains a concept or activity on your site, there is a very good chance that you can easily gain traffic to that content. Let interested people know about the explanations you provide via social networks, forums, etc., and you could quickly find your site gaining traffic, links, and search engine rankings. But it all starts with great content, and in the case of the “how-to”, the art of the explanation. Get that right, and everything else follows.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2008. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: explanation, how-to, oil, Online success, search engine, search engine rankings, social networks, tutorial
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.

1. Organic search engine traffic – This is the granddaddy of all traffic. Visitors who arrive at your site from a search they’ve conducted are extremely targeted. This is what SEOs live for – high search engine rankings for popular phrases related to your niche. Bonus points if the great rankings are on Google, as that sends far more traffic than others. Don’t make the mistake of concentrating solely on search engine traffic however. If you lose your rankings, and you have no other sources of traffic, your site’s traffic will be devastated.
2. Sponsored search engine traffic (PPC) – Second best is the traffic obtained from visitors clicking on sponsored listings from those same search engines. Essentially, you get all the same benefits as above, but there’s one difference. You have to pay for this traffic. The major search engines have made it a bit more complicated to play the PPC (pay per click) game. No longer is it as simple as “the biggest spenders get the top listings”. You can be very successful with this method, and the fact that you have more control over placement is a big draw. Keep in mind, however, that without experience, you may end up spending a bundle of cash on PPC systems such as Google’s Adwords without reaping any profits.
3. Referrals from other sites – This could come in several forms. Other sites may simply link to you because they like your site, or you may have chosen to purchase advertising (either as a link or a banner ad) on others’ sites. Either way, if a highly-trafficked sites in your niche recommend your site, there’s a good chance that you’ll receive nicely targeted traffic from those sites.
4. Participation in forums/communities – If you participate in forums and communities related to your niche, you can build up an element of trust. That trust helps send others community participants to your site via any links that you’ve listed in your signatures or profile pages. This may not send large quantities of traffic, but it will probably be traffic that has a strong bond with you. Those visitors may then go on to either link to your site or recommend your site in other ways.
5. Guest blogging – Like the community participation above, guest blogging helps build up others’ trust in you, and your name becomes well known. This in turn builds up your personal brand, and you become more recognizable. At some point, people will know who you are, and that almost always translates into more site traffic. Obviously, you should be creating quality posts on others’ blogs if you hope to succeed with this method of traffic generation and increase blog traffic.
6. Social networking – Traffic from social networks such as Digg and Stumbleupon, or social bookmarking sites such as Delicious, or popular video sites such as Youtube, can be huge. However, the traffic comes in spikes, usually only lasts for a few hours or at most a few days, and the visitors rarely stick around. These visitors may not be very targeted, or they may just not be all that interested in what you have to offer. Nevertheless, you may get some much-needed attention (buzz) or a few nice links, so social networking traffic is worth getting. It’s just not worth as much as the factors mentioned above, in my opinion.
7. Article marketing / Directory submissions – Submitting your site to directories or writing articles that will be syndicated via article marketing sites are both useful for obtaining a few links to your sites, and perhaps a handful of visitors. You won’t see much direct traffic from these sources, so put this a bit lower on your list of things to do. It’s not a bad idea, and it can be useful for link building purposes, but it’s just not highly useful.
8. Purchasing traffic packages and traffic exchange programs – In general, you should avoid these, and I only include this in the list so that I can warn you about them. If you are tempted to “buy millions of visitors for only $99″ or whatever the offer is, ask yourself if you enjoy throwing money away. These types of programs may or may not send you traffic, but the traffic they do send will likely either be fake or it will consist of visitors who have absolutely no interest whatsoever in your site. You will be wasting money. Likewise, traffic exchange packages usually consist of webmasters visiting each others sites, just to obtain more traffic for their own sites. Again, they aren’t interested in your site at all. They only want to increase their own traffic, which won’t be useful traffic for them either.

I’m sure there are other traffic sources, but those are the ones that I receive the most traffic from. If you know of any other great sources, please share in the comments below.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2007. | Permalink | 26 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: article marketing, directory submissions, forums, Google, guest blogging, high search engine rankings, Organic search engine traffic, search engine, search engine traffic, search engines, SEOs, social networking, social networking traffic, social networks, sources of site traffic, traffic exchange, Youtube
This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this in your news aggregator/reader or on DazzlinDonna, then the site you are looking at is probably infringing upon my copyright.