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What Does it Mean to "Trade" Links?
Trading links simply means that you are going to provide a link for a web site in exchange for them providing a link to your site. What is the purpose of trading links with other companies on the Internet?
The purpose of trading website links is to provide another avenue for your target customers to find you. |
Not all customers will look you up on a search engine or find you by doing a search, but they may go to another site that has a product/service related to your site. That's where they may find you.
For example, if you are selling computer software but not computers, you may want to trade links with a company that sells computers. When that customer visits the site that sells computers, then there's a chance that they will want to buy some software to go with that computer.
Since they've already placed their trust in the company that sold them the computer, they may consider going to the software company that is recommended by that site (which will be you).
Even though that company may know nothing about you or your business, they are, in a sense, referring their customers to you in trust-which is a very powerful promotion tool!
What are the Benefits?
Great benefits!!!! Everybody wins in this situation. You're receiving customers from them, and they're receiving customers from you. Both parties involved benefit. The more sites related to your product/service with which you can trade links, the more traffic.
The more traffic, the more sales. See the power of this one idea? If you have 10 sites linking to your site, it would be like having 10 salespeople out working for you for free - day and night, 24 hours a day!
Tip! Make sure you trade links with websites that match your content or one that is related to your subject matter for best link trade results.
How do I get started?
Below are 5 helpful secrets to trading links...
1) Find Your Target Market
You may have noticed that I often mention target markets. That's because finding your target market is the first step to promoting your Internet business no matter what avenue you're going to use. Once you determine who is going to be buying your product/service, then you can successfully choose sites to trade with you that would enhance your site.
2) Search for Sites that Complement Your Business
These sites should have products or services that are related to your business. Your customer would be interested in this site as much or more than he/she is interested in yours. That should help you decide which sites would be of much benefit to you.
You will not be able trade links with every site, but the ones who respond and trade should be focused on reaching your target customers. This will bring great benefits to you and the online business you're trading with. There are several ways to find Internet business sites which are related to yours.
A) You can do a search on the search engines using keywords that are related to your product or service. (e.g. If your company sells baby products, you may want to use keywords such as baby, babies, baby products, infants, infant products, toddler, baby toy, pampers, cribs, bottles, etc.)
This will allow you to find companies related to your Internet business.
B) Although sending out a personal e-mail to each contact can be effective, it's also very time-consuming! There is a better way - Automate! I use two programs to accomplish this.
First, you'll want to find target sites in the search engines. So, you can use a software program called Supersonic which searches multiple engines by keywords all at once and accumulates the URLs along with e-mail addresses.
Then, another program, Mailloop extracts the URL and e-mail address out of the results and sends your link proposal out to thousands of potential partners all at once. Mailloop not only sends your proposal. It will also personalize each e-mail and insert the URL, person's name or whatever other information you want to include from a database.
This program was actually made to send e-mail newsletters (e-zines) but works really well with Supersonic.
I have used Mailloop for about two years now and don't know how I ever got along without it. It's very affordable and you can get more information about Mailloop by going here.
Tip! Finding your target market is probably one of the most important steps to trading links. Miss this step and the rest of your efforts may be futile.
3) Just Ask!
It's that simple! Write to each company, let them know a little about what your company does, and then ask if they would like to trade links with you. You will be turned down sometimes, but many of the other site owners will be glad and thankful that you contacted them. Remember, it benefits them too!
4) Write Your Own Link and Description
Also, give them an opportunity to do the same. When applicable, always take time to write an attention grabbing headline and a 2-3 sentence description for your site's link. Even though this is free, you still want to get results from your efforts.
5) Build a Separate Page for Your Links
You don't want your customer to come to your site and then click right back out of your site to go to another. The best way to do this is to form a link on your homepage to an "Interesting Business Links" or "Resources" page.
You can let your customers know that these are companies you recommend them to visit. This way, you're following through with your promise without giving your traffic away. Go here for a sample resource page...
I hope that trading links will be a very successful marketing tool for your online business!
Learn more promotion techniques in our new course for online business beginners. Go here for details about the webmasters course ...
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Article written by Candice Pardue, writing service for business websites and owner of Online Success for Internet Business. Go here to learn web design from start to finish. This one's for beginners...
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