What if You Built a Website and Nobody Came?

Is Your Website Popular?

So you built a website, and you thought that would be enough to reap the benefits of millions of online internet users. The problem is, when you do a search on the major search engines for your products or services, you find that it returns thousands of searches. Sometimes when you even search for your company or personal name, you find that other websites or directory entries are displayed over yours.

You may not get any visitors. You may get a few visitors every day. Or you may even get dozens or hundreds of visitors, but know you could get more. So how can you make your website more popular without spending a lot more money?

Major Search Engines

The major search engines, like Yahoo!, Google, and MSN, account for the lion's share of internet traffic. When most internet users get online to find a product or service, they often start by making keyword searches in these large search engines. There are also smaller search engines.

You probably know that most searchers only look at the first page of search engine results. In fact, many people only look at the first two or three entries. If your website is buried on the third or thirtieth page, it might as well not be there at all. You need to figure out what your target market would look for, and you need to take steps to move yourself up in the search engines.

If you sell "big red widgets", and you enter that search in one of the large search engines, do yo see your website entry on the first page? If you are located in Houston, for instance, do you see your website when you ask for "Houston big red widgets"? That is your goal when you try to get found in the natural or organic search listings. By natural or organic searches, we mean listings that do not not pay for placement.

The search engines do look at your pages, and they figure out what they are about. Those would be onsite factors. But beyond those, they also look at offsite factors. If they find several similar websites, they will also look at the popularity of those sites. To do this, they look at the number of quality links back those websites have from other quality websites (backlinks). Is anybody linking to you?

Related Websites, Social Bookmarking, Business Directories and Forums

You can also gain more visitors by mentioning your website in other online websites that attract the sort of visitors who might want to do business with you.

Social Networking - You have probably heard of Twitter and Facebook. These are exampes of popular social networking websites. Your own social network is probably interested in what you have to promote. If you do not have a network, it is time to build one.

Related Forums - There are thousands of popular forums, and some are related to your niche. Join and make yourself a respected member of the forum. Most will allow you to place a link to your website in a signature line. You may even be able to put a link in your posts if it is related to the topic. Follow the forum rules, and don't just start spamming. You should be able to build website traffic this way.

Business Directories - You can find directories that list companies in your market niche, or in your geographic areas. Niche and local business directories can help you build traffic, and they can provide links that will make your website look more popular in the eyes of search engines.

Related Websites - Say you sell big red widgets. Maybe you can get the guy who only sells small blue widgets to link to you from his website. You will gain a link from a related website.

Offline Website Promotion

You do not have to confine your website promotion to online methods either. You can also use your print media to promote your website. Think of your site as a super-duper business card that customers can look at 24/7. You could print your website URL on your business cards, stationary, and other offline promotion. Some businesses give out fridge magnets or pens with a website name printed on them.

Did You Build a Website But Nobody Came?

If so, it is time to start promoting it. You will not get much value out of your investment if nobody ever visits it. However, if you do capture a steady stream of visitors, you will probably be rewarded for your efforts.