If you agree that traffic is the true currency of the web, then youd want to read this article very carefully

Every web site owner and Internet marketer with a commercial goal understands the true value of the visitor, studying the synergy between traffic and sales.

The problem is, it is all too easy to get caught up in specific traffic generation methods and lose sight of the bigger picture.

Whats this bigger picture you ask?

Your focus should be on creating a total traffic strategy, instead of just concentrating on smaller individual techniques.

This is important as a well-defined strategy allows you to choose the BEST traffic sources for your business goals. Its the smarter and more powerful approach for leveraging on your incoming traffic for skyrocketing profits.

Now setting up a strategy might sound daunting to some, but it really comes down to understanding the difference between SHORT-term traffic and LONG-term traffic.

Most marketers do not even realize there IS a difference between the two, and how this difference can impact your business in more ways than you will imagine.

First let us look at the definitions of these two traffic sources:

1. Short-Term Traffic

Short-term traffic creates a temporary boost in visitors, but there is more to this. You might immediately think of a pay-per-click campaign as an example of short term traffic; but, did you know that certain search engine optimization efforts could also result in a short-lived traffic boost?

The key word here is the word temporary and the question to ask is: temporary relative to what?

A PPC campaign might be temporary relative to your budget. Perhaps you can afford only X number of clicks in your current situation. It may be temporary in that it is not your primary method of traffic generation, but you run campaigns in order to collect leads for your newsletter or test your landing pages.

Likewise, if you have a large budget and have found through testing that PPC visitors convert well for you, then this method becomes a part of your long term strategy.

Here is another example:

Lets say you jumped on the bandwagon and created smart pages or doorway pages before Google wised up and started banning those sites.

If Google failed to blacklist those types of sites, you could have had a source of long-term traffic on your hands.

I bring this up just to make it clear that not all search engine optimization tactics produce long-term traffic. Experts pound us all daily with the notion that SEO is the holy grail of consistent, long-term traffic. It bears noting that this isnt entirely true.

Changes in algorithms can affect your ranking even when you use legitimate optimization tactics. Put another way, SEO is a preferred method, but you MUST stay on top of things, else your efforts will be short lived and so will your traffic.

2. Long-Term Traffic

Long-term traffic consists of repeat visitors and a consistent influx of new visitors.

Understand that repeat visitors come through relationship building and branding. The focus is on communication, compelling content and some form of direct link between the visitor and your site (e.g. by a newsletter subscription, bookmark or viral product containing your link).

For the search engines, new visitors will only reach your site through broad and consistent exposure. This means you should maintain at least first-page positioning on a handful of relevant keywords. Another necessary criteria is a dominance of a reciprocal linking strategy with other relevant sites. You should also learn how to convert new visitors into REPEAT visitors all the time.

As mentioned one way to a constant flow of long term traffic comes from being able to maintain high search engine rankings for relevant keywords, which is not easy. A powerful weapon I would recommend you to immediately use is at http://www.ewenchia.com/stomp.htm

After understanding the difference between these two traffic sources, the question is how do you use this knowledge to maximize your results and ultimately, profits?

The answer lies in identifying your business goals.

Why? Simply because your goals dictates the type of traffic you want to go after.

Here are some real-life examples. Is your goal to:

• Split test sales pages? Then use short term traffic through PPC

• Recruit new subscribers? Use short term traffic through PPC and long term traffic through viral marketing

• Create consistent flows of visitors to an established site for free? Then use long term traffic through search engine optimization, name and brand building, loyalty building within existing subscriber base and an affiliate program.

In summary, short term traffic is mostly directed toward some form of testing or quick list building. It also presents an opportunity to collect important feedback on your site in real time.

Long-term traffic on the other hand builds your customer base, subscriber base and audience over time. It allows you to spot trends through examining months worth of patterns logged in your servers web stats. Your repeat visitors provide a valuable test bed for researching your market and learning how to communicate with them effectively.

The successful marketer uses a blend of both short and long-term traffic and, more importantly, knows the difference between the two so as to create an effective total strategy for website success.

For a deeper understanding of the entire traffic generation game, check out http://www.ewenchia.com/ts.htm and youll be on the way to an avalanche of quality traffic in no time.

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Copyright 2004 Ewen Chia