Site Promotion is Vital to Success

When you're trying to make a living through an online business, promotion is an life or death proposition. Your first stop should be listing on search directories. Few start up businesses – especially those being run from home part time – have the resources to advertise in traditional print, television or radio media. So how do you get your web site in front of people who are looking for your product or service? The simple most effective way is to make sure your site is listed in the on-line directories. Think of them as the phone book yellow pages of the internet. You’ll have to put in a little effort to find the right directories, but once you find them it’s usually a simple process to get listed.

Start with the big ones like Yahoo, MSN and Google. These are the major players in the search engine business, so you want to make sure you show up there as soon as possible. Then use those same services to do a search for other directories and start adding your site in as many places as you can. Don’t forget the tips outlined in Lesson Four and Lesson Five about relevancy! It won’t do you much good if you’re selling shoes and your site is listed on a directory of magicians.

Being listed in a lot of directories can increase search rankings for your site, but you need to be choosy about where you list your site. Try to find quality directories that are relevant to your own site. Most of the better directories are free, some offer premium placing for a fee or charge for “immediate” listings. Depending on your needs, these services can be a big value to your business. There are also sites that only list for a fee and other services that will provide automatic listings to a network of directories. Some of these are worth the investment, but be sure you know what you’re getting before spending your money.

For more on this topic and other tips on building your online business read this.