In this article you will learn how to create a “traffic plan”, or strategy, to help drive visitors to your web site.

Why create a strategy?

First, remember that traffic is part of the big picture when it comes to TARGETING your market. For this reason, traffic is really the first step to conversion. It won’t matter how good your offer or your sales copy is if your visitors are untargeted.

Second, you need to have a daily plan of action. There are many steps you’ll take each day to move your business forward, and the task of generating targeted traffic is no exception.

Third, a lot the traffic generating techniques you’ll learn about are cumulative in their effects. In other words, you won’t see significant results unless you repeat and build upon these steps.

For example, let’s say you want to use articles for driving traffic. If you submit only one article for publication to the article directories, you’ll get (maybe) 15-20 visitors within the month, and the numbers will drop off as that articles ages.

However, if you submit, say, 10 new articles each month, then your traffic will accumulate from a few visits per month, to hundreds… and pretty soon you’re looking at a thousand or more visitors per year just from article marketing. Make sense?

This is all about using your critical thinking skills to plan ahead, and make focused, deliberate choices.

Sample Traffic Strategy Checklist:

  • Top 3 Free Methods: Article , Groups/Forums, Viral report
  • Top Paid Method: Pay-per-click advertising
  • Approximately 1 month if I can devote at least 8 hours per week
  • Average cost-per-click in my market is 10 pence for roughly 400 visitors per month = 40£/month.
  • 1 hour in the mornings before going to work (5 total). 1-2 hours in the evenings Tuesday-Thursday (3 to 6 total). 2 hours on Sunday afternoons. Grand Total: 10-13 hours per week.
  • Current Total Business Budget: 120£. Web hosting costs : 15£/month. Auto-responder costs: 20£ month. 120£-35£=85£ available for traffic.

There are a couple of things to notice here. First, the above list is pretty good but it is also makes quite a few assumptions. These assumptions may or may not be accurate.

For instance, it assumes that you would already be clear on how long it takes you to write an article, or how long it takes to set up a pay per click campaign. Depending on your past experience and skill level, you would adjust your time estimates.

When you make your list, I want you to think about what you’re good at and what is easy to you, as well as what might give you hard time.

The point of creating a strategy is not simply to list what “sounds good”, but to organize your campaign so that you begin from your strengths, rather than your weaknesses.