Internet marketers, we are bombarded with all kinds of techniques to drive traffic. A marketing budget could be spent in any number of ways, and it often becomes difficult to decide which approach will provide the best ROI (return on investment). However, there is a solution, and we can borrow it from the offline advertising world. It's using a combination of the top approaches. This is simple but powerful. Developing an online marketing campaign using numerous techniques can often be the most successful way to increase traffic.

In the world of traditional marketing and advertising, agencies often develop campaigns that involve various methods and media. Let's say a new car dealership has come to town. Their goal is to build awareness to ultimately get people to come into the store. They employ an advertising agency that begins work immediately on writing copy for a local radio station spot. They also create a number of display ads for the local newspapers. Furthermore, they invent a coupon offer that can go in the circular of the Sunday paper. Finally, they may buy a list of names and addresses of people in the region. They would use this list to send out a direct marketing mailer announcing the car dealership's grand opening.

The virtual marketing world is no different. To use some guerrilla marketing imagery, it is often beneficial to attack the objective of building traffic on a number of fronts by choreographing a campaign. Let's take the car dealership again as an example. Say the dealership has a web site, and it is e-commerce enabled. The only difference is that they would be marketing nationally instead of just locally. Now the goal is to get as many people as possible to visit their site, and since they can deliver anywhere, they can target the entire national Internet audience.

First, their site needs to be optimized so they can achieve good rankings in the top search engines. Their home page needs to have all the META tags, a good description tag, and verbiage developed with excellent keyword phrase placement in mind. Then the site needs to be submitted to all the engines and directories and tracked over a period of time. Necessary adjustments would need to be done to maintain the excellent keyword phrase placement.

Second, they may consider doing some strategic link development. Research would need to be done to determine where their Web site link could be placed to build traffic. There are always opportunities for link development specific to each industry. Another benefit of this is that the more links to the site, the higher the site ranks in most search engines.

Third, a company called PostmasterDirect.com offers opt-in email lists. These lists consist of people who choose to be e-mailed about the subjects they sign up for. It is not spam. The dealership could purchase an automotive list and write a compelling e-mail message to bring traffic to their site. The response rate is actually higher than in the offline direct marketing world.

Finally, the dealership could sponsor an industry e-zine or online forum and get its link placed in it. There are all kinds of periodic newsletters that offer rented space to place a company link and description.

There are many other methods the dealership could use as well. By developing an online marketing campaign that utilizes a number of different techniques, you have a better chance for success. It is important to note that all of these methods focus on a very targeted audience, an audience that is already interested in the specific industry or product. But the key is using numerous approaches to reach this target audience. Instead of relying on one or two methods to generate traffic, let's learn from traditional marketing and start developing online marketing campaigns. This approach will help ensure an increase in your traffic and your ROI.

author : Jason O'Connor