A way to get completely free traffic

Blog Contests

Contests are nothing new in the online world. Many people have been using contests to get free web traffic for years. However, there is a slightly new twist since the blog revolution that has made running a contest much more effective and fun.
The concept is the same. You come up with a prize (or many prizes) that would be appealing to your blog readers. Of course, offering your own product as the prize would be preferable since you can mention it on your blog (so everyone who sees your contest will also see your product link). But, if you don’t have your own product, you can easily ask around and find people who will donate.
Once you have your prizes, the fun starts. You have several options for your contest.

1. If your goal is to get people to interact, ask your readers to post a comment to win.
2. If your goal is to get incoming links to your blog, and, if your readers are bloggers themselves, ask your readers to blog about your contest (on their blogs) and then comment to let you know they did it.
3. If your goal is to get to know your readers, ask them to complete a survey to win.
4. Or a combination of the items above.

Immediately after you post your contest, send a mailing to each of your ezine lists, letting them know about the contest. You’ll want your loyal readers to have the opportunity to win.

Next, contact your circle of influence (your friends) and let them know about your contest. Offer to do a blog post swap. If they’ll blog about your contest, you’ll owe them one the next time they have something they want to spread the word about.

Then, go and submit your contest to all of the contest websites. Yes, there are sites that list contests and free offers. This is obviously more effective in certain niches than in others, but it is free exposure to your contest. (Search google for “submit contest” & “submit sweepstake”.)

If your wheels are turning… you’re probably also thinking of the possibilities of offering your product or service as a prize to a popular blog in your niche and asking them to run the contest. Good thinking. It works both ways! You can also read my previous post how to generate traffic to a blog.

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