So you just built your prize website. You put weeks of work into making the best site possible. Everything is perfect.

So, you wonder, why is nobody coming to my site. The answer is simple: You Must Promote!! Promote everyday and then promote some more.

There are many ways to promote your website that will cost you nothing. Here are some of the best ways that I have found.

*Link Exchanges

Set up a link exchange page and find sites that are complimentary to yours. Email the webmaster and explain why you want a link exchange. Tell them a little about your site and invite them to take a look. Be selective about which sites you put your link on. More often than not, the webmaster will exchange links.

You can also get on some link exchange email lists:

[email protected]

[email protected]

[email protected]

*Message Boards

Get involved in message boards. Don't just post an ad and never come back. Ask questions, answer questions, and get involved with the group. Many people have had alot of success with this method. You can search over 310,000 forums at:

http://www.forumone.com/index.php

*Publish an Ezine

If you are serious about your business you should definitely start an ezine. You want to provide quality information as well as updates and information on your site. This will be one way to gather emails and keep your potential customers coming back. There are many sites that will help you get started with an ezine.

http://www.e-zinez.com/ http://www.web-source.net/web/Ezines/ http://www.zinebook.com/publicz.html http://newslettercoach.com/ http://ezine-tips.com/

*Search Engines

You should manually submit to the top search engines. You should also get listed in the minor engines and any directories you can find on other sites. Get listed in as many places as you can(except possibly FFA pages). I prefer not to place my ad on some of these FFA pages. Here are the top search engines:

Yahoo - http://www.yahoo.com

Alta Vista - http://www.altavista.com/av/content/addurl.htm/

Excite - http://www.excite.com/info/add_url/

Lycos - http://www.lycos.com/addasite.html/

Hotbot - http://www.hotbot.com/addurl.asp/

Infoseek - http://infoseek.go.com/AddUrl?pg=SubmitUrl.html/

Northern Light - http://www.northernlight.com/docs/regurl_help.html/

WebCrawler - http://www.webcrawler.com/info/add_url/

Do not submit to these too often, you could be banned. Every three to four weeks is often enough.

*Announcement Lists

There are hundreds of announcement list where you can announce your website or your ezine or business opportunity. Make sure you follow the rules for submitting your ads to each list. You can find some of these lists at:

http://www.egroups.com http://www.listbot.com http://www.globelists.com http://www.milomail.com

When you have a website or ezine, you have to spend a lot of time promoting. As you promote, you will learn more about the different ways you can do this on the internet. You must keep at it and do not give up when things look bad. It takes time to get your business established online. Doing these things I have listed will help you spread the word!

About the author: Terri Seymour owns and operates MyOwnEzine.com MyOwnEzine.com is a website, ezine and service which provides the resources, tools, guidance and more to help you start, publish and promote your own ezine. You can contact Terri at mailto:[email protected] Subscribe at mailto:[email protected] or visit http://www.myownezine.com for lots more info.