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There is only one thing that will turn your web site into an income generator, and that is traffic. Even if you have the most beautiful, sophisticated site on earth, if no one is visiting, you won't make sales or commissions.

We've all heard the adage that it takes money to make money. In the world of the Internet, you do not necessarily have to spend a lot of money to generate traffic. There are a number of ways to generate low cost web site traffic without having to spend what you are unable to afford. Many people have spent a lot of money on advertising and have regretted it later.

There are many ways to attract traffic, but here are five simple techniques to generate low cost and/or free web site traffic that could help you start earning something from your site. Even if you only get a small percentage of paying visitors compared with your overall traffic, that small percentage can pay off healthy dividends to you if you have a high volume of web site traffic.

Link Exchanges May Work With Quality Sites

Link exchanges are a proven way to generate traffic so long as you are receiving strong links from reputable web sites. It is unusual to see a popular web site that has no links coming in or no links going out. Many webmasters are willing to exchange links with one another so that they could produce more public awareness about their sites. If done right, you will see a boost in traffic from other sites. The thing about link exchanges is that you don't want to deal with sites featuring a huge conglomeration of links that have no theme to them. For instance, if you have a site about organic gardening, you don't want to exchange links with a site that is obviously a machine generated site with tons of reciprocal links to porn sites, inactive sites with 404 errors or just plain junky sites.

A major factor in exchanging links with other sites is to make sure that the site you are exchanging with has the same general topic as your site. The sites you exchange with should share a common subject so that there is something of interest to your target audience. If the site has a links page, be sure that it is a quality link page that is indexed in the search engines. The link page should be accessible from the home page of the site, not buried in an obscure subdirectory.

Exchanging links with good web sites can boost your chances of getting a decent ranking in search engine results. It is common knowledge that search engines ranks high sites that have inbound and outbound theme-related links. With a good ranking position in the search engines, you will see a healthier flow of traffic to your site without having to spend a lot of money in advertising..

Start Publishing Articles

There are many groups, ezines, article directories and other resources on the Internet which will publish your articles. Authoring your own articles may be time-consuming, but you will save money. However, there are many freelance writers who are willing to write for you for a small fee. If your web site is about something that really interests you, you may find that you will enjoy writing your articles instead of hiring someone else to do so.

Make sure that your articles are themed along with the topic of your site. An example is if you have a site featuring healthy eating. You can write articles about cooking techniques, recipes or nutrition. Write something that you are interested in and have some knowledge about so that when someone reads it, the reader feels that you are knowledgeable about your topic and will be eager to visit your site for more information. Writing articles with useful tips and guidelines is an invaluable practice.

Include a resource box at the end of your article that links to your site. Write a little about yourself and your site. If you provide a light, informative and interesting article, people will go to your site for more.

Publish an Online Newsletter or Ezine

At first, newsletter publishing might sound like hard work because of all the content you may need to use to build an informative publication. However, this is not true. There are many authors willing to provide free articles so long as you provide the author's name and resource in on your publication. This provides free advertising for your authors and you get free content.

As your newsletter gets passed around, you can expand your popularity and build an opt-in list of people who regularly visit your site.

Join Online Communities and Forums

This traffic building option requires some time but does not involve a lot of effort. You can share your experience with many online groups and can promote your web site. You can get free advertising when you go to forums that have the same subject or niche as your site.

Follow threads that are interesting and then share your opinion or knowledge. As you build your reputation, you also build the reputation of your site, making it a respected resource that could be visited by many people.

Start Blogging

Blogs are a great way to generate web traffic. Like the forums, newsletters and articles discussed above, blogs are a way to share your expertise. You can submit comments containing your site address to blogs. When doing so, make sure your comment is not 'spammy.' It should be thoughtful and well written, which will build your reputation.

Some blogs allow you to post 'mini articles' or blurbs onto their blogs. This is an easy way to get one-way links to your web page.

If you're more ambitious, you can start your own blog that ties into your niche. For instance, if you have a site offering psychic readings, you can set up a blog about astrology, spirituality, tarot or some other topic that is related to your psychic site.

Obviously, the above five tips are just the tip of the iceberg. But they are easy to do and for the most part, are free.

Looking for free blogs for your backlinks? Start blurbing! An example of a blog that accepts short articles - or blurbs - is Unknown Resources. Visit http://www.unknownresources.com today to find out how you can take advantage of several free blogging services to promote your site.