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Unfortunately, most websites end up like a billboard in the middle of the desert, never to be found or seen by anyone.  Why is that?

There are “secrets” to marketing on the Internet that once known, help you achieve the success you are looking for.  It’s up to you to pull these “secrets” out of an online guru (if s/he will tell you!), purchase all the information you can find or sign up for a program that will give you the information you seek.  This is no easy task – consider this as difficult as getting your MBA.

You see – there are no shortcuts to online success.  It takes time, knowledge, some technical ability and marketing experience.  Marketing is actually the #1 tool you need.  If you have no experience with marketing, you can start your reading with Zig Ziglar or Dan Kennedy.

On the Internet, you have to build rapport with people just as you do in the offline world before you can expect to make a sale.  We do this through socializing in forums, getting to know each other through Twitter, leaving comments on a regular basis on your favorite blog, using linkbait to cause a buzz and so much more.  The most efficient way to build rapport is by building a list of subscribers.  But you can’t do everything at once.

One secret most people won’t tell you is you have to master one marketing strategy before moving on to the next strategy.  After all, if you can’t master one, you certainly can’t expect to succeed with the next one.  The progression is to take what you learned from becoming successful with the first strategy and applying it to the next strategy you want to use.  Eventually you have a full arsenal of marketing techniques to use every day that are giving you the results you need.

Why Isn’t Anyone Finding Your Blog or Website?

It’s very simple – you’re not using keywords correctly.  You are using them, right?

Not only do you need marketing strategies, but you need to understand how the Internet works.  The Internet is based on people searching for information.  As a marketer, it’s your job to give them what they are looking for.

First – you need to use a keyword research tool to find what people are searching for.  Let’s use building a business as an example.  You can find prospects by knowing exactly what they are searching for to solve their problem.  They may be searching for:

•    Ways to get out of debt
•    How to start a home business
•    How to supplement their income
•    Boost retirement savings
•    A network marketing opportunity
•    A MLM company
•    Etc.

You can use the free WordTracker tool to do your keyword research or you can download my free keyword tool.

To find out what people are searching for to supplement their income, use supplement income and start the search.  All the related searches containing “supplement income” and the number of searches per day will be displayed (here’s what it looks like in WordTracker):

From the keywords returned, I see two that could be used in an article or blog post:

•    How to supplement one’s retirement income
•    Ways to supplement income

If you have a blog, you choose one or two keyword phrases to use in a blog post.  Use one keyword phrase in the title of the blog post as your primary keyword phrase.  Then repeat the keyword phrase 2 – 3 times in your blog post.  Once you have your article completed, list your keyword phrases as tags and keywords on your post.  This is how you attract people to your site through the search engines.

How Does this Work?

If you are not posting information on the Internet using keywords that people are searching on, people won’t find you.  Along with your keyweords, the search engines rank websites, blogs, and other information by site popularity.  They consider the number of other sites that are linking to yours and give you a popularity rating.  The more popular a site is, the higher it is placed in the search engines.

So – if people are searching on “ways to supplement income” and your site is using this keyword phrase, the search engines will then count the number of other sites linking to your site and present them in their search engine results pages (SERPs) in the order they think are most important to the people searching for that information.

This is a simplistic approach to understanding keywords and the search engines, but it provides you with an understanding of how things work and what you need to do to “work within the system.”

To get results on the Internet, you need more than just a website.  You need knowledge, tools and a marketing plan for success.