Anybody marketing on the internet knows the importance and necessity of always looking for ways to increase website traffic. As the world of web 2.0 evolves so do the ways people devise of increasing traffic to their sites. Over time however certain techniques have continued to be both popular and effective for attracting targeted website traffic.

Let's examine 3 of the most effective means many use for increasing traffic to their sites and compare the pros and cons of each.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is a source of highly targeted website traffic since the people on your list have already shown an interest in what it is you promote. Even better these people by virtue of opting into your list have indicated an acceptance to receive your promotional emails.

Marketing through email does not come without effort since list building is a time consuming and often frustrating function.

PPC

Pay per click is one of the fastest ways of increasing traffic to your website. This method involves composing appropriate ads for what you promote and posting them online. People who are looking for what you are advertising will then 'click' on your ad and be taken immediately to your site. When you consider that the ad you wrote is very descriptive of your product it stands to reason that any traffic that visits your site will be highly targeted.

Even though this technique sends targeted traffic very quickly to your site it can be expensive and downright costly IF you do not know what you are doing.

Blogging

Blogging has become a very popular way of marketing on the internet. Having the ability to actually interact with visitors to your blog is a huge advantage in terms of promoting anything. You have the ability to find out their preferences while they can also tell you what it is you need to improve upon.

Another enormous advantage is that blog visitors quite often return so you are able to build a relationship with them. It is also no secret that blogs are 'favored' by search engines due to the fact that the content is often updated frequently. This normally results in a higher ranking which means more free traffic from search engines.

Although marketing off a blog can be done at little or no cost it does involve a huge investment of your time and effort. Blogs as mentioned above do need to be updated frequently and with good content for them to be effective.

Every online business knows that to increase website traffic is to also boost the bottom line. Anybody marketing on the internet is all too familiar with the importance of targeted website traffic and different ways to generate it are always being sought. The 3 methods for generating traffic reviewed above are the most popular and effective means currently used online. As you can see they all have their strengths and weaknesses but their effectiveness is not in question. Your choice of one or none or all of the above in your marketing efforts will likely be based on your particular skills and/or resources. The intent here today is to simply help you make a better informed decision when considering the options available to you.