Merging The Old With The New

Internet Marketing.....Merging The Old With The New

Back in the early days of the Internet, the marketing methods were pretty basic. Most of the advertisers used things such as safelists, hit exchanges, submitters, and other basic marketing tools. As time passed however, marketers relied less upon these marketing methods as some of the more conceptual traffic generating concepts entered the scene. Does this mean that those older and highly effective internet marketing concepts are no longer useful or even effective? Not at all, in fact many of the older concepts not only work well but they tend to work better due to the fact that not as many people are still trying to crowd that concept! Realistically, the premise of the old tools and new tools is very much the same, it is just executed using different tools and banking on the infrastructure of the new social internet empires.

While Social Networking has now become the preferred method of doing business for many, some of these new concepts can be so crowded with people using them that although effective at the core, they may not be as effective to the individual because of many factors involved. To use a mechanical concept, the new concepts are brilliant, but there are simply too many moving parts for the new marketer, and there are too many people doing the exact same thing which dilutes it's power beyond what the old school techniques brought. If you think about it, since the premise is the same, you could still effectively use some of the tried and true traffic generating methods such as traffic exchanges to bring in traffic, and in fact many people are starting to realize the power in incorporating these concepts back into their marketing plan because they bring a good mix of old and new school concepts. In the world of internet marketing, traffic is your life blood, so you should try to use any potential traffic generating resource at your disposal, regardless if it is something everyone is using or not. The bottom line is that your barometer should be results, not popularity of the tool.

With that said, while using traffic exchanges can be an effective means of generating traffic for your site if used correctly, there are things you need to be aware of before embarking into this concept. The first thing to keep in mind is that this concept banks on web browser traffic, so the vehicle of this concept is the browser itself. If you want to make sure you are putting forth the most effective and efficient effort, you will need a good browser to use, one that won't crash or allow viral activity to enter your computer. These days the viruses out there are getting quite cleaver and you can contract one on your computer simply by loading the wrong page. For the most part the Microsoft browser internet explorer is not very secure and is not coded very well where security is concerned. The Mozilla FireFox browser however is not often attacked by these sites and is light years ahead of the IE browser in security features. Your computer must be running efficiently for you to make the best use of your traffic exchange program, so I would suggest you get the latest version of FireFox for this use.

You also want to make sure in conjunction with this system that your computers antivirus program is also set up with the latest update to make sure your protected from viruses. This is not just a precaution you should make due to the traffic exchanges or internet marketing, it's something you should be well aware of always because again, today's internet is higher tech, but so is the web page security problems. Even FireFox can contract certain website virus scripts, so with both armed your better off. There are some great AVP's that are absolutely free and incredibly powerful. One I use is called Avast, which is free for home users and it catches just about any internet page script that tries to infect your computer. The best thing to do is to set your browser history to 0 days also to protect your computer as many of these viral pages enter through the browser cache folder (temp folder where pages are stored).

The Mozilla FireFox browser is also best set up for traffic exchanges due to some great features and plug-in capabilities. FireFox allows you to set up groups of traffic exchanges that can be set up and configured with a simple click of a button. Setting up several groups extends your surfing power thus your ability to dynamically boost your traffic generation power. In this concept the name of the game is brows-ability, the more you browse the more traffic you can create for your site. With this concept you can load one page and set it in its own tab, then run another page and another. You will never have to wait for timers to wind down on certain pages which could take up to 30 seconds a page. The beauty of this system is it doesn't matter if you physically are looking at the page, it just has to be loaded on your computer and technically it is.

Lastly, to get the best out of your traffic exchanges you should be using a broadband internet connection. The faster your connection the faster pages load and more pages will load. Since the page has to be loaded for a certain amount of time and the timer starts when it is loaded, it would be in your best interests to make sure it loads fast. Keep your computer defragged, your internet cache empty, and your internet connection fast. It may also be a good idea to have plenty of memory on your computer. Your computer is part of the equation and should be a decent speed with a decent amount of memory to handle all the browsing activity at once.Your best bet is to take some time and read up on the traffic exchange concept, and really get to know how it all works. The best place to do this is in a traffic exchange forum where you can ask other users questions and read how others found success. People these days love to talk and help one another out, so it is actually a better time to get into this concept than it used to be for many reasons. Be creative, create your own special custom pages, don't put out the same thing everyone else is, remember others will look at your pages if you have something fresh and exciting to look at!

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Have you struggled to earn money online? Learn how this business can turn a low one time payment into a large monthly income! Perfect business for today's ecoonomy...low cost, great informational products, fantastic compensation plan. http://www.billthomas.ws William J. Thomas is an online entrepreneur and also contributes articles on Business and Internet Marketing.

Does Article Marketing Software Really Work?

Having recently come to the realization that I was spending more time submitting articles to article directories then I was writing them, I decided to purchase a popular article submission software with the hopes that it would automate many of the tedious details of submitting articles, and allow me to spend more time writing. After purchasing the software, I excitedly downloaded it and jumped right it wanting to put it to use right away. Unfortunately, after using it a few times, I discovered that it failed to live up to my expectations, and it wasn't long before I discarded it altogether. This article looks at my experiences with article submission software, and points out several areas where this software fails to deliver.

One of the main benefits touted by article submission software sellers is the claim that much of the time consuming work such as filling in details can be automated.
The claim is that once you sign up for a directory and submit your information, the software will automatically load your information the next time you login to submit an article. Unfortunately, what happens with many of the article directories is that when you login to submit a new article it will load the original article that you had submitted when you first signed up, meaning that every time you submit an article, you have to go back and remove the original article, and copy and paste in the new one. It doesn't seem to matter how many articles you submit, the article submission software keeps loading the original article. Needless to say, this becomes quite aggravating, and a complete waste of time.

Another one of the alleged benefits of article submission software is the claim is that the software contains hundreds of pre-loaded sites that you can submit your articles to, allowing you wide exposure for your articles. However, what I discovered when trying to submit my articles to the directories was that many of the sites were no longer in business, and many of the sites would took so long to load that you would tend to get frustrated with them, and move on to the next site. While it would be unrealistic to expect perfection, one would expect that the majority of the websites would be active and functioning. Unfortunately, it seems like the owner of the this submission software had not spent a good deal of time keeping his product updated.

As if the previous issues weren't enough to make you wonder if using article submission software is really worth the trouble, I should also mention that you won't be able to use the same username and password for many of the article sites but will instead have to use an email generated one. While in theory this shouldn't cause a problem since the article submission software is supposed to remember the information you entered for each site, in practice it often failed to do so, causing you to type in those two dirty words, "forgot password" repeatedly. While it may not sound like a huge deal, having to constantly stop and check your email to retrieve a password not only wastes time, but defeats the whole purpose of why you purchased the software in the first place.

If all this negativity hasn't dissuaded you from trying article submission software, you should know that this type of software can be rather costly. Before purchasing software, I would suggest that you go to a few Internet Marketing forums to see what others are saying about the software you're thinking of purchasing. You can also do a check simply by doing a Google search with the words 'Article Submission Software'. As the saying goes, 'buyer beware'.

As with many things in life, expectations are oftentimes greater than results. While Article Submission software promises to eliminate much of the dirty work in article distribution, it did leave this writer a bit disappointed with the results. While I found that there were some benefits to be had in using this type of software, they were more than offset by the problems I encountered. Perhaps my experience was not the norm, and there is in fact software that will allow you to hit a couple of keys and have your articles posted to hundreds of sites. Just be sure to do your research before spending your depreciating dollars on this type of software.

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William J. Thomas has been an avid Affiliate Marketer for several years. Bill also contributes articles on Internet Marketing and other business related topics. Bill's website reveals how you too can enjoy all the benefits of working at home and earning money with Affiliate Programs. http://www.billthomas.ws/