Are you thinking about expanding your business by adding

online revenue streams? Maybe, you're thinking about

creating a new online business? If this is the case, many "gurus" are awaiting the opportunity to share the intricacies of their wisdom with you for a very high fee. While some are good... you'd better know precisely what type of assistance you're seeking or you'll see your fees eaten up long before you even get close to accumulating any return on your investment.

Put simply, building an on-line revenue stream requires

skills in 2 areas:

1. Bringing the right kind of visitors to your web site

2. Persuading them to take the action you want

Let's examine an example wherein:

- Selling your product for $100.

- Attracting 1000 visitors monthly to your site.

- Expecting 1% of these visitors to purchase your product.

Then your short term revenue is found according to the

formula:

Product price x number of visitors x % visitors who buy

$100 x 1000 x 1% = $1000 per month

Thus, increasing your revenue based on the given product

price are broken into the following options:

- To increase your site's traffic flow.

- To increase the percentage of visitors who buy ~ the conversion ratio.

- To do both.

But traffic and conversion ratio are not independent

factors. The type and source of your web site visitors can,

and will hugely impact your conversion rate.

So what options do we have when it comes to getting visitors

to come to my web site? There are probably only a few key

stratgies:

1. Purchase traffic.

You can buy traffic from options such as banner ads,

off-line advertising, or Pay-Per-Click (PPC). These choices are generally quick ways of bringing visitors your way. However, these options can be costly, as well as complicated. For an inexperienced PPC buyer, many common mistakes are pointlessly carried out.

2. Build Traffic

This means optimising your web site to gain a high position

in the Search Engine Results. While this can be highly effective, and deliver significant "free" traffic, it takes time, experience, and ongoing management effort to acheive and sustain an envied placing on the first page. And your efforts can be quickly trashed by competition, or simply a change of policy by the Search Engine. Unless you already have the experience, in practice this means a steep learning curve, or paying an SEO consultant to do it for you. So much for "free" traffic!

3. Dig up traffic.

By this, I'm referring to digging up existing customer lists

of yours and directing them toward your new online offer.

This approach is excellent, especially if you already have

an accessible list of customers that are prime for the new plan. However, what if you don't?

4. Bring in traffic through public relations.

Create opportunities to promote your offer on TV and radio

or in newspapers and magazines. Also, include your website address on press releases, "advertorials" and articles for people to take the next step to learn more about your topic. If you're wise and maintain good media contacts, public relations are effective avenues.

5. Traffic from "OPT", Other People's Traffic.

Find several resources that are related to your topic.

These resources contain thousands of subscribers who are on their circulation lists. Thousands of online newsletters and magazines editors are hungry for great, pertinent content. Imagine if a resource publishes your advert or article along with perhaps a personal endorsement to their circulation list, you can then expect a deluge of visitors. Unless you repeat the same act to another list or submit a new article for that first publication, this surge may soon recede.

Naturally, you can't expect to do everything at the same

time! What start-up sequence should you follow? The

following order will put you on track:

1. For a fast market test, buy traffic from a highly keyword -targetted source. Test the viability of your niche, your offer, and your advertising copy. (Of course, if your exisitng client base is good for your new offer, test first with current clients.)Provided buying traffic remains profitable, keep this as a key part of your on-going traffic strategy.

2. Do you believe your niche is viable? Have you

established your opt-in rate or conversion rate? If so,

you're ready to use "OPT". Bring your offer to your

preferred publishers and negotiate a deal that's good for

all involved, so that the publishers can carry your ad or article. You should be carry this out regularly over a long period of time and use a variety of publishers that touch different market segments.

3. Build your sales website following the key Search Engine Optimization rules. Your site should have relevant content, a clearly focused theme, growing in-bound links, and so on. As the site over time increases its visibility on major Search Engines, your traffic is bound to grow.

4. Keep your news newsworthy. That is, as soon as you have news, find ways for TV, newspapers, radio and such to carry it.

As a final point, repeat over and over as long as this

stream is profitable.

Copyright 2005 Riki Trafford. All rights reserved.