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I consider myself pretty knowledgeable about many topics including article marketing – heck, I might even say I’m an article marketing genius. Just kidding – not a genius but pretty darn knowledgeable. Not meaning to toot my own horn but I’ve got about 2000+ articles on the net published in my name and yes, I do write under aliases too so take my word for it, I have a LOT of articles floating around the net. I must admit however, that I’ve been a bit confused with traffic generation. I mean, its not that I don’t understand what traffic is but I don’t understand how to get it more of it (or rather why other bloggers have so much and I have so little). Sadly, traffic generation seems to be the one thing that is keeping me from really improving my income and achieving my goals. So, like most savvy internet marketers, I’ve taken it upon myself to get my fair traffic share.

What I’ve discovered from all my research is that some marketers swear by article marketing, whereas others believe that getting back links and using social bookmarking is the answer. Then, there are some marketers that swear by blog commenting, forum posting or both. Well, all this conflicting knowledge, is enough to give me(and most marketers) a massive headache and a severe case of “I’m so confused that I’ll do nothing.”

Well, I’ve decided not to get frustrated and not to give up. Instead, I plan to take action and I want to inrease my traffic using ALL of the above methods and to work off my fanny until I increase that traffic. And, the real cool thing is that I am going to use this site as my test site to see if I can increase my traffic right here on IM Writer Blog.

Here’s what I am going to do:

1. Write one really informative and thorough article every single week so that I can attract more readers and teach them something in the process. Its not that all my content isn’t good its just that I don’t always write really superb article every week.

2. Promote my site on YahooAnswers and other sites to let them know about my site and how I am working my internet marketing strategy. 10 answers a week!

3. Network with other writers turned internet marketers to see if I can get them to visit my site. I will do this by visiting mybloglog and other blogger sites that I admire to see if I can interact with them and get them to connect with me.

4. Post one article every single weekday (not including weekends)– not just with random posts but posts that are search optimized for my targeted keywords.

5. Backlink like a lunatic. I will try and get 100 new and relevant backlinks to this site in the next few months by using directory and article directories, social bookmarking, profile linking, twittering, etc.

6. Write and post 1 free eBook a month and use it as a giveaway.

7. Write 10 posts a moth and submit to article directories.

That’s it. By doing this, I really think that I will be able to increase my traffic from 40 visitors a day to a gazillion (OK at least 100 visitors a day). By doing this, I should be able to increase my PR from a 0 to a 2 plus get some steady readers. So, what do you guys think of my plan? Will it will work? Only one way to find out!

There seems to be a bit of a hot debate between Hubbers and Lensmasters about which one is the better platform. Hubbers tend to think that Hubs far outrank Lens by Lensmasters and so forth. Well, I believe that each one has their place and both can be used for increasing traffic and creating some very strong back links. A couple of months ago, I did an informal test on both platforms and I created a bunch of lenses and hubs in order to see which one worked the best for my purposes. I also did a bit of back linking to each one and pinged them too. In essence, I half followed the advice of Pot Pie Girl in One Week Marketing (not because it wasn’t good but because I was lazy). Anyway, here are the results of my findings:

Lens:
48 lenses created, average score 3, views 81, money made $.64

Hubs:

71 Hubs created, average score 64, views 2408 money made $6.11

Now when evaluating my findings, keep in mind that I typically targeted the same keywords for both platforms but not always. In fact, once I saw that more pages were getting indexed and more views on HubPages, I sort of lost interest in Squidoo. So, for me, HubPages seems to be the clear winner in my somewhat skewed experiment. Not only did I earn more money from HubPages but I also received more views for my efforts too. I think this is because the pages got ranked faster and without much effort. I also felt a sense of friendliness and willingness to help one another at HubPages. Lastly, I really loved the way it was set up and the ease of putting together Hubs.

So, in the future, I will continue to use both platforms for my back linking strategy but I am going to concentrate more heavily on HubPages for their monetization potential. I also plan to utilize the recommendations of Pot Pie Girl in One Week Marketing to see if I can increase the visibility of my Hubs and my income. However, I also need to increase my HubScore to 75 so that my linked sites can also enjoy the value of the links. Right now, my links are no follow and will remain this way until I get my HubScore to 75 or over so, I’ve got a bit of work to do. But, the way that I look at it, any platform that helps get you traffic and make a little coffee or bumble gum money is a good thing.

Today is September 1, 2010 and I am very proud of my accomplishments this past month. Oh happy day! I was finally able to pass the $2000 a month residual income barrier and I did it by a whopping $271.00. Now, that might not sound like a whole lot but how many employees can ask their bosses for a $271 raise and get it? Welll, if I continue with this pattern, I will have a whopping $3,252 extra at the end of the year and that is freaking awesome!

That said, today is a brand new day/month and it is now time to evaluate my strategy for this month. My plan is to continue building traffic to my 5 winning sites and also to try and get all my sites ranked using multi-backlinking strategies which consists of forum posting, Yahoo Answering, article writing, and Web 2.0 submissions, etc.

By diversifying my marketing strategy, I should be able to protect my interests and really market my sites and get them the traffic they need to be successful little niche money makers. After all, building sites and leaving them to fend for themselves is never enough. You have to optimize them for their keywords and backlink them like crazy if you want to increase your organic traffic and your income.

Only then will you rise up the SERPS and make money. Well, enough chatting – it’s a new month and I’ve got work to do. Make it happen!