Promotion and Community Building

IT WOULD BE great to just sit back and wait for word of mouth to make your site a success, but unfortunately it rarely happens. However, make good use of Web rings, meta tags and discussion forums, and you could whip up a publicity frenzy. Bravenet have all the feature for Free Web Rings, Forums and much more.....

71. What's the META
To get your site noticed by search engines, add a description tag in the HEAD section of your page. Use this format: <META NAME="description" CONTENT="place your one sentence description of your site here"> You can read more about Meta Tags and how to create them for free at Metatag Creator

72. Unlock keywords
Providing keywords is another way to up the search rankings. Think of the categories that best fit your site, and use this tag: <META NAME="keyword" CONTENT=""> Again to go Metatags Creator the make you metatags on the fly

73. Seek and you shall find
Add a search engine to your site, courtesy of Atomz

74. Googlify your site
While you're at it, let visitors search the rest of the web, through a drop-in link to Google, the best of the bunch. Sign up at google

75. Syndicate to Accumulate
Guarantee that you have regularly updated content on your site, by including syndicated stories and links. A site as Bravenet lets you customise the headlines you want, and include them on your pages with a one-line JavaScript tag. To see this script in action go here Søgemaskine Nyheder and also another one here xbiz

76. Keep in Touch
If you use an instant messenger such as ICQ, and don't mind instant feedback, add a banner to your site that allows visitors to get in touch.

77. Ring, ring
Joining a Webring is a great way to draw traffic to your site. You'll see banners at the bottom of people's sites showing that they're members of a ring: if you come across one you like to join, simply click on the banner and add your site.

78. Be my guest
A guestbook lets visitors to your site leave their mark, without opening your email account to spam. There are plenty of free guestbook sites that hook into your pages: try Bravenet Free Guestbook , which is simple and easy to adapt.

79. Talk about it
Add a discussion forum, to build a community around your site. For a basic free service, try Bravenet Free Forum : for something more sophisticated, a UBB can't be beaten.

80. Ask the audience
Adding online polls will give you a feel for who's stopping by your site, as well as giving your visitors something to come back to check. Best pollster of the bunch is Bravenet's Poll, a free service which even manages to stop cheats from voting twice!

81. Make a wish(list)
Sign up as an associate amazon.co.uk, and link to your favorite books and records: you'll receive commission if someone buys them. You can also create a wish list so that visitors can reward you for you efforts!

82. Search patrol
The major search engines trawl the Web with 'spiders', but you can speed things up by actively submitting your site. Fortunately, submission engine such as Submit for all make this simple, as well as providing tips on how to bump up the ranking.

83. Make it a takeaway
Register your site as a channel with AvantGo and users will be able to store it on their palmtops to read offline.

84. Publicity freak
If you're got a site to be proud of, tell the world! Put your URL on your business card, your letterhead, and anywhere else you can think of. (within reason. We don't recommend tattoos.) FREE four-color business cards! An $85 FREE gift!