Whenever I start a new website or blog, I follow the system I'm about to describe below to get a good influx of backlinks from Day 1.

If you have a WordPress-based blog, I suggest that you modify your ping list to something more robust than the measly default list WP gives you. I'll share my ping list with you in another post. Keep your eyes peeled for that.

I also encourage you to install the Ping Optimizer plugin. It will keep you from pinging too much, which can get you banned from various sites.

If you're familiar with weight training, you've probably heard of the "5×5" system. It's a weight training system where you do 5 sets of 5 reps for each exercise. There are various ways to implement it, but the goal is the same – improved strength and size.

I do something very similar with building backlinks. I try to get 5 links from 5 different methods, every single day until I feel comfortable with the results. It all kind of depends on the niche, my competition, and how willing I am to keep at it day after day (I'm being honest here – I didn't get into this business to work harder than I did in the "real world").

1. I go to 5 blogs and make 5 on-topic comments. I only make comments on blogs where my name serves as a hyperlink. If the commenting system allows you to input your website address ( URL), then your name will serve as a hyperlink to your site. I try to get a mix of on-topic and off-topic backlinks.
2. I submit my site to 5 directories. Here's a good list – Directory Maximizer
3. I use Angela's Backlinks and get 5 links. I've found this service to be invaluable. Angela finds about 30 high PageRank website and shows you how to get a backlink from each (hint: to make things way less cumbersome, use RoboForm).
4. I submit my site (could be the root-level domain or a particular page/post) to 5 social media sites (examples include twitter, Facebook, digg, Reddit, and Dropjack).
5. I create 5 articles and post them to a popular article directory. There is conflicting advice on this one on the 'net. Some say to use original content; others say it's okay to use your existing content (content already published on your site). I have seen no evidence of the latter being detrimental. However, what I do is I submit the original article to an article directory (Searchwarp.com is my favorite because they approve quickly and your article gets indexed very fast) and then repost that article on my site. After all, that is one of the dual purposes of article directories – the idea is that others are free to use your content on their sites with attribution to you, giving you a backlink in the process.

That's it. There is one super strategy that I'll partially share with you in a subsequent post. I say partially because it's not originally my idea and I paid to get full access to it – I suggest you do the same. Hint: It's called Backlink Flood if you want to get a jumpstart – it's the easiest free method for getting a ton of backlinks.

Driving traffic to your web site is your number one goal when starting out. No matter how great your web design is, how awesome your content is, or how fabulous you are, your web site is worthless if nobody visits it.

Of course, you don't want thousands of people flooding your website and never buying. But look at the alternative: Zero visitors and zero purchases. Which would you rather have?

If you create compelling content (i.e., a reason for people to read your posts), you will find buyers who keep coming back.

So how do you get people to come to your site?

There are 2 main ways to drive traffic to your site. One way is to pay for it with cold, hard cash. Cash that you probably don't have because you're just starting out. We'll explore paid traffic in a future post. But it's really for experienced marketers who have some money to invest and time to spend learning how to do it properly.

The second way to attract traffic is the free route. It's really not free, however. You're just spending time (which you have more of) instead of money (which you don't have).

However, there are some free methods for driving traffic to your site that give you a really good bang for your time buck.

One thing you should embed in your head is this: EVERY time a visitor visits your site, it's from a referral.

Think about that for a minute. Let it settle in. Visitors don't randomly type in your URL. They see it somewhere. It could be from:

• Google, Yahoo, or Bing (or another search engine).
• Another website. The author may like your site or a particular post and linked back to your site. He may have linked to your site in a post or he may have liked your site so much that he put you on his blogroll.
• You may have made a comment on another site and the reader of that site wanted to know more about you or your site.
• A visitor may have found you in a Directory. There are directories all over the web, from places like Yahoo, Google, and other search engines to site directories to niche directories.
• The visitor may have found your site through a forum. Perhaps you made a good post or answered a question and the visitor wanted to get more familiar with you.
• Perhaps your visitor found you on twitter, Facebook, or some other social media site.
• Article directories. Did you know you could post articles on ezinearticles.com, goarticles.com, and Searchwarp.com with links back to your site? These directories get loads of traffic and it's not too difficult to get these pages indexed and ranked on the search engines. Plus, depending upon the rights you give, other website authors may post your article on their sites with links back to your site (they have to attribute the content to you or else they're guilty of violation of the TOS of the article directories as well as plagiarism).
• If you participate in blog carnivals, you can attract visitors to your site if you post compelling content.
• If you run a blog, your RSS feed might be picked up by a feed directory and visitors may find you through this route.

There are many more ways to attract visitors with free methods like this. These are just a few of the big ones – these offer a huge bang for your time buck.

Just note that all of these backlinks do not happen by accident. You can strategically place backlinks on other people's sites through various methods, such as by making forum posts, submitting comments on other blogs, creating your own blog that links back to your main site, or by submitting your articles to directories.

You can learn more about these methods by picking up a copy of Guaranteed Free Traffic System. This inexpensive report will give you the tools and knowledge you need to build a lot of targeted traffic to your website.

Of course, I will make specific posts in the future about various tactics and strategies that will build your web traffic.