Hello there, 
I would like to promote my website some more. 
I have about 60 incoming links to my site, 
But I would like to have more and from quality sites without paying too much.
Does anyone have any good places I can start?
I have tried most online directories and I do not want to start a link
exchange as they look cheap and are often "tacky"

Thankyou.
Steve.

Dear Steve, 

You are right not to want to participate in link-exchange networks.
They are indeed for losers, and the reason is pretty simple: who needs
link exchange networks? Those with bad ranking; linking to them does
not link you to reputable sites and I wonder how many users actually
use ads in link-exchange sites.

Here are several more productive ideas. Please note, that Google
Answers Researchers, like myself, are NOT Google employees, and have
neither "inside information", nor "connections" - only extensive
knowledge.

There are several ways to draw more traffic to your site. I will
review them, but I recommend that you'll read further, both in the
links I'll provide, as well as in books about this subject.

Start with Listing Your Site
============================
Has it been submitted to major search engines? You can start with the
following, and think about search engines or directories used by your
target group (regional/national ones, language-related ones,
professional ones):

Submit to Google 
<://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl> 

Submit to MSN 
http://search.msn.com/docs/submit.aspx?FORM=WSDD2

How to Suggest a Site to Yahoo! 
<http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html> 


Getting Listed 
==============
Not everywhere. That doesn't help. Spamming the world never did any
good. However, it is very important to get yourself listed in major
directories, such as DMOZ (Google Directory), Yahoo! Directory, and
local directories for businesses in your area. You have to find the
appropriate
categori(es) in Google Directory and follow from there:
<://www.google.com/dirhp>  

Yahoo! Directory
<http://dir.yahoo.com/> 

Quite frankly, while this is likely to bring some visitors (who were
browsing through these categories or searching Yahoo!, which has a
very useful directory), the next strategy is much more important.

Old Fashioned PR
================
Before people buy something, they try to research it. For example, if
you want to go somewhere: most people read articles about their
destination, get consultation, do their research. They don't just
choose some site they stumbled uponon the Internet. If you have rich
content (for example, articles about the topic in general) you add
another reason for people to get into your site and talk about you.

There is no difference here between a website and a brick and mortar
business, except for the fact that there's much more competition
online. You have to write press releases; send them to the press; get
yourself to be known. If you could convince someone famous to use your
products (publically!), and in exchange to have his/her pictures in
the press -
that would be wonderful. If you could, a promotional action (get X for
free; contest; etc.) always draws crowd. If it is a contest, you could
collect information on the visitors to your site through the
registration form.


Silent and Word of Mouse PR
===========================
Proper PR agencies cost money. In the meanwhile, getting yourself
known through Word of Mouse is a good and cheap idea. It is actually
very simple: get your site link at the bottom of your email, as a
signature, and ask your family to do the same; go to forums advising
people on tourism questions, and if it is permitted on those sites
(check ahead, if not you might be spamming), add your site to your
sig, and give sound advice. For example, for a travel site:
rec.travel.europe
<http://groups-beta.google.com/group/rec.travel.europe> 

There's a book I recommend in cases like that. It is a bit simplistic
(like all advice books) but gives several helpful tips on online
marketing in free venues. You can get it at amazon.com
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0935047298/ltc-political/002-8658478-2156038>
Let Your Fingers Do the Talking: Using Word of Mouth Advertising on
the Internet, by Tom Clarke-Hill, but also probably in some libraries.

Advertisement
=============
Before I offer you that, let me tell you that I am not an employee of
Google, but an independent contractor, and I receive nothing from
recommending Google-related schemes to you. However, I warmly
recommend Google's AdWords program. This is a program of sponsored
links: whenever someone searches for your search terms (say: Golf,
Holiday, Spain), they'll get your ad on the top or to the right of the
results:
AdWords
<://www.google.com/ads/> 

Yahoo! has a similar scheme, where you can pay for a better listing,
as you've probably noticed from the link I gave you regarding getting
listed on Yahoo!


Maintaining your site 
=====================
It is important to keep the site updated all the time, to have - at
least once - someone who'd look at the graphics, the keywords, the
compatibility to all search engine robots (not all spider through
frames; most hate flash, for example); and your linking: no dead
links, updated and premium links.


Further Reading
===============
There are many other search engine submission and maximising tips and
tutorials out there:
http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/    
http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Internet/Web_Design_and_Development/Promotion/Help_and_Tutorials/?il=1
http://www.addpro.com/    
http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Internet/Web_Design_and_Development/Promotion/Free_Search_Engine_Submitting/?il=1
How to Get more Traffic To your Weblog
<http://www.plasticbag.org/archives/2002/01/how_to_get_more_traffic_to_your_weblog.shtml>

 Kim Komando, Tips to get more traffic to Web site ,  The Honolulu
Advertiser ,  December 21, 2004
<http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2004/Dec/21/tc/tc04p.html> 
 
I hope that helped and answered your question. If you need any further
clarifications on this answer, please ask before you rate this answer.

Thankyou for this.. maybe i should have paid more than $2... thankyou
for your time.
Steve.
tho im not rich so...

I am running three website since two to three years.Two are b2b abd
third is my company's site and my experience to promote website is
much different than recomended by "politicalguru-ga" .

Promotion of website depend on which type of your website is? If it is
your's companies website than submitting to search engine and
advertising at google adwrod or similar is enough.In this way you can
expect few hundred visit per month which should be enough for just
inroduction. But if you are running b2b portal and you need thousand
of visitors per day than above mentioned way will not be sufficient
unless you have any tip so as your site always come on fist page,of
search engines,which is normally not possible.

If  you want to save money and need large visitors than the best way
is you introduce through your site,chamber of commerce and trade
association as these instituations are still very effective inspite of
popularity of search engine etc. Secondly option is bulk emails.
Although spam mailling is considered not to be good but,even than,it
is allowed with some restriction.To make minimum inconvience to the
peoples you can make your own targetted mailling list by selecting
from trade directories,searching from internet or to buy such mailling
list. Third option is advertising as much as you can efford.For this
you have to choose best b2b site or seach engine which can give you
maximum result.

I hope,above comments will be of any help to you.

Regards
Ijaz Ahmad

Thank you for the rating and the tip.