If you are trying to drive traffic to your website, one of the methods that can help you achieve this is to build an online community. Traffic building depends heavily on the relationships that you build on the Internet. You are who you associate with, even on the Internet. The more reputable your associations are, the better your website’s reputation becomes. You need a good online reputation to build website traffic. Thankfully, it is not that difficult to build an online community, and you can do this through social networking, exchanging links and creating a mailing list.

Tapping social networks is a no-brainer in traffic building. Facebook alone has 400 million registered users; Twitter, on the other hand, has 100 million. If you can develop a solid fan base on Facebook and get people to follow you on Twitter, you get the surge of traffic that your website needs. And while Facebook and Twitter are the biggest social networks online, there are many others that you can tap, such as Digg, StumbleUpon and Delicious. Just submit your newest content to these sites and you can build the website traffic that you need.

Exchanging links is a good way to connect with other webmasters whose websites are relevant to your own. Although they will not increase your website’s search engine ranking, they can give you the chance to tap the traffic that goes through the websites you have connected with. It also opens the possibility of joint ventures with other webmasters in the future.

Creating a mailing list, on the other hand, allows you to build relationships directly with your target audience. With the use of a landing page or an opt-in page, you invite your prospects to give you their email addresses where you can regularly send them information about your products and services. With a mailing list, you are always in touch with your prospects. Feed them useful information and let them know how your products will benefit them. Eventually, you will convince them to buy from you.

Building an online community – building relationships, if you will – is an essential step to traffic building. When you establish this online community, you get to drive traffic steadily to your site and potentially convert this traffic into sales.