You always need a strategy to get quality traffic for your websites. The easiest way to get traction is by shelling out money. Nothing is going to be more effective than paying to get traffic. But, there’s yet another effortless way which requires not even a single penny: Ad swaps.

This advertisement swap or ad swap can be seen as a beneficial arrangement, wherein you highlight someone else’s ad on your website in exchange for them doing the same. This arrangement serves to offer exposure for a specific purpose, which might be selling products/services or creating awareness about your brand/site. Do not confuse it with link exchange (which is just meant to pucker your search engine rank). Rather this beneficial planning is merely for brand-advertising purpose.

In search marketing what matters is getting traffic to your web site; and ad swaps do exactly the same. Being free, they are the most effective way of building your list, most effortlessly, each week.

Ad Swaps are one of my personal favorites, when I think of list-building or increasing the already existing lists. All you need is a small list; and a free item relevant to your niche for which you have the rights to give-away in your opt-in email marketing. You can even start form a list of 200-300.

4 Essential requisites for a Successful ‘Ad Swap Arrangement’

You must fulfill these four essential requirements in order to have a successful Ad Swap Arrangement:

Congruent Traffic and Exposure : Both the parties, agreeing for an ad swap arrangement, must have congruency concerning the amount of visitors received daily, o an email list with a decent amount of subscribers. My personal experience goes behind saying that the ad swaps are most agreeable and effective only when both the parties swear of equivalent audience reach/traffic count.

Adequate Ad placement : Your Ad needs to be positioned at a place which is easily viewable and accessible by the visitors. There can be a difference in the site design, but the exchange must be so as to display the ads in a similar fashion. I am often least interested in the pop-up ads, and feel more inclined towards the wide-banner ads. The same goes for others as well. So agree to use equivalent ad formats (banner ads or pop-up ads, etc).

Choose Same Niche/Relevant Page: Ad Swaps work best in the same niche. Both the trading parties would benefit from this traffic trade when both the sites deal in a similar niche, as they would be targeting traffic which enjoys similar interests.

But, this is no hard & fast rule! You can even enter into trade with sites working in different niche. The point here is that you must place your ad on a relevant page where you can vouch for an increased traffic.

Avoid Competitors : Just in case your websites sells products or offers some kind of service, do not get into this deal with your competitors (other merchants/firms in the same niche). However, you can consider doing it for some joint promotion of a specific event or shared project.

There are increased chances of Ad Swaps after your site gets traction and you become increasingly visible online; and when people start viewing you as a potential gain. While, aiming for other objectives, you need to keep in mind even these perspectives as well.