It's a sad thing to know when you have a website developed at great cost and then it doesn't get any visitors. When the launching party is over, then you begin waiting for any good signs, but soon you find out that the visitor counter remains at zero. If you're one of these unlucky website owners, there is no need to despair. It's probably only because you do not know how to drive free targeted traffic to your website.

The very first step you should take is to submit the URL of your website to the many search engines and search directories on the web. Overtime, most of the search engines will pick up your site, but this can take quite long. Search directories do not really crawl the web, so they won't find your site. You have to manually submit it. The general search directories are important for another reason as well - quite a lot of the small search engines use directory listings for their search results.

Then you also get niche directories for specific interest groups. Should you for example have an affiliate website where you try to sell website hosting, you will find a large number of web hosting directories where website owners can submit their URL for free. Even if you are a blog owner, there should be more than one specific directory to which you can submit the URL.

Social bookmarking sites are becoming more and more popular. Many people are nowadays using them to locate what they're looking for instead of the search engines, simply because the results are more targeted. With social bookmarking sites, you rely on your fellow web searchers to provide you with websites they deem important enough to visit.

A further great way to drive free targeted traffic to your website is by publishing a press release. There are a surprising number of free press release services where you can submit a press release about your company for free. They will not only publish it, but also submit it to other sites in their group.

Article submission is another way of promoting a website that is fast gaining popularity. The way this works is that you write an article about any subject, but preferably something that relates to your own site. You're allowed to add a link to your own website at the bottom. You then submit this article to one or more of the various free article directories found all over the net.

Last but certainly not the least, there are the growing number of social media websites. Getting your own page at one of these means you can promote your blog or website for free. You can also network online and meet many potential customers. And what is very important is, your page will be included in their website's search results, making it possible for potentially millions of visitors to find you - surely an excellent way to drive free targeted to your website.