Traffic to websites is like oxygen to humans. Without it, we die, and without generating traffic, websites die a horrible death too. If you've ever done any Search Engine Optimisation (otherwise known as SEO), you're probably just as tired as I am of the constant battle of wits between "us", and "them" (the big 3 search engines - Google, Yahoo and MSN).

The ever-changing rules of the game mean that SEO is a continuous cycle of updates to the search engine ranking algorithms followed by a surge of investigation, testing and tweaking by the clever SEO "gurus" on the inter-web.

The problem is, it's all a waste of time, and here's why:

Google is a very, VERY clever piece of software. If your site is worth ranking, it will rank! The dozens of factors that search engines take into account means that they're generally pretty good at displaying the good stuff near the top of the SERPs, so if you have a frequently updated site with original, interesting content, you'll get links (because people like linking to useful sites), and the big 3 will take notice without any need for complex SEO.

Plus of course, you have to spend countless hours and dollars fighting to keep up with all the tiny little changes everyone keeps making to their ranking algorithms!

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So.. if you want traffic, spend your time more wisely. Here's 5 methods for boosting your website traffic without relying on search engines:

1. Videos You've heard of YouTube, right? Of course. What you may not know is that there are dozens of similar sites that let you upload your own videos with accompanying descriptions and sometimes direct links. Find video sites by searching for phrases like "upload video", "video clips" and "share videos". There's plenty to be found, both generic and niched.

2. Social Bookmarkers A wonderful invention that is fairly recent, social bookmarkers are giant bookmark sharing sites. If you come across a site that you find interesting, you bookmark it. If other people do the same, or they see your bookmark and vote for it, your entry climbs the rankings.

3. Blogs They're not just for writing, but they are for writing on as well. It's simple - visit the homepages of the larger blog providers like Blogger and Wordpress, and search to find blogs within your niche. Collect a list of them, and start posting comments on the newest entries.

4. Forums/Groups I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that you're a member of at least one forum in some niche. There are forums or discussions groups for absolutely anything you care to think of, and the daily stampede of visitors is amazing. Statistics like "Most users ever online was 3,425", and "Members: 100,468" are not uncommon.

The basic idea for forums is as follows: find a large, well populated forum with decent traffic. Create an account, and setup your signature to include a link to your site (assuming forum rules allow for this). Now, join in! Start threads of discussion with well thought out questions, and participate frequently in other debates. Every time you post, your signature (and link) is shown.

5. Articles Lastly, but by no means leastly, you should write and distribute short, punchy, informational articles. Visit sites like eZineArticles and iSnare to see what I mean if you haven't discovered articles yet, and then go and write a few.

Article distribution sites let you include a resource or author bio box at the bottom of your articles, in which you place a link to your site. These sites are so powerful because they are large, well indexed and well known to the search engines, so they show up so well in search results (yes, I know, a little ironic!).

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Get out there and start making an impact on the web, and the traffic will come. Relying on any one source of website traffic (including Search Engine Optimisation) will let you down, and means you're not maximising your potential.

About the Author

Will Barden is a successful Internet Marketer and prolific writer. This article is composed from portions of his new book, "The Rise And FALL Of Search Engines". Visit http://BardenMedia.com/searchengines/ to learn more about traffic!