It is the ongoing problem for all web site owners - How to increase the flow of traffic to their sites? Many strategies have been, and continue to be developed, and it has to be said, some far more effective than others.

One method that has continued to work for many through many ingenious applications, is that of viral marketing. Viral marketing is relies simply on the tendency for individuals who final something of use, to share it with others.

This is the principle of networking, and most companies have relied on this human action ever since man/woman began trading with others. Viral marketing comes in many forms, as varied as other individual imaginations. It could be an e-book, a free report, an interesting story or a piece of gossip. It is usually low cost and is an extremely effective tool for any business to use for spreading the word about their product.

Time to Use Your 'TAFS'

By far, one of the easiest methods in viral marketing available to any web site owner is through the use of 'TAFS' or a 'Tell a Friend Script'. This is a simple bit of code (freely available on the net) that you ad to your source code of your site. The script can be on any (or every) page of your site where you feel there is something of special interest to your visitors. This then allows your visitors to easily tell and friends or family about your site.

The usual format of the script is a input form including the visitor's name and email address along with the recipients email address. A message is then sent to the recipient with the senders name on it so that it will not be seen as spam and will be readily opened.

The tell a friend script allows for quick and easy communication between friends and removes the risk of the message being blocked. It allows for wide-spread distribution of information about your site and can be highly effective and best of all - free!

So, the recipient reads/hears the information about your site and will be introduced to what your site is selling or promoting AND will be given another tell a friend script to forward on to their friends - are you beginning to see the bigger picture?

As more people use the tell a friend script, more and more people will know of the existence of your company or site. Anyone who read the ads inside the message and liked what they read who liked what they read, would go and click on the link and visit the site. This drives traffic into the site resulting to great number of potential customers.

Find A Tell A Friend Script

The script itself is very simple and requires very knowledge of web site programming. You can simply copy paste a script and put it on an intended page. Finding one is easy. All you have to do is go to any search engine and type in "tell a friend script".

On the results page you will see many links that will direct you to sites offering a tell a friend script. Often the only requirement is that you leave the name of the site where you obtained the script in the source code (this is already there - you do not have type it in).

With this simple viral marketing strategy, a tell a friend script can effectively drive targeted traffic to your site resulting in increased sales and higher profits.

Don't think of this as a get-rich-quick action but as a very effective strategy in your overall marketing efforts. Give it a little time and allow it to grow as it gets spread around. Your ads will be read and there is a higher probability that people will visit your site as a result and all because of a little bit of simple code.