The first step to starting an online business is building a website, but just because you build one and it exists for people to find doesn’t mean they will find it. Even if you build the greatest, most unique website out there; you still need to market it in order to drive traffic and gain customers.

You always want to make sure that you’re marketing to your target audience, but there are a number of ways to do this to ensure you are reaching different realms of the web with your business’ message.

One such way is social networking. A few popular sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and MySpace can make it possible for you to reach thousands of people and other businesses alike. By creating a business page or account with each of these you can tap into a whole new realm of consumers. On Twitter you’ll want as many followers as possible and on Facebook you’ll want as many fans, and the like with the other sites. The key is to keep your status, your page and your photos updated. When you make an update the social site’s server picks it up and feeds it to the main page for all your followers and fans to see. All they have to do is click to be taken back to your page once again. Although many of these sites were first used by students as a form of keeping in touch and displaying personal talents, the amount of business they’ve now brought to online companies is phenomenal.

Another method that has also grown in popularity is the use of online classifieds sites like Craigslist, Kijiji and Oodle. The main purpose of these sites is to buy, sell and trade items locally including everything from pets to rare antiques. If you are selling a product you can post it for offer in its specific category so you get the attention of people who are looking for that particular item and you can add a link back to your website for people to view the rest of your inventory. If you offer a service you can do the same thing or add a description and link to your business under resumes.

These are two powerful, proven and cost effective ways to branch out and drive traffic to your website from different directions.