Ways of Natural Link Building
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Link building is one of the most important things you can do in terms of off-site search engine optimization. As you may know, search engines like Google tend to rank pages higher in search results depending on the number and quality of links to those pages. In essence, the more links you have, the more likely you are to get a good ranking if someone searches for keywords related to your site.
Some of the most common ways to link to a website are the following:
Link requests - Here you simply ask another website owner to create a link back to your website. These will actually hit or miss and depend on how well you can convince the website owner that your link on his website is beneficial to both him and his visitors.
Link purchase - This is the big taboo, but it still happens. Instead of politely requesting a link from a website owner, you approach them with a business instead. Some consider it advertising in the form of a link instead of a banner, but Google believes it's a good reason to punish a website.
Directories - There are a vast number of directories - general directories, local directories and niche directories. Some allow you to create an entry free of charge, while others are paid. The latter does not constitute a "bad link purchase", even if you pay for the link.
Content links - There are many ways to create links about content, from creating articles to article marketing networks to guest blogging with a link in your author biography.
Social links - I'm not just talking about links in your social profiles (although we will be addressing these). This refers to all the ways that online social business (blog comments, forum posting, answering questions, and using social media) can lead to links.
For this article we will not focus on the first three (inquiries, purchases or directories), but on the last two - in terms of content and social aspects. Why? Because the chances are good that you are already doing most of them or know that you should!
The reason why these two are so important is that they are not just about creating links for an SEO value (although some of them will have some SEO value anyway). It is about creating links that people are likely to click on. So instead of waiting for clicks and conversions from higher rankings in the search results, you could get both immediately through the link itself!
Linking with content
Content creation is a great way to get valuable backlinks to your website while demonstrating expertise in your industry. There are three ways in which you can get links from other websites besides your own blog, where you should also have great content.
Guest Blogging
Guest blogging is a great way to get your name, company and link out to a new audience. Once you have some good content on your own blog as an example of your writing, you can start reaching other blogs in your industry whose listeners could be potential customers. Since you have success with smaller blogs in your industry (success is posts with a good level of social engagement and comments), you can use them as examples to introduce them to larger blogs in your industry.
Below are some tips for building links for guest blogs:
- Don't just think of guest blogging as an exercise in link building. Think of it as a way to position yourself or your brand as an authority in your niche and drive visitors back to your site. In this sense, create great content that fits the blog and its audience
- Read other guest posts on the blog first. See how they format their posts and follow them accordingly
- When it comes to links, you will most likely add them via an author biography. Look at the biographies of other guest bloggers to see how many links you can have and where they should lead (your website, blog, and/or social networks)
- Make sure that the keyword phrase and the page you link to in your author biography appeals to the blog's audience to maximize the number of potential clicks
Article Marketing
Many popular article marketing sites like EzineArticles experienced a huge success when the Google Panda update came out. Since then, they have been working to update their networks to focus more on quality than letting everyone get away with quantity. However, it is not certain how much real value is created by link building through article marketing on these sites.
My suggestion would be to look for article communities (not just directories, but real communities) whose audience fits your demographic. And when I talk about communities, I mean sites like HubPages and Squidoo, where members can connect with other members through private messages, comments on their profiles/articles, or even by hanging on forums. This way you can find other members in your industry or members who would be good potential customers, contact them and finally lead them to your articles and websites.
Videos
Another great type of content that can be used to build links is video. Most video networks (YouTube and Vimeo are my favorites) allow you to add a link to the description of your video.
This means that someone who comes across your videos through search or on YouTube itself can go directly to your site. Therefore, your videos, like your written content, should be informative and aimed at attracting the right kind of audience for your business.
Remember, videos don't have to mean anything too crazy (or even something that gets you behind the camera). You can convert PowerPoint presentations into movie files, you can upload pre-recorded webinars, or you can use screencasting software to create a video tutorial with a recording of your voice and computer screen. All these options make for great video content!
Link to social profiles
If you participate in social media, you are likely to be sitting on several plots, which may contain one or more links. Let's take a look at where you can put your links, where and how they affect you.
On Twitter you can set links in two places - in the web and organic section of your profile. To edit your profile, go to Twitter and use the drop-down list to find your settings. Then edit your profile to include a link in the Web and Bio section of your profile. This way you will have two links in your profile.
How does this affect the establishment of connections? There are many other sites that will access your Twitter profile information and use either your bio-information only or your bio and web link. Having a link in both means that you are covered in both cases as you get more links to your sites.
While there aren't as many sites on Facebook that retrieve your user information, your Facebook page has many places where you can place a live hyperlink.
These help visitors to your Fan Page see your other social properties, blogs and websites. Try to use links that are as short as possible, but at the same time, don't just use bit.ly or other shortened links, as these are often used by social spammers to trick involuntary visitors into clicking on shady links. Bit.ly works well if you want to shorten a Facebook or LinkedIn profile, as it uses its own short domains on.fb.me and linkd.in, which only lead to these pages.
LinkedIn allows you to have three links in your profile, each with customized anchor text (although they do not count for the SEO value). Think of the anchor text as a way to get visitors to click on the links. To edit your websites, click Edit Profile under the Profile drop-down menu. Then click on the Edit link next to the links of your website. Be sure to use the Other option in each drop-down menu to get the customized anchor text.
Personal Google+ profile
Google+ offers you the possibility to add a large number of links. Try not to make it look like spam, but be sure to take advantage of this opportunity. To add links, go to the Info tab in your Google+ profile and click the Edit Profile button. Then click the Other Profiles, Contributor to, Recommended Link and Introduction sections to edit them. In each of these sections, you can enter links to your websites (and the pages they contain) with custom anchor text.
Please note that the following links should be of a certain type:
Other profiles - These links should lead to pages that revolve around you, such as your info page on a blog or website, and other social profiles.
Contributor to - These links should lead to your own author pages that you write for, such as your own blogs, blogs you contribute to, or other important websites you contribute to.
Recommended Link - These links can lead to any other website of your choice.
You can create the same types of links on your Google+ pages, except that you only have the Recommended Links option in the right sidebar.
YouTube
Thanks to the new YouTube channel design, you can have more than one link to your other websites at the top of your channel profile. To edit the new channel design for adding links, click the Edit button next to the About section. Then add the title (custom anchor text) and URL for each link.
While the downside is that these links are nofollow (or otherwise ignored by search engines), the upside is that you can add more of them for visitors to click on!
Linking with commitment
Working with the communities in your niche / industry will help you build your personal, professional and business brand. Below are ways to combine building relationships with your commitment to get the best of both worlds.
Blog comments
Whenever you start blog commenting, make sure you comment on posts because you want to say something important, not just because you want to leave a link. If you do it because you have something to say, your comment will make an impression that will make others curious about you. This curiosity corresponds to a click on your link.
Hints on how to make others want to click on your link in blog comments (besides just filling out the Website / URL input field in the form) include the following:
- Get a Gravatar - Use the email you comment most often, sign up for an account, and assign a photo to each email address you comment with. This ensures that on most blogs that use WordPress, a photo appears next to your comment, and helps blog owners distinguish spam from legitimate comments. Because as a blog owner, I almost never approve a comment without a Gravatar unless I recognize the person's name.
- Always use your real name in the name field of comments. The only exception are WordPress blogs that use the KeywordLuv plugin. These will be known to you because somewhere near the comment form there are instructions on how to use your name@your keyword in the name field, so that your website is linked to the anchor text you specify. This means that you still use your real name in your comment!
- Search for blogs with CommentLuv - search CommentLuv keyword on Google to find them. Whenever you comment on a blog with the CommentLuv plugin, you'll get an additional link to your most recent blog entry below your comment when you enter a blog URL in the website field of the comment form.
- If a blog uses a third-party system such as Disqus, sign up for a profile so you can add your website link and photo to your comments. You will also get a link from your profiles on these networks and a way to track your comment development (see this profile on Disqus for example).
Forums
Forums can be a bit difficult when it comes to getting links. Some communities are happy to accept it, while others call anyone who adds a link to their own site a spammer. You can find great forums in your industry by searching Google for the keyword BoardReader or "powered by vbulletin". Once you find these forums, go to a public post to see if the forum users are allowed to use signatures. They are displayed at the end of each post.
If you don't happen to know everyone on the forum (because it's new or you're the owner of the forum), I'd suggest that you make a few posts in the forum before adding your signature links. Once you've gained some recognition as a valuable member of the community (maybe 15 to 20 posts, preferably not in a day), go to your forum profile and add your signature. If everyone else seems to have just one link in their profile, just add one in your profile. If people have three, take three. Once you've posted a bit in the community, you'll know what works best.
Also make sure (as with any other website) that you fill out your member profile completely. This usually includes at least one place where you can link, and it will help other members get to know you.
R&D Networks
Question and answer networks are great places to build your authority and occasionally drop a link as part of an answer to a question. The major question and answer networks - Quora, LinkedIn Answers, and Yahoo Answers - all have a resource box where you can add links as a reference to your answer or a place to search for more details. In this case, having a blog is handy, as your blog entries will provide better answers than a product link. The latter will probably brand you as a spammer, unless the question is specifically "Where can I buy this product..." and you happen to have it for sale on your website.
As for profiles on these networks, Yahoo Answers does not offer a profile where you can add links. Quora, on the other hand, is one where you will make sure that you fill it out as much as possible. You may have links in your main biography.
You can also have links as part of the topics you follow. When you follow a topic, you will be asked to describe your experience with that topic. In this section, simply add a short blurb with your link.
Bonus Tips
I decided to make a few bonus tips that have nothing to do with content or social engagement, but are also simple ways to naturally generate more links to your website.
Link to the Us page
The first bonus tip is to simply add something to your website that helps others easily link to you. Call it your "link to us" page and make sure it contains the following.
Badges & banners are just simple images that people can use on their website. If possible, create them in a range of different standard sizes so people can find the right one for their site. 125×125, 468×80, and 300×250 are fairly standard banner sizes.
In addition to your badges and banners, be sure to include the HTML code that people can use to link to their site, as shown in the example above. The easier you make it, the more likely people will link to you.
Widgets
Can you imagine a simple widget that fits your website? If so, create a widget that people can place on their website. And make sure that this widget has a link to it!
Email links
Do you send many e-mails? Do you use an online email service like Hotmail, Gmail, AOL or Yahoo? If so, use WiseStamp to create visually appealing email signatures with links to your websites, or simply add links to your websites under your name.
Several people have clicked on these links in my signature and then sent me back an email saying they did not know I write, blog, or photograph freelance. After visiting my website, they wanted to ask about services or photo prints!
Statistics Check the links
Would you like to see some interesting statistics about your website (or someone else's) while creating some quick links to it? Try searching for your domain on the following pages. They will give you some useful information and create a profile page for your domain with a link back to it.
Alexa - On this website you will learn how your domain ranks in global traffic and in your own country. It will also give you additional details, including the number of sites linking to your site, top queries for your site and additional statistics.
Built with Technology Profiles - This site tells you what your domain uses on its website, including content management systems, analytics, frameworks, server information and more.
Quarkbase - This website provides you with the latest Twitter comments related to your domain, traffic statistics and social statistics. For blogs, even the latest and most popular blog entries are retrieved!
About the domain - On this website you will find basic SEO information about your domain such as title, meta description, headers, incoming links and even the Google Analytics ID #.
Similar Site Search - This website tells you websites that it thinks are similar to yours, based on keywords and content.
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