~~~Guest Moderator: Debra Mastaler, Alliance-Link~~~
Warm greetings from historic Williamsburg, Virginia! I've been a
long-time reader of this super newsletter, and am honored to be able
to submit tips and techniques on how to develop a successful
link-building campaign for the case-study site, Nobscot Corporation.
Given all the attention link popularity and reciprocal linking get,
it's not necessary to go into the philosophies behind starting a
linking campaign. However, it's important to mention that following
links from other sites is the second most common way Web sites are
found. This alone should make them a very important part of your
marketing strategy!
So let's start at the beginning...
Looking at the main page of Nobscot's site, I immediately notice they
don't offer a links page. Chances are in today's cyber game, no one
will link to you if you do not offer to reciprocate. Trading links is
a powerful promotional strategy used to drive qualified traffic and
improve link popularity. If Nobscot wants to play ball, they'll need
to create a links (or resource) page, and trade links accordingly.
I used the words resource page as an alternative to links page,
because I think it's a better fit for the Nobscot site. Whatever you
decide to call your page, be sure it's clearly labeled as such, and is
also located within the first two levels of your site. Make sure to
offer detailed information on your linking criteria, right on this
page, and also an HTML coded link that can be copied. You want to
make it as easy as possible to swap links with other sites.
A quick check of Nobscot's current backlinks shows most of them to be
internal links, with only a handful coming from outbound sources.
They'll need to increase the number of quality hyperlinks pointing
toward the Nobscot site if they are to benefit from a boost in link
popularity, Web site traffic and spider-crawling frequency!
Nobscot needs to start the search process by asking themselves a short
list of key questions:
1. Who are their top three competitors?
2. What are their top five-keyword phrases?
3. What associations/professional organizations do they belong to?
Armed with the answers, Nobscot can begin the search process by
reviewing the sites linking to their competitors. Using
link://www.competitor.com they will be able to find all the sites
linking to their top three competitors in Google. There are also a
number of free link popularity tools to find sites linking to a URL.
My favorite is at: http://www.marketleap.com/publinkpop. (Queries All The Web, Alta Vista, AOL, Google, HotBot and MSN.)
After carefully reviewing those sites, they should bookmark the
*keepers* and move on. The next step would be for Nobscot to research
their top keyword
phrases and the professional organizations. I use a couple of Meta
search engines, directories, and Google to do this. (Google, because
it uses link popularity as a part of its ranking algorithm, plus it's
my favorite!) Again, Nobscot should carefully review each site that
they find, and bookmark the ones with potential.
And now for the challenging part! Once they've accumulated a lengthy
list of potential link partners, Nobscot should write a customized
email to each site. In it, they should include a standardized list of
information about their Web site (URL, email, name of the owner,
contact information and URL of the page their link would go on), and
explain their reason for contacting them. It shouldn't be a long
email, but needs to include the key information and ASK FOR THE LINK!
Whenever I start a link campaign, I create a spreadsheet outlining
each Web site I send an email to. It's important to keep track of
mail dates, responses, URL's, follow-up emails, etc. It's very
important to stay organized in the process in order to project a
positive image for your company. This organization also helps you to
be able to respond quickly and accurately to questions and requests
from the site owners.
Some dos and don'ts for linking campaigns:
* Consider offering an incentive or free trial of your service/product
in your link request. Get the link and showcase your product!
* Send a second, follow-up email 14 business days after the first one
if you have not heard from a potential site you felt was a great
partner. You don't want to send a follow up email too soon or too
frequently, because you stand a chance of alienating the site for good
if you do this. They may have good reasons for not responding right
away. Move on.
* If you can't find the name of the Web site owner, direct your email
to the Sales Department. Sales people know an opportunity when they
see one and will usually respond!
* Don't link to Free For All (FFA) pages or "link farms." Period.
* Employ netiquette and common sense to your approach. Remember the
golden rule, "Treat others as you would like to be treated!"
* Don't launch a link campaign if your site is under construction or
has any part not working.
* Check your links every 30 days to see if they are still in place.
If they aren't, send a short, polite note asking to reinstate them.
And conversely, check and remove broken links on your site.
* If you outsource your link-building project, be sure to discuss
your expectations before the campaign begins. Start off on the right
foot and you'll hit a home run with your link campaign!
* Say "thank you" when someone adds your site to his or her site.
Are there other avenues to search for potential link partners? You
bet! A quick list Nobscot could focus on would be their vendors,
customers, suppliers, topic specific directories, community
directories, webrings, employment agencies and industry consultants.
The Nobscot site has tremendous potential as a link partner and will
benefit from a link campaign by gaining search engine ranking,
credibility and terrific content!
Debra Mastaler
Effective Link Building Campaigns
Alliance-Link
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