Remember back in the day when “paying for links” as search engine optimization strategies guaranteed a site a top spot on the search rankings? Quality and content didn’t matter, it was all about who had the biggest bankroll to fund the links. Thankfully, today those practices are not only shunned, but also are penalized by the major search engines, especially Google.
So how do you boost your rankings of your site or blog? Simply put, you create your own viral marketing campaigns to get other quality, content-heavy sites and blogs to link back to you. Sound hard? It isn’t, and the time it does take will more than pay for itself through your increasing rank!
Tip #1: Acquire, Link and Repeat
Find a quality site or blog that you enjoy reading, or has content that is relevant to your interest, and consider purchasing it or entering into an ownership agreement. There is a lot of great content out there, and many times the owners simply stop maintaining it or move on to other ventures. As a result you may find a lot of quality sites that can be purchased relatively cheap.
With your newly acquired site, you will link to your content from theirs, and vice versa. Remember the SEO mantra: “Quality builds quality”. You’ll get a boost on both sites! Just remember, be sure to keep the sites up to date and relevant; and never purchase a site (no matter how cheap) if the content is lacking or totally unrelated.
Tip #2: Consider Sponsorship of Local or On-Line Events
Not only is this a great way to generate traffic and link-backs to your site, but depending on the sponsorship may also be a tax deduction! Image that – being able to take a tax deduction for promoting your site!
Find an organization or online event that goes hand in hand with what your site is about. Say you run a website on debt reduction; a good sponsorship there might be to sponsor an online contest aimed at helping people discover alternate ways of gift-giving and celebrating the holidays without spending a lot of money.
The beauty of sponsoring events online is that you also help build up a network of visitors and like-minded business professionals. Sometimes the networking can be far more valuable than the links!
Tip #3: Plant A Seed, Watch it Grow!
Help other bloggers get started by providing the platform, marketing and how-to they need. Nurture the best bloggers to help them grow and continue to deliver great content. Not only is this a great way to help others out and get started in the world of blogging, but it’s an excellent way to get a steady stream of fresh content for your sites!
You can even discover new topics and potential revenue sources if you have some bloggers that have interests that are different than yours. Put out ads and have your staff help them get started – you may be amazed at the content they deliver!
Tip #4: Form a Partnership
If you find a site with a lot of high-quality relevant content offer to form a partnership where you supply them with content and they in turn do the same. Many times other sites are more than willing to share the content with other sites if they believe the partnership will benefit them as well. In order for this to work you will need to look at other sites within your own range (for example, it probably wouldn’t be good to approach the Wall St. Journal unless your traffic was the same as theirs).
Start out small, but realize that as your content partnership grows, your numbers will grow and you may be able to approach larger and larger sites.
Wed, Dec 3, 2008
Link Building