5 Tips to Turning Link Building into Link Earning

by

OMB Kristin

While the

digital marketing

landscape is changing, one thing remains on the priority list for most marketing departments and business owners: links. No matter how much the landscape has changed, the number of high quality links leading back to your brand s website is an important factor in your rankings, your ROI, and your brand awareness. If you want Google s attention, you ve got to have those links so how do you get links when the term link exchange has begun to sound more and more like another word for spamming?

The answer is: earn the links!

The reason people think of link exchanging as synonymous with spamming is because in the past, it has been done the wrong way. At first, many companies built links solely by submitting spammy keyword stuffed articles to low-quality article sites, and putting their own site information on low-quality directories. This was a way to quickly build thousands of one-way backlinks to their site. This is not helping your end user, therefore, its simply not the right way to do things.

A link should be the product of a well-built relationship. Example? You just read a blog by someone who consistently has intelligent and unique insights into your industry, and you think: Hey this person could provide my site s visitors with a lot of information that they would find fascinating and useful! This is where proper link-building can begin. The next step is to build a relationship with this person, and show them that you too have great information that they, in turn, might want to share with their site visitors.

Building an online relationship is the same as building one in real life (you know, its what people did before Facebook). You don t walk up to someone on the street and tell them to please agree to be your friend. Right now. Instead, you find common ground and strike up an interesting conversation. A normal conversation starts with an ice breaker, like a compliment to the guy standing next to you in the checkout line about his killer mustache. The most successful conversations don t begin with a blanket statement like this: Hi, my name is Bob from marketing and I d like to begin a friendship with you starting immediately.

Apply this same principal when link-building online. Tweet at an expert in your industry, complimenting them on their latest blog post. People love to be complimented, so many times this will be an easy way to get the ball rolling. Let the conversation move organically towards what you do, what they do, and how each of you could benefit the other s expertise and resources. People are most likely to respond more favorably to this then being one of 100 bloggers who received from you a mass e-mail asking them to promote your site.

If you build a solid relationship with an expert in your industry, whether it be the CEO of a company who offers a complimentary service, a blogger with a strong voice on a topic pertinent to your company, or a celebrity whose fans use your product, you may find a one-time link is the LEAST they re willing to offer you. You may find yourself mentioned in their social media, recommended to their followers, or asked to be a guest blogger on their own website. Chances are, if your company is worth promoting, relationship building will be a much more effective strategy than old fashioned link building, and will help you reach your goals more efficiently.

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digital media

agency offering services in paid advertising, media buying & planning, pay-per-click, search engine optimization, social media marketing, PR, web analytics and marketing consulting to everyone from entrepreneurs and start-ups to Fortune 500 companies.For more information about how to turn your digital marketing efforts into a successful campaign, visit: http://optmybiz.com

Article Source:

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