Who Will Do a Better Job of Capturing the Right Tone and Feel of Your Blog Business?

While press release writing is specialized work, there are many cases of businesses wanting to write their own press releases instead of outsourcing the work.

It might be that you are a new startup with a limited marketing budget (and thus want to avoid the costs), or maybe you feel that yourself or an in-house employee will do a better job of capturing the right tone and feel of your company.

Whatever the motivation, there are pros and cons to both approaches. This content will discuss the advantages of both options, and then (hopefully) help you make the right decision for your company.

Writing Press Releases Yourself

After reading through this blog post, you should have a clear idea of what is required to write a press release. In short, you need:

• A good story.

• Good writing skills (specific to press releases).

There are distinct advantages of writing your own press releases, and I would fully encourage you to do so if you can consistently write well (or have an employee to write for you). If you are unwilling to invest in an employee, or unsure of how eschewing a professional PR service can help you, read through the following reasons:

Cost

A professionally written press release can cost you anywhere from $200 to $500. Considering that this is just a 1-page document, which will eventually contain information that you will provide, this seems an exorbitant price.

Personalized

While press release writing services make every effort to personalize every press release, there is a distinct style for each writer and for each company as well. Personalized ‘style’ of press or media releases. A powerful example of this is Google – check Google Press for a sample of effective personalized press releases can be.

Be warned though. This is not something easy to accomplish. As press releases are terse, 1-page news items with a very big emphasis on content, it is difficult to establish a style.

Practice will help you improve, and if you feel that the identity and image of your company will be better served by writing the press release yourself rather than outsourcing it, then make sure you read many different press releases from other companies to get a feel of how to build your unique style.

Other Benefits

Being directly involved with your industry, you are in the best position to highlight the advantages of your ‘news’ to your potential consumers and competitors.

You will be able to provide relevant, current information and your insight into your industry will also help you to pinpoint which news hook will be most successful.

Verdict

Matching the expertise of a professional press release writer is a difficult task. On the other hand, in-house press release writing, especially if done by an employee, can be ‘good enough’ if due attention is paid to getting the details right.

Professional Press Release Writing

Despite the obvious advantages of writing your own press release, a professional press release service gives you specific, money-valuable benefits:

Experience

Professional press release services have the advantage of having working in this field for a lot longer than you – they have written (hopefully) dozens of press releases, and know the industry inside out.

As such, they are well placed to avoid mistakes that beginning press release writers might make and are likely to produce good, reliable press releases.

Of course, there is also a chance that the press release might not be what you are looking for – maybe the writer gets the tone wrong, or underplays certain features that you wanted to give prominence to.

The added experience will also ensure that the writer will be able to judge better whether the information you’ve given him is enough, not enough or too much. In addition, there is the value of having an ‘outside’ perspective. Outsourcing your press release to an independent PR service will:

• Allow them to present the news in a more realistic light.

• Discourage you from making a press release without having effective content.

Be careful about putting too much faith in the press release service to tell you what is right or wrong, however. The responsibility of ensuring that there is enough ‘newsworthy’ information in your press release is yours, not of the service.

Time

A press release can take anywhere from 30 minutes to a day to write, revise and get just right. If you are part of a fast-paced company where you measure your time in hundreds of dollars, then spending that much time on a press release might seem expensive especially since you can get better results by outsourcing the press release.

Do not underestimate the time required to write a press release – for your news to be a full-blown success, every little detail has to be just right.

Verdict

It’s just a 1-page document. Why does it cost so much?

I’m faced with that question every day. Considering that you will still have to provide a lot of the information to the press release service, it seems ridiculous to pay over $200 (and up to $500) for a press release. But in the end, it’s the results that justify the costs.

A professionally written press release will always have a better chance of being accepted for distribution, and the experience of a professional PR service will serve you will in making your press release successful.

Another factor working in the favor of professional press release services is their ‘package deals’ – a promise to distribute your press release at a discounted rate if you have your press release written by them.

Costs vs. Expertise

I’ve been saying this throughout the content, and I say it again:

Your press release is (almost) worthless without newsworthy information. Keep this point in your mind as you make the choice between writing the press release yourself (using the advice in thisblog post) and outsourcing it to a professional press release service. Where will that newsworthy information come from? From you.

In fact, even if you outsource the press release, the bulk of the information put in the press release will come from you, either as part of the original specifications presented, or from the questions that the writer will ask you to help him write the press release.

So what are you really paying them for?

Their experience – press release writers have considerable, battle-field knowledge of writing press releases – the kind that only comes through time. You are also paying for their language and marketing skills, as writing a press release requires a specific writing style that does not fit into traditional sales copy.

Don’t hire a sales letter writer to write your press release until you are sure they have experience in writing successful press releases.

However, if you are willing to learn and apply the knowledge from this content (or have an employee as a suitable candidate), in-house press releases can be just as successful as those from a PR service. The key is to do two things repeatedly:

• Ensure that you are fully prepared.

• Differentiate between traditional sales copy and press release writing and make the effort to write ‘in a reporting, unbiased style’.

Choosing the Right Service

While this content goes a long way towards helping you write your own press releases, the primary aim is to guide you into preparing the best press release for your company, each and every time.

And sometimes, a company does not have the time, or the technical skills, to dedicate resources towards in-house press release writing.

In such cases, outsourcing your press release requirements becomes necessary. This section, although concise, will help you in picking the right service for your company.

Hiring a PR service

If you are looking to hire a professional press release service, make sure that you complete the following checklist.

• Does the service have a portfolio or a client’s list? Make sure that you can see visible results, and don’t be afraid to ask for proof.

• Compare costs and services between different PR companies to make sure you get the best deal.

• Understand the fine print. Some PR firms may not allow for more than 1 revision, and some also don’t allow for free consultations – which essentially means that if the PR firm decides that your ‘story’ is not newsworthy, you would have ended up paying for nothing.

• Don’t automatically jump for combined packages (press release writing and distribution). Make sure the investment is worth it, and that you see a list of the media contacts (at least their names, if not their contact information) that your press release will be distributed to.

• Themed distributions are very different in impact to generic distributions, so don’t fall into the trap of paying less and actually getting something that is worth nothing to your company.

• If you like the company’s portfolio, try to negotiate a discounted package in return for bringing all your press release business to them. PR firms would normally not refuse long-term business relationships, and the promise of continued business can possibly lower your long-term costs as well.

Hiring a freelance writer

Of course, if the cost is a really serious issue, and you cannot have the press release written in-house (for various reasons) then you may be better served by outsourcing to a freelance writer.

There are several online freelance websites from where you can hire good writers – Elance and RentACoder are the most popular, and most effective.

With freelance writers, there is the advantage of saving on money – a good press release can be written for $100 or less. On the other hand, there is a risk of not getting what you really want.

I’ll not go into the details of how to ensure that you don’t get your money’s worth as there are many ”freelance hiring”guides on the Internet (some good, some bad, and some bad copies of good guides).

Just make sure that you follow the same pattern as you would when hiring a PR service – check their portfolio, and do your best to provide them with complete information.

RentACoder has many safeguards that prevent buyers (like you) from projects that go bad, so trust the system and follow their advice.

However, one bad apple does not make everyone else incompetent. Freelance websites are full of hard-working individuals wanting to earn good money – make sure that you find someone who is capable of doing the job, and then enjoy the benefits of a well-written press release for a fraction of the price.

What is your opinion on DIY vs Professional writers?

5 More Local Link Building Tips

Does your site’s success depend on receiving traffic from users in the local area? Whether you have one storefront or nationwide locations, link building with a local focus is important to keep traffic numbers up. Maintaining your rankings for competitive local terms can require quite a bit of  effort. Last month I shared five tips on this very topic here on the SEM-Group.net blog, but I thought I’d give a few more. Here are five more tips on finding local link building opportunities.

Network for Links
Industry or networking events in your local area are prime places to share your business card. Why not take it to the next level and use this as an opportunity to build links? Ask people you meet locally if they have websites or blogs. Can you offer up a guest blog post for them in the future? Maybe they have a partners/link/recommended section on their site. Do research on those you meet to find link building opportunities. Write this information on the back of their business card so you can reach out in the future for possible linking opportunities. Slowly but surely you can build buzz about your company just by offering to write a few posts on a few local blogs or links placed on local sites. Additionally you get some very juicy local links along the way.

Groupon for Links
Recently I attended a Groupon presentation and it was mentioned that local search rankings can sometimes increase when a Groupon is successful and catches on. Certainly makes sense – many sites pickup deals from Groupon and post about them, often with a link back to your site. Some of these sites are specific to your local area and can be the perfect local link for your site. Its reasonable to assume you’d see some possible ranking improvements. Note: some businesses certainly see Groupons diminishing their business rather than helping, so use at your own risk. Really take the time to examine all angles to determine if offering a deal is right for your niche.

Cover Local News
Do you have the resources to blog regularly and become a content publisher? Covering the news or local events is a way some have found success in garnering local links. Who else but local folks want to share news and events in the area. They’ll share your posts and some news might even get picked up by local blogs and news sites – linking back to you as the source. Submit your blog to Google News and get extra pickup and possible traffic.

Charity Tweetup
Have a local cause in mind? Organize a Tweetup at a local bar or restaurant, invite local vendors, bring in a local band and invite the community to get together for a good cause. Even if you don’t have the time to organize one you can take advantage of a good ol’ Tweetup. Look for local tweetups in your area and see if you can become a sponsor and get added to promotion efforts – and of course a link on the site. This higher tech crowd is good to network with and some are also likely to tweet, share on Facebook, write about it, take pictures, and otherwise possibly mention the event and your brand.

Colleges, Universities & Vocational Training Centers
Places of higher education are always looking for businesses in the local area who want to partner with students to help them learn skills for the workplace. Offering an internship program through a local college, university or vocational training center can present a link building opportunity. Proactively search out schools that have an area on their site where they feature businesses offering internships or on their thank you pages with links to their websites. Everyone knows that links from .edu websites can be some of the best – plus you’ll be helping to train tomorrows workforce or get some cheap labor out of the process.

Well, that makes 10 tips for local link building. Have more to add to the list? Please share with us in the comments below!

5 Common Link Building Faux Pax to Avoid

If you have been in the link building business over the past years, you must have noticed that things don’t work the same way any longer.

Generating tons of search engine traffic by slapping a few reciprocal links on your page simply does not work.

Before you embark on your SEO link building quest, it’s useful to understand what strategies DID matter a while ago, but are merely obsolete today – learn from the history, you know.

#1: PRECISE ANCHOR TEXTS

Previously, SEOs used to optimize their sites by using the same anchor text for all their links.

Well, this strategy is not that hot these days; as a matter of fact, you can be penalized by Google for doing it and not even know it.

Natural anchor texts are the key today.

But what is natural you might ask?

Basically, a natural link looks like it was built by a user, not an SEO. Normal users would not use a precise anchor text in their links, and neither should you – ALL the time, anyway.

In practical terms, when working on your link building, don’t just use your high value keywords in your links, but throw in a few “natural speech” words in there as well, like “cool site”, “click here”, etc.

Don’t over-optimize!

#2: GOOGLE PAGERANK

I can’t believe there are still so many discussions about the validity of PageRank in the SEO world these days. I suppose if so much is written about it, somebody wants to read it, right?

As far as link building is concerned, PageRank is not the best indicator of the page strength.

The famous green bar has been a JOKE ever since Matt Cutts of Google confirmed that Google “takes care of people querying the PR data too much or too heavily.”  (The source is a bit old, but if anything changed since then, it would be the fact that Google tried to downplay PageRank even more.)

Sounds like Google returns random page rank data if they feel like it – just because it’s fun to fool SEOs.

But why did I list PageRank as one of the factors I look for in a perfect link?

Simply because we don’t have too many alternatives to measure page authority aside from PR and maybe SEOMoz Page Authority metric, which I use quite a bit as well.

Either one of those metrics can be used as an indicator of the page strength, but not the primary factor by any means.

#3: ALEXA RANK

This metric is geared towards online marketers and does not truly measure ALL the traffic that might come to your site.

It’s based on the sample of Alexa toolbar users, is browser-specific and can be easily manipulated (from what I’ve heard anyway).

Plus, the formula Alexa uses to determine its page rank is overwhelmingly debated.

Once again, it’s a good indicator of the site authority, but should be used along with other factors to determine if any given site is truly a good link building candidate.

#4: GOOGLE BACKLINK DATA

Referring to the link:somedomain.com Google query.

Don’t ever trust Google to really tell you how many links a specific website has. Plus, when you do a Google search on your links, random samples are returned, so you might see the spammiest of all the links you have.

Yahoo! Site Explorer used to be a great backlink research tool, but alas, it’s out of commission.

I’ve done a lot of research on the alternatives, and so far my two best suggestions for link research are:

1. Market Samurai: if you already own Market Samurai, look no further.

I love their SEO competition section. It used to be powered by Yahoo! Site Explorer, but was recently changed to Majestic SEO – another great backlink checker that otherwise requires a monthly subscription to use.

Here’s a video on how to use the SEO Competition module of Market Samurai:

http://youtu.be/dg-7x1DI8W0

2. SEOSpyGlass: this software goes a few steps further than Market Samurai as far as backlink analysis is concerned.

My favorite part is the fact that it measures the VALUE of a link, plus the fact that their free version is free for life.

#5: GOOGLE CACHE DATE

This metric has also been used and abused by SEOs to the point that it can’t be relied upon. Juicy pages that rank are often returned as having no cache set.

So forget about the cache date as well.

Marketing Takeaway

Simple: if you are heavily relying upon any one of the above metrics to determine whether any given site/page is a good one to get a link from, stop it.

Effective link building is all about diversity.

5 Geospecific Link Building Tips

When I’m approached with a client who heavily relies on business from a specific geographic area may seem daunting to come up with advanced strategy for SEO without a bit of out-of-the-box thinking. There are only so many profiles you can submit, customers who review your business, citations you can claim, and onsite optimization changes to make. Eventually there comes a time when you need a strategic link building campaign that focuses on giving search algorithms the signals needed to improve your geospecific rankings.

Through the use of content marketing, social media, and traditional link building you can compete against the rest of that 7 pack. The concept is simple: look for sites that are designed and used almost exclusively by those in your geospecific area. Those signals can help improve local rankings. Here are a few tips to help you with your geospecific link building.

Local Community

If you have the luxury of being a business in a large metropolis or heavily populated area you stand a chance to integrate your business into the local community through a variety of avenues. Reach out to local bloggers, influencers, artists, photographers, business owners and PR professionals. These are the people who will want to link to your site, share the good word about your brand, and of course become your customers too. Many of them likely have websites or blogs where they can link back to you.

Contact local organizations like Local First Arizona, here in Phoenix where I live. Their goal is to work to support the local economy. Organizations like this, promoting the local movement, exist in many other areas too.

Government and Local Resources

The department of commerce websites often contain large lists of local businesses with information such as phone, address and website. Submit your business to sites like this and to local resource sites also. Using an advanced search command such as “phoenix” “list” “businesses” “add your company” or “phoenix” “list” “add your company” “pizza” can yield some decent results for local resource pages.

Targeted Local Directories & Libraries

Many local directories exist still today. More commonly used prior to the popularity of search engines, local directories are a great place to obtain a link. Advanced search commands, just as described above, can showcase some opportunities. Try adding “add your link” to the searches listed above to find additional sites.

Libraries often have local resources linked to from their sites as well. Again, advanced search commands come in handy to track these sites down.

Newspaper Websites

Online newspapers and news sites offer a great way for businesses to highlight their businesses – allowing them to become contributors. A news site like NowPublic.com are crowd powered sites, relying on citizen journalists to help tell the news. They are looking for experts to help contribute and as an expert in your own field you can apply. Bio pages on these reputable sites often have in content do-follow link building opportunities, along with of course the content itself.

Radio Stations

More and more radio stations are becoming content publishers. Many have entire forums and social components to their sites where users can drop links. Additionally some rely on citizen journalism as well. Apply to become a writer or search around the site to see if they have a local resource list to add your business to.

These are just a few of MANY strategies that work to reinvigorate a geospecific link building campaign. Have you done much geospecific link building? Tell us about some of the ways you were able to find some great local links in the comments below.

Whitehat Link Building at Its Finest

Many tout link building as a laborious and often unsuccessful venture. Sure it’s hard work that requires manual research, networking and a bit of schmoozing – but it’s not impossible. There are some really easy ways to do the research and compile lists of sites to reach out to…and you don’t even have to spend much time doing it!

Consider the below tips before you start on your next whitehat link building adventure.

Personal Websites

These days just about everyone and their mom has a blog. That means your employees and your customers do too! Check through your list of employees and clients and think about opportunities to garner a link on their sites. Sure not every one of your clients or employees sites will be exactly what you want, but pick out the ones that are applicable. Think about a value proposition before you approach the employee or client. Why should they link to you? For clients you might offer to add them to your own website in return or offer a discount on their next purchase.

For link builders who might not have direct access to a client’s employee list or client list – try some research. Check through LinkedIn search, Twitter search and even Facebook search. Many employees will list employers on Facebook. Then add your findings to a list and approach your link building client with this opportunity as a way to garner some good “low hanging fruit” type links. Have them do the dirty work of reaching out to make it more personal and it’ll likely improve the success rate.

Brand Mentions

Working with large brands I’ve seen this many times – websites large and small write about their brand but don’t link! If they are willing to write about the brand don’t you think they’d be willing to link too? Okay, maybe not all the time … but sometimes certainly!

Set up a Google alert for your brand name. Also set up Google alerts for misspellings of your brand name. As brand mentions roll into your e-mail compile a list and prioritize the opportunities. Every month make it a goal to reach out to at least some of these sites and ask for a link back to your site.  Every now and again, as applicable, let the writer/webmaster know about news or information about your products, services, awards, etc… Since they were willing to write about you without you knowing, they might be willing to write about you again – so give them the information to do so. It might garner some good links to internal product pages.

Industry Resource List

Between library sites, government sites, and even education websites – there are many resource lists that I like to call industry lists. You’ve seen them, a list of a large number of resources for the casual web visitor to peruse at their leisure. In my experience there are industry lists for just about every single industry out there.

Using advanced search commands look for these industry lists. Use search commands looking for a number of your competitors brand names mentioned on a site. Say you’re Alltel. You have quite a few big name competitors: Verizon, Virgin Mobile, Sprint, AT&T, etc… Do a search like this: “Verizon” “virgin mobile” “sprint” “AT&T” “list”. Dig through the list and find an industry list where Alltel isn’t listed but should be and reach out to that webmaster. Another option is to have your client reach out directly (or you – from a branded e-mail address), which may increase the likelihood of being listed on a .edu, .gov, or library site.

Charities

Especially true this time of year, businesses donate to charity. Talk about a pretty juicy link! Most non-profit websites are .orgs, have a lot of incoming links and many have a lot of traffic. If you’re a partner, sponsor, on the board, or otherwise involved with a charity look for link building opportunities. Almost all charities should have sponsors and/or an acknowledgement page on their site.

As link builders you should look at a client’s newsroom and press releases for charities they are donating to if your client isn’t a constant source of information (which is 99% the case in my experience). Then do a bit of research to find those sites and if they have a place for a link. Present your client with a list of opportunities and have their PR team do the dirty work for you to ask for links or logos on the site. Remember – if they opt for logos, don’t forget to customize that alt text!

These are just a few ways you can use some whitehat techniques to help improve the number of unique domains linking to your site. Feel free to share additional ideas in the comments below!

What Makes the Best Backlink?

Link building is an essential part of any successful SEO campaign; there’s no arguing about that. In order to rank for any given keyword, we need backlinks – and lots of them.

However, not all links are created equal.

The reason it’s important to know how valuable your links are is very simple: the higher the quality, the fewer links you need to get ranked.

The following 10 qualities are the ones I always look for in a perfect link.

#1. High PR of the domain

High PR can be equated to more domain authority in the eyes of Google. The more authority a site has, the higher quality the links coming from that domain will be.

My ideal homepage PR is 4+.

Of course, it’s a whole lot better to have a link on an inner page that has high PR of its own.

#2. Keyword-Rich Anchor Text

Google uses anchor text pointing to a page to determine what that page is about.

If I start building links to this post with “Ana Hoffman” as anchor text (like a lot of blog commentators would do), then Google might find that this post is more relevant to that keyword than to such keywords as “link building” or “backlinks“.

It’s best if you try to rank each page of your site for one specific keyword or variations of it, but of course, this is not a must – just works better that way.

Also, try to have at least 70-80% of exact match anchor text. The other 20-30% could be naked URLs, long-tail variations of the keyword, or even a few “click here” links.

#3. Long-term Link

This is the kind of link that won’t be removed in a few days.

Forum links are one such example. You create a new profile, sprinkle it with some links, place some comments on a few threads just to learn a week later that the forum moderators decided to remove all your links.

Here’s a better way to create forum profiles (thanks to Gerald for teaching me this link building trick): create your profiles without any links in them, wait for a week or two for the moderators to check it out, and THEN go back and add your links.

The chances of them sticking are much higher this way.

#4. Page is Indexed by Google

It only makes sense to add your links to pages that Google already knows about, right?

However, there are plenty of times when it’ll be up to you to make sure that the page your links are added to is indexed, like in article marketing for instance.

I strongly suggest that you keep track of all the URLs where your new content is placed and make sure all those pages are indexed by pinging them, linking to them in a few comments – just to name a couple of ways of doing it.

#5. Link Building Consistency

This is where most sites get in trouble.

The webmasters fail to maintain link velocity, i.e. to build links on a regular basis.

So what happens is a few hundred or even thousand of links come in within a span of a couple of days and then… nothing.

Very obvious one way link building pattern that can land you in Google sandbox.

#6. No Bad-Neighborhood Links

I would never add a link to a page that already has links to sites like porn, pharmaceuticals, etc. – you don’t want your site to be associated with bad neighborhood sites in any way.

#7. Active Sites

An active site with fresh content posted frequently, with lots of signs of reader engagement, like comments, social media shares, etc. is much more likely to be crawled often, which means your links will be quickly discovered and indexed.

The following 3 qualities might raise some eyebrows; let’s talk about it in comments if you disagree.

#8. Not Sidebar/Footer Links

It sounds like a great deal to be listed by another site in their blogroll.

However, aside from branding and potential traffic generation, those links might not be worth as much, since it’s not that difficult to obtain them.

#9. Relevancy is Overrated

There’s a lot of talks about getting links from niche-specific sites only.

I haven’t seen any conclusive testing that’s been done on that.

On the other hand, I’ve heard of plenty of link builders who ranked their sites on page 1 with nothing but “irrelevant” links.

#10. Authority Outbound Links

Yet another debatable point.

However, I, among many other SEO’s, believe that it helps to have your links on a page that links out to authority sites relevant to the topic in hand.

Here’s a good example of this train of thought:

• A Little Known Way to Improving Your SEO by Linking to Your Competition (DIYThemes blog)

And yet another one:

• Link Intelligence: What Goldilocks Can Teach You About Linking Out (Traffic Generation Cafe)

Marketing Takeaway

And there you have it.

Boxing gloves on?

Comment to show me that you’re alive!

The Golden Rule of Effective SEO Link Building

SEO link building is a very important part of any search engine optimization strategy. If you do it right your keywords will improve on the search engine result pages and the organic traffic to your website will increase. But what exactly do you need to do?

The golden rule of effective SEO link building is to diversify your link building methods. Think of it this way, if you are a boxer that can only throw a left hook you will most likely lose all of your fights. In the same way links that are built by using only one method will not be very effective.

There are plenty of SEO link building methods around and when you combine them the impact of your link building efforts will visibly improve. Two link building methods will be discussed in more detail in this article and you are welcome to use them to diversify your link building (Tip – make a list of the link building methods that you intend using and draw-up a weekly link building schedule with slots for all of the methods.)

Content traps and article marketing:

• One of the most effective link building methods available today is the use of original and unique content to build links and generate traffic.
• Start by researching popular search phrases for your website, product or service and choose keywords with a low level of competition.
• Write original articles using the keywords that you have chosen.
• Submit the articles to article directories and Blogs.
• Build new links by linking back to your website in the resource box of each article.
• In addition your articles should show-up in the search results for the low competition keywords that you have chosen thereby generating traffic to your website (content trap).

Blog commenting:

• This method has been abused but it is still very effective when used in combination with other link building methods.
• Search for Blogs that are relevant to your website, product or service and ensure that they allow you to enter your name and URL when posting a comment.
• Read the article and post a comment that is useful and informative (you need to give in order to receive.)
• Webmasters delete comments that they view as spam and it is important that you add value with your comment and not try and sell yourself.
• Post comments on both do-follow and no-follow Blogs to ensure that the search engines view the links as “natural”.

In addition to the two methods discussed above you can build new links to your website through the use of bookmarks on social sites, forum profiles and posts, submitting your website URL to link directories and the uploading of videos to popular video sites.  SEO link building is very effective when you combine three or more of the available methods. Start improving your keyword search optimization today by becoming a boxer with more than just a left hook in your arsenal.

Top Three Link Building Tactics: Leave No Stone Unturned!

We are all more than aware that in the world of search engine optimization, it is an ever-changing industry. With that being said, it is more important than ever to stay ahead of the game with your link building tactics, especially since many companies are continuing to rely upon outdated tactics that no longer work. I think that we can all agree that spamming is becoming more and more obvious to Google, even resulting in penalization.

To avoid this type of outcome altogether and continue to create genuine back links to your website that will last for years to come, here are some of the best lesser used techniques to get you started:

1. Article Marketing: How is this a lesser known technique, you may ask? Anyone and everyone out there have already submitted an article to Ezine at this point, but the important thing to keep in mind is that you must provide quality content. This is advantageous because quality and hot content submitted to article directories will most likely be picked up by other websites seeking content. In many cases, your article may be picked up by a website of a higher page rank, automatically offering a link back to you as an added bonus. You can also take this one step further, if you see websites using your article in accordance to ezine terms then you can approach those websites with an offer for unique article with your links in it.

   So how do you create this hot content for the article directories? Instead of writing generic filler content related to your niche market, search for your keywords on popular sites like Digg and even Twitter for inspiration. These are sites run by and for the people, and you will find a slew of resources linking to the hottest news articles related to your keywords. From there, you can see what the people are really after and write a corresponding article that will be more prone to being picked up by a popular website for reposting. It’s as simple as that.

2. Yahoo Answers: Again, Yahoo Answers is not a venue where you can spam to get easy back links. In fact, that practice is adamantly discouraged. Instead, you can use Yahoo Answers for the Holy Grail of link building, which is setting yourself up as an expert in your field. Once you have achieved this task, people will start to turn to you and your company for information, and they will also link back to blogs, articles, and answers that you have already posted. After all, you are the expert, so why wouldn’t people trust you?Yahoo Answers does not offer Do Follow links, but they do have a section within each Yahoo Answers forum to list websites as references for an answer. These links alone will often draw traffic back to the original website if you have provided a relevant answer. Of course, you do not necessarily need to only promote your website but instead, become a well-rounded expert in your niche market who provides valuable answers, and people will automatically be attracted to visit your website because of the authority you have created.

3. Feature guest blogs. If you have a blog for your website or online store, this is the perfect way to continue to update it with unique content and to also offer interesting posts for your customers and readers. Beyond just updating your blog regularly with content, it is also a brilliant idea to incorporate guest blogging. Guest blogging will help bring inbound links to your site, and it will also build your reputation as a brand.

Start by reaching out to other blogs within your niche market, or use guest blogging resources, like Blogger Linkup. You can offer to do an exchange of guest blog posts with many companies, which will give a link back to your website as a bonus. Even better, the longer that your guest blog stays on a company’s website, the more valuable it becomes as a link back to your website. There is also a benefit in posting guest blogs on your own website because a blogger will normally promote his or her guest blog to their reader base. This means that all of the regular readers of a specific blog will take a swing by your blog to see the guest blog post, and they may potentially return if you have good content related to that niche. This means an instant spike in traffic for you if done successfully!

These three little known link building tips may seem complicated, but when you invest time in them on a weekly basis within your marketing plan, you are guaranteed to see serious results in new visitors and valuable links back to your website.

The Value of In-Content Keyword Links

This is a guest post from Carol Wiley. It is part of The “Bad Ass” SEO Guest Blogging Contest.

I get a lot of link requests from sites that want to exchange links and put my link on a long page full of links. I usually delete the requests without replying.

Why? How much credibility do you think search engines give to a link amid 50 or 100 other links? Here’s what Google has to say: “Some webmasters engage in link exchange schemes and build partner pages exclusively for the sake of cross-linking, disregarding the quality of the links, the sources, and the long-term impact it will have on their sites. This is in violation of Google’s webmaster guidelines [emphasis mine] and can negatively impact your site’s ranking in search results.”

What’s the option if you want to exchange links? Relevant in-content links – links from within a content page using a relevant keyword.

Taking this approach means you have to find relevant sites (that don’t directly compete with your site) related to content pages you already have on your site. You contact a site and offer to link from a content page using anchor text that includes a relevant keyword in exchange for an in-content link from a quality page on the other site.

This approach offers the opportunity for deep-linking (getting links to pages other than the homepage). For example, if you have a landscaping site, you could approach a rose-growing site and ask for a keyword link to one of your pages that complements, but does not compete, with the rose site. You also offer to link from one of your rose or flower pages to a page on the other site that contains information you don’t offer.

Or you have a beauty-related site with an article about pedicures. In your article, you can link to a site with more detailed information about sterilizing pedicure tools – as I just did here. In return, you might request a link to one of your pages about relaxation (with the anchor text ‘relaxation’) from the other site’s article Relaxation Benefits of Pedicures.

Two points to keep in mind when choosing link exchanges:

(1) Make sure all links on your site provide value to your reader. In other words, choose links to benefit your site’s visitors, not to artificially attempt to influence search engine rankings.

(2) Link only to quality sites, and generally only to sites with similar or related topics.

Although links are important for SEO, Google explicitly says that the best way to get links is by creating content to which people want to link. Using your time to create this content can provide a higher payoff than excessive time spent trying to set up link exchanges, especially because you have to educate many site owners about in-content keyword links.

3 Tips for Effective ‘Link Luv’

This is a guest post from John Landells. It is part of The “Bad Ass” SEO Guest Blogging Contest.

As Internet Marketers, one of the things that we’re constantly looking for is how we can get targeted traffic for the lowest cost.  By now, I’m sure you realise that the single most effective way of doing this is by investing the time and effort in generating good organic search engine rankings.  In other words, you can get on page one of Google by paying a fortune through AdWords, or you can instead choose to invest the time and do it properly!

In this article, I’d like to share with you 3 tips that I’ve found to be extremely effective in getting ‘link luv’ (backlinks) to my site with only a small time investment.

Articles

You’re probably familiar with this already.  Articles are still an extremely effective method for getting link luv to your site and building your authority within the search engines.  However, there’s a right way and a wrong way to do it.  The wrong way is to over-use your keywords throughout your whole article, making it difficult to read, then uploading that one piece to as many article sites as you can find.

In my opinion, a far better technique is to aim to use your primary keyword phrase just 5 times – once in the title, once in the opening sentence, once in the middle, once in the opening sentence of the last paragraph, and a final time in the resource box.  Additionally, I try to make the keywords in the resource box into a clickable link, if possible as well as providing a straight URL for my site as this really helps in SEO terms.

Once the article’s ready for submission, I like to use a quality service such as SubmitYourArticle as my distribution method, as it offers powerful technology that guides you through producing many variations of your original article, without the readability challenges that is normally inherent in traditional ‘spinning’ technology.  As a bonus, it’s also the only service that I’ve found that includes EzineArticles in its submission list!

Social Media

Social Media sites are becoming more and more powerful in terms of generating good quality backlinks to your sites.  I’m not just talking about Twitter and Facebook – I’m referring more to sites like Squidoo, HubPages, Scribd and SlideShare.  I link to build pages using all of these services which link back to my primary sites, then I use the micro-blogging platforms (Twitter, Facebook, etc) as well as the free blogging platforms (such as Blogger.com) to build links to social pages.  This creates significantly more depth which again, adds to the authority of your primary site.

On top of this, I use bookmarking services such as Digg, Delicious and StumbleUpon to drive more traffic (and potentially backlinks) to both my main site and my social media pages.  However, when using this strategy it’s vitally important that you only add one or two of your own URL’s at a time and then add five to seven links to other good sites that you find in-between.  If you don’t do this, then people who look at your accounts will see that you’re only using them for self-promotion and may tend to discount the credibility of any links you post.

Video Marketing

Video is now becoming my preferred method of marketing online.  Not only is it more engaging to the people who watch them, videos are also loved by the search engines.  In fact, it’s common today to see clips of videos included in Googles search results on page one!

Many people are sadly put off from producing videos as they believe it’s a complicated process requiring expensive equipment.  This could not be further from the truth!  If you’re just starting out, you can use services such as Animoto to produce a great 30-second promotional video which looks awesome and has a great backing track for free.  Pay them just a few dollars and you can produce something much longer and really drive home your call to action.

Once you have your video, you need to distribute it.  I use a paid for service called Traffic Geyser, which can generate hundreds of backlinks for me for each video that I submit.  It’s not cheap, but I believe it to be a solid investment in my business.  However, if you’re on a budget, TubeMogul offers a video distribution service for free which is well worth checking out.

Whichever service you use, it’s important to use the service well.  The most important aspect from a search engine marketing perspective is to include your full site URL (including the http://) as the first thing in the video description.  On most video sharing sites, this will be automatically translated into a clickable link giving you valuable link luv back to your site.  Also make sure you include your keywords in both the video title and the video tags.

Of all the things that I do to develop my Internet Marketing business, these 3 strategies are the ones that I find most effective in building link luv.  Give them a try, see how they work for you and please share your experiences in the comments.

For more Internet Marketing tips, please check out my blog, Internet Marketing with John.