Get a free PR4 link in one minute

August 28, 2008

Yes, really! I was on Twitter today (okay, I’m on Twitter all day, everyday, but usually it’s through TwitterFox) and noticed that my profile is now a PageRank four page. I looked around at a few of the people I communicate with frequently and they range from PR 1-4.

We all know the links in the “Web” section are nofollowed, but if you just type your link in your “Bio” section, that’s a followed link and it just took you a minute to leverage a tool you’re already using! (If you’re not, you should be. And if you are, you should be following me, @rachael823!)

Looking for more great ways to build links? Read Wil’s recent post on the three link building tips no one ever talks about.

Posted by Rachael at 6:17pm
No Comments »

Three link building tips NO ONE EVER talks about

August 26, 2008

OK, there are so many posts on building great content to attract links, buying old domains, guest blogging, advanced queries like these, etc.

Of which we at SEER do them all. But after finding two links in my scanning of our web analytics tool, I wondered how did we get two links?

One link is from a PR 6 one is from a PR 0, but who cares about that. Both links came to us in two different ways without trying and there are hundreds more that have as well.

Remember this one fact, people like doing business with people they LIKE. Linking is no different.

Tip #1 - Karma & unselfishly helping others leads to unsolicited links

Sure the example above got a PR 0, whoo-hoo, but who cares about that, at one point all new sites are a PR zero. Stop using PageRank as the sole way to judge link value!

It is just my style to sit down with people trying to figure out SEO over coffee and seeing if I can help them…NOTE by help them I DON’T mean make them clients!!. I mean help them expecting NOTHING in return. I have found that this approach has led to more people linking to us than I ever expected. NOTE – I never asked for these people to link. (I do think it is smart to run an advanced query, because not everyone who thinks you are great links to you and they gladly would).

You get more when you give more.

I have been asked by 4 universities to speak to their students for either classes or conferences. How does this happen? Easily…people usually watch our youtube channel and realize that I am about helping people and giving it all OUT. If you can learn from me and never become a client, that is fine w/ me.

So in conclusion, link tip #1 – Give of your knowledge freely and GO MAD DEEP in your area of expertise…by helping people out 10 minutes here, over coffee there, in the airport, you’ll find that those people have sites, blogs, and friends and sometimes, just sometimes they link to you without you asking.

Ask yourself – when is the LAST time you used your knowledge or network to help someone else, and not to try to get their business. When is the last time you looked at someone’s web site and offered 10 minutes of your time to help them out (thus alleviating them from the arduous process of getting that same knowledge by reading books and blogs for hours?)

Here’s a starter, sign up for help a reporter out. You’ll find opportunities for friends, colleagues, and clients to get press, they’ll like you for that.

Tip #2 - Traveling & Going to Conferences
Chris Winfield recently asked on twitter why do you go to conferences? Most people replied for the networking and connecting with people in our industry. There is a byproduct of connecting with people in your space AND taking Tip #1 – LINKS!!! If you meet people who share your same passion and you help them, and several others (and by help it could be something as simple as Todd Malicoat telling me to speak with Tamar at the last Pubcon). Everyone you meet won’t link to you, so meet a lot of people and take time to LISTEN to their struggles, see if you can help or know someone who can.

At the last affiliate summit I referred someone to Jim Kukral who was having a hard time monetizing his site – I don’t know what will come of it, but my goal is to help as many people as possible that I can in business and personally (yes everyone at SEER volunteers. Building your own network can help you help others so network!

You want 5 good on topic blogs to link to you and have a ton of fun in the process?

Get on a plane, train, or automobile
Go to a conference
Ask 25 people you meet what their struggles are
Help them if you can or connect them to your network if you know others who can help

I asked Todd Malicoat a question, he used his network to introduce me to Tamar, easy, he spent literally 30 seconds at a conference and got a link from our vastly important site

This is not easy, you can’t walk around with a can I help you sign – you have to LISTEN.

The other part about using your network to help others is doing it with NO profit motive.

At SEER we have never accepted a referral fee and we never will. I like seeing people succeed and if I can be a part of that, then that’s all I need.

So in conclusion, link tip #2 – Get on a plane or train, meet some people on the conference floor and in the sessions, listen to them, see if you can help them or know someone who can. Do this as often as you can, at the bar grabbing drinks, in the registration lines, etc. You can’t help everyone immediately, but follow them on twitter, linkedin, etc and some day they may just reach out for help in a way that you can help them.

PS: buying a lot of drinks and hanging late is also a great way, as people post photos and their discussions of how much fun they had at the hotel bar to their blogs often. This happens at a lot of tech events and networking sessions.

Tip #3 doing a great freaking job
The first link I mentioned above came from an OLD client (we worked with them some years ago), who gave us a massive shout out on their website credits sometime in the last few weeks…we never asked for it, and I am just now finding it. They have about 51,000 inbounds, of which 1,500+ are from .edu’s and 200 from .gov’s. This is a great link…how did we get it? We did a great job, we pushed and pushed and pushed for them to analyze our impact beyond rankings and traffic but to leads and even though they couldn’t do it, they knew we wanted to track our efforts from the beginning. We were good guys and girls who wanted to make sure they they got a great ROI and we also kicked their traffic up a notch or two

The best thing about these strategies is that not only are they ways to get links, but they actually get CLICKS – when is the last time you got a click from a low quality directory site?
Hardly ever. Even the PR 0 site is sending us a little traffic.

So I guess at the end of the day its the golden rule that wins out. Watch this to get you pumped.



Posted by wil at 3:07pm
No Comments »

Want authority links? Then check indexing times of new content

August 22, 2008

I have been shocked by how quickly content on some sites are picked up lately. An article I posted on Ezinearticles.com and our company profile on SEOmoz.com are examples of pages I have seen that within hours of getting something approved and live on the site the post was picked up.

This got me thinking…

A while back Aaron Wall mentioned using cache dates as the new Google PageRank.

I believe that.

Along that vein, search engines should spider sites more frequently that post new GOOD content, an easy concept. So for those of you asking me if setting up a script to pull a new press release everyday is a good idea the answer is still NO.

If you set google alerts to daily or weekly you may not get an indication of what sites have content that gets picked up most quickly.

Taking Aaron Wall’s concept one step further, a KEY component of being a good SEO is understanding link value, and if your client can write 1 article a quarter, which of the 1000 article sites should you submit your 4 to this year for them most bang for the buck?

If you are JUST using PageRank you could be way off.

I would recommend that you run tests on the top article sites (or any site for that matter), submit garbage and submit good stuff…see which ones let the garbage in…I would be willing to bet that the sites that have CRAP QA on article submissions are less likely to get their pages get in the index within 24 hours. The really strong ones do.

By running a test on how quickly a page gets in the index from hundreds of article sites you should be equipped to ensure that you get the articles in on sites that are seen as most credible (and authoritative) by the search engines.

If you set your Google Alerts to get notification as they happen you’ll see that some sites get picked up within hours of mentioning you…to me that says the site might be seen as more of an authority site than others that take longer. This is one way you could look at article submissions or any effort to gain authority links…if you order them based on time to get something indexed it should be one indicator to help you understand authority.

You can also do this using your Google reader if a site you are trying to get a link from has RSS.

I opened my reader and searched for some content from the most recent post which happened to be from SEroundtable. Notice it was posted 1 hour ago.

Now notice how long it took Google to pick it up – about 1 hour.

Competitive hint: Looking at the sites mentioning your competitors and getting picked up quickly is one way to prioritize which sites that link to your competitors should be targeted by your linking efforts.

I have not tested this strategy fully, so I would absolutely welcome some alternative points of view.

Posted by wil at 5:34pm
No Comments »

A Link Request Debate

August 22, 2008

One of the things that makes SEO so fun is that there is sometimes no definitively right or wrong way to do things. There are few things that I enjoy more than a good debate with the team about the pros and cons of different strategies. Coming up with strategies to drive high-quality, long-term valuable links for our clients is one of our current areas of focus.

A little while ago, I ran across a site that, on its blog, asked people for a link in exchange for a $5 gift card. The blog would also link back to anyone who linked to them (can you say reciprocal link?). This immediately sparked debate internally. Some thought it was very smart – it was argued that the site is simply asking people who enjoy its services to link to them. I agree; I think it is a smart idea to get people who like your company to link to your site. However, I argued that there were some flaws in the execution.

I wouldn’t have made my request so public. Last year, Google started cracking down on paid links by asking people to report them. Honestly, if I was a competitor of this site and saw this, I think I’d consider reporting them. Whether this counts as “paid links” is sort of borderline, but when you’re in a competitive industry and someone isn’t playing by the rules, I’d let a third party (Google) decide.

To correct this, I’d take a much more “below-board” approach to this strategy. I wouldn’t put the linking request out there as a public post on my blog. I would recommend communicating with customers, communicating with Twitter followers, messaging people in Facebook, etc. The strategies that I would employ are ones like this. Sure, a competitor might catch wind of it and still report you, but at least you’re minimizing your risk. Why not first try to get maximum value while minimizing risk? And if that strategy doesn’t work, then think about going public. But the risk is huge – if you are reported and Google decides that this is against its policies, you’re putting your site and your revenue at risk.

Still, it’s a very grey area. What do you think? Would you consider this example link buying? How would you improve upon their strategy? Let the debate continue.

Posted by laura at 2:48pm
3 Comments »