What 2 things will u focus on when you start Link building today?
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My primary focuses would be on the quality of content and the relevancy of links to our niche. According to a Search Engine Journal's report, Digital PR is gaining significant traction as a hot topic. So building solid relationships with relevant brands would be helpful.
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Thank you, Will check about Digital PR
not sure how it's different than usual press release
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There's a huge difference. With a press release you write it, publish it, and pay for it and it's done. With Digital Public Relations (not digital press release) you make content, notify journalists, and they choose to cover your content in the news.
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@impactp, I decided to focus actively on link building 10 months ago and have been able to build a lot of high-quality links from DR 50 to DR 92 sites. I broke down the strategies I'm using below.
1. Automate the process to quickly respond to (and qualify) inbound link or guest post requests
I'd say 95% of the random people who contact me ask for a guest post. I respond to almost all of them with a templated response. It takes me less than 5 seconds. The only emails I skip are (1) casino and adult since we don't link to them and (2) ESL emails that can't string together a simple sentence because their sites are usually shit with a sub-10 DR.
The template says no to the guest post and offers a link exchange instead. My templated email outlines what I do and do not link to. I give accepted Ahref DR scores and topics for both sites linking to me and that I will link to. In my email, I ask them to respond with a list of sites they can offer links from. This last part is important. Most randos hitting you up will have multiple sites to offer. If they reply with shit sites ask for other options... they almost always have other options!
About 50% of the people I email respond positively. About 50% of those positive responses have sites that are worth getting links from. Best case scenario they have multiple sites to offer so you can do a three-way link exchange instead of a one-for-one between two sites.
Don't forget: They contacted you so get them to push your link live first and then you reciprocate. Finally... ask if they have any other sites they want you to consider. They usually do.
This shit works. I get between five and ten links from sites with DR scores between 50 and 75 each month. For free. With limited effort. If you were paying for those links, you'd be spending a couple thousand minimum... speaking of paying...
2. Pay someone to build links
This was a game-changer for me. For the last ten months, I've been spending four figures ($5k) on link building every month. I used a reputable company that came recommended. I decided to test them out for three months and then reassess. They've been great and I have no plans of slowing down.
I've landed multiple links from 90+ DR sites, links from competitors that should not be linking to me, and all-around solid links averaging a DR score of 75. This is a solid compliment to the other free links that I'm getting with the automated/templated approach above. And allows me to double the links I get to the site each month. Also, it ensures I'm getting linked to more than I'm linking out, which is something I want to keep to a minimum.
This sort of active link building isn't something I wanted to put time into myself and so I never would have been able to land some of the big DR sites for my niche and in related topics. It has been well worth the investment (in my opinion) so far.
3. Digital PR (Starting this year)
I've already started looking into a few providers that specialize in this and there's a group I like. I just need to tackle a few other priorities before allocating the budget towards this.
My plan with Digital PR is to start with an initial test and if that goes well do one campaign every quarter. I see a lot of value in this as an add-on to my current link building so I'm going to continue the other activities above and just layer this in.
Big takeaway...
There are free and paid link-building options. Figure out what you can afford and come up with systems to streamline the process as much as possible. If you can set aside a budget to pay someone, it's worth it in my opinion.
One clarification: I'm building a business (and site) that I would like to see around in 10 years. So when it comes to my decisions, they aren't always driven by the fastest return on the dollar. I'm looking medium to long-term and my business/budget decisions reflect that.
Good luck!
1. Automate the process to quickly respond to (and qualify) inbound link or guest post requests
I'd say 95% of the random people who contact me ask for a guest post. I respond to almost all of them with a templated response. It takes me less than 5 seconds. The only emails I skip are (1) casino and adult since we don't link to them and (2) ESL emails that can't string together a simple sentence because their sites are usually shit with a sub-10 DR.
The template says no to the guest post and offers a link exchange instead. My templated email outlines what I do and do not link to. I give accepted Ahref DR scores and topics for both sites linking to me and that I will link to. In my email, I ask them to respond with a list of sites they can offer links from. This last part is important. Most randos hitting you up will have multiple sites to offer. If they reply with shit sites ask for other options... they almost always have other options!
About 50% of the people I email respond positively. About 50% of those positive responses have sites that are worth getting links from. Best case scenario they have multiple sites to offer so you can do a three-way link exchange instead of a one-for-one between two sites.
Don't forget: They contacted you so get them to push your link live first and then you reciprocate. Finally... ask if they have any other sites they want you to consider. They usually do.
This shit works. I get between five and ten links from sites with DR scores between 50 and 75 each month. For free. With limited effort. If you were paying for those links, you'd be spending a couple thousand minimum... speaking of paying...
2. Pay someone to build links
This was a game-changer for me. For the last ten months, I've been spending four figures ($5k) on link building every month. I used a reputable company that came recommended. I decided to test them out for three months and then reassess. They've been great and I have no plans of slowing down.
I've landed multiple links from 90+ DR sites, links from competitors that should not be linking to me, and all-around solid links averaging a DR score of 75. This is a solid compliment to the other free links that I'm getting with the automated/templated approach above. And allows me to double the links I get to the site each month. Also, it ensures I'm getting linked to more than I'm linking out, which is something I want to keep to a minimum.
This sort of active link building isn't something I wanted to put time into myself and so I never would have been able to land some of the big DR sites for my niche and in related topics. It has been well worth the investment (in my opinion) so far.
3. Digital PR (Starting this year)
I've already started looking into a few providers that specialize in this and there's a group I like. I just need to tackle a few other priorities before allocating the budget towards this.
My plan with Digital PR is to start with an initial test and if that goes well do one campaign every quarter. I see a lot of value in this as an add-on to my current link building so I'm going to continue the other activities above and just layer this in.
Big takeaway...
There are free and paid link-building options. Figure out what you can afford and come up with systems to streamline the process as much as possible. If you can set aside a budget to pay someone, it's worth it in my opinion.
One clarification: I'm building a business (and site) that I would like to see around in 10 years. So when it comes to my decisions, they aren't always driven by the fastest return on the dollar. I'm looking medium to long-term and my business/budget decisions reflect that.
Good luck!
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Politico
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Mind sharing the company you work with?
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I’m not really into the whole metrics side of the things I am more interested in traffic and brand awareness.
As such I really stick with digital pr.
It’s essentially free and just takes a little bit of time to research and reach out.
As such I really stick with digital pr.
It’s essentially free and just takes a little bit of time to research and reach out.
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I've just taken a look at the BuSo rules and if I'm reading the promotion section correctly I shouldn't be sharing any links to services that don't promote via the marketplace.
Am I reading this correctly?
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You can share genuine recommendations. We know when it's a real user sharing a real experience and not some rando trying to spam their own service. Share away!
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@impactp I just wanted to share that the conversation happening in the post "When Does Selling Links Start to Effect Your Site Negatively" is forcing me to rethink how I approach the automation play outlined above (basically who I link to).
While I do not link to spam/crypto/gambling/gaming/adult/essay/etc, that doesn't mean the sites I'm linking to don't... and that could be a big problem.
In particular, the explanations from @Potatoe and @Ryuzaki put the risks into perspective for me, which (I feel stupid saying) I never thought about in the more macro "zoomed" out way before.
While I do not link to spam/crypto/gambling/gaming/adult/essay/etc, that doesn't mean the sites I'm linking to don't... and that could be a big problem.
In particular, the explanations from @Potatoe and @Ryuzaki put the risks into perspective for me, which (I feel stupid saying) I never thought about in the more macro "zoomed" out way before.
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You could update your templated reply to ask if they have a budget or would consider a link swap and anyone who replies with money you could cross off as 'risky' because they're obviously buying links as well as just doing their 'guest post outreach' if you wanted to continue it in some way without adding lots of extra work to your process.
We're doing a lot of that in reverse at the moment - using a mix of egobait pages and outreach to get local businesses to exchange links with clients. They're often sites that don't normally link out to anyone/don't do guest posts or anything so really clean real businesses. One of our clients even nofollows the links they 'give back' so it just shows the level of sophistication/knowing about what's going on you get into if you target people who are 'outside the usual link ecosystem' that they happily linkback without noticing or even caring. One or the other I have no idea - I didn't think it would work when the client suggested it
.
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@Steve Brownlie thanks for the feedback - there's a lot in there I'd love to unpack. And I will definitely be updating my templated approach, great suggestion.
Can you give an example of what this might look like for your clients (or a random example)?
When you are getting links from these sites, is it usually to increase traffic, relevance, DR? I'm only asking because I wouldn't think many of these local sites would pack much of a punch from a backlink perspective unless you were looking to build local relevance.
Just to clarify, when you said they no-follow sites they link to 'outside of the usual link ecosystem' do you mean the client no-follows links to potentially shady sites or something else?
Can you give an example of what this might look like for your clients (or a random example)?
When you are getting links from these sites, is it usually to increase traffic, relevance, DR? I'm only asking because I wouldn't think many of these local sites would pack much of a punch from a backlink perspective unless you were looking to build local relevance.
Just to clarify, when you said they no-follow sites they link to 'outside of the usual link ecosystem' do you mean the client no-follows links to potentially shady sites or something else?
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nps at all - hope it's helpful. seemed a shame to throw the baby out with the bathwater if there are still some good opportunities in there for you.
random example in the wild (not ours) - not the best example because of the topic/relevance etc but enough to get the idea - https://porch.com/advice/internet-technology-older-adults
I think if they're in your industry (or a really highly related one) and really hard to get (not many people have them) they probably pack more of a punch than a higher DA site that posts lots of stuff and links to lots of things and where you end up 100 pages away from the homepage within 6 months etc.
I don't recommend nofollowing them or anything - one client just wanted to test if he even had to bother giving a real link back or not or if the swaps would work anyway. They did - but I'd imagine this working is highly site/niche dependent.
I didn't mean outside the usual link ecosystem as in bad I meant good - sites that everyone else hasn't spammed to death yet with linkbuilding requests so they don't know what's going on/are more willing to just roll with it AND as an added bonus you're often one of like 7 things they link to - so yeah they might not pack as much total punch but on a in/out links ratio they can be really strong so overall I think they compete well with higher DA sites that link to 'muchness'.