Tis The Season For Link Love

I’ve been pretty busy with the holidays and a couple of other projects I’m working on so its been too long since I posted here. But I’m gonna keep it short today.

I don’t usually bother with “link love” types of posts because they don’t add much value to the reader…but in the holiday spirit its time for a little shout out to some of my friends and fellow bloggers…

Franklin Bishop talks about 8 blog headlines guaranteed to get your reader’s attention.

Caroline Middlebrook discusses a pay-as-you-go business model.

Learn how to comment your way to success from Danny Cooper.

Ben Pei lists his 16 must have Twitter tools.

Watch a tutorial by Christopher Ross and learn how to make awesome 3D icons.

Check out Yan Susanto’s massive list of 101 blogging tips.

Dennis Edell is running a neat contest with a $100 prize.

Josh Spaulding proves that duplicate content can rank in the SEs.

50 Ways To Get Links To Your Site

I originally wrote this for another blog of mine but I’ve decided to repost it here…

Whether you’ve just launched a new site or already have an established blog with hundreds of posts, you should always be on the lookout for new links. Backlinks increase your Google PageRank, bring new visitors to your site, and (hopefully) increase your revenue.

But link building can be a frustrating experience for even the most seasoned marketer. It takes a lot of time and hard work, which is why so many bloggers and website owners do a half-ass job and never see the benefits of a well-constructed link building campaign.

My goal in this post is to create a definitive list of [TAG-TEC]link building[/TAG-TEC] strategies. I’ll come back to update it from time to time so make sure to bookmark it so you can use it as a reference.

Note – In this article I’m not concerned about PageRank or Nofollow tags. People obsess too much over this stuff. Nofollow links can still bring paying customers to your site…remember that.

50 Link Building Strategies

1. Give your readers unique, top quality content that they’ll find useful and you’ll get plenty of links without having to do a thing.

2. Be controversial. Take a stand on an issue and you’ll get links from those who agree AND disagree with you.

3. Be the first to comment on hot topics. Keep an eye on news channels and you can scoop other bloggers. The first to post on a topic is often linked to by other bloggers.

4. Include cool tools on your site (like a loan calculator) that people can use and link to.

5. Give away freebies. Create free Special Reports on your niche and let readers download it. Let bloggers in your niche know about the freebie so they can let their readers know.

6. Allow others to reprint your site’s content as long as they provide a backlink.

7. Trade content with another blogger. He writes an article for you and you write one for him.

8. Become a “guest blogger” and provide content for another blog in exchange for links back to your site.

9. Simply ask visitors to link back to you. You’d be surprised how often that works.

10. Make it easy for others to link to you by creating a “Link to Us” page. Give them the html code so all they have to do is paste it to their site.

11. Issue a press release using a service like PRWeb.

12. Exchange links with related sites. Reciprocal linking is still useful.

13. Create a simple program (such as a quote generator) and submit it to various directories like Tucows and Download.com

14. If you have coding skills, design a wordpress theme with your link at the bottom. Everyone who uses your theme will be linking back to you.

15. Not a coder? You can sponsor a theme and still get a link back. You can work either directly with a coder or bid on a theme at the DigitalPoint Forums. Expect to pay anywhere from $25 to $100 to be a sponsor. The nicer themes go for more but usually result in more links.

16. You can buy other links at DigitalPoint too. Blogroll links, text links, blog posts, etc. Keep in mind that Google is not a fan of sites that sell links. It would be a shame if you bought an expensive PR6 link only to have it drop to PR0 with the next PR update.

17. Classified ads on Craigslist, USFreeads, etc.

18. Take out a solo ad in a popular ezine. Many ezines archive their newsletters and you’ll receive a permanent link.

19. Use Social Networking and Bookmarking Sites…add your site to services like Digg, Furl, Fark, Reddit, Stumbleupon, and Del.icio.us.

20. Make it easy for other to do the same. Include bookmarklets at the end of each post to encourage readers to pass your link along.

21. Directory submissions are not as powerful as they once were, but they still influence PR and will give you a trickle of visitors too.

22. If you have more than one site, give yourself a free link.

23. Start a free Blogger blog and link back to your main site.

24. Do the same with Squidoo lenses. Use them to drive traffic to your site.

25. Add your link to your signature file in forums you visit.

26. Post useful comments or questions on other’s blog posts. Don’t spam!

27. Be generous linking to other blogs, they may notice and give you a free plug. Also, your post may appear as a trackback in their blog comments where their readers will see it.

28. Provide useful answers to questions posted on Yahoo Answers. You can leave a link to your site as a reference, but don’t spam.  Download Answers Domination to learn everything you need to know about using Yahoo Answers for driving traffic.

29. Join or start a Google group focused on your niche.

30. If your site isn’t overly commercial, you can post a link on Wikipedia. There’s a good chance it will be quickly deleted though.

31. Look for companies that have an “In the news” page on their site. If you post an article about them and let them know, there’s a good chance they’ll add your article as a news item.

32. Submit testimonials for products you find useful in exchange for a backlink.

33. Sponsor a contest.

34. Review products on Amazon and include a link back to your site. This works especially well if you write a short, well-written review on Amazon and then mention that you have a more in-depth review posted on your own site.

35. Write a short ebook to give away and post it on various “free ebook” sites.

36. Take out an ad in your online yellow pages.

37. Join your local Chamber of Commerce and get a free link on their website.

38. Do the same with your local Better Business Bureau chapter.

39. Join other local business communities and organizations and you can get a link in their directories too.

40. Ask businesses and contacts that you work with offline to give you a link on their site.

41. Donate money to a local school and you’ll often get a link on a page listing donations. These EDU links can be very powerful.

42. Pay a professional link builder (very expensive).

43. Buy older sites that are indexed with traffic and pagerank and link back to your site.

44. Purchase expired domains and link to your main site.

45. Buy misspelled domains and domains with and without dashes. If your site is YourDomain.com, you should also register YouDomain.com and Your-Domain.com and point them back to your site.

46. Find old sites that aren’t updated but are still indexed and sign their guestbooks.

47. Automate link building with a service like 3waylinks. I do have some doubts about their long term effectiveness as search engine algorithms change, but in the short term their effects are often amazing.

48. Start an affiliate program. You can quickly have hundreds of affiliates sending thousands of visitors your way.

49. Add your link to your eBay profile page. Whenever someone views your profile they’ll see your link.

50. Last, but certainly not least, article marketing is still one of the most powerful methods for building both traffic and links. Submissions to article directories can be republished time and time again. Each time one of your articles is published you get another link.

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Your Blog Is Doomed To Failure

I absolutely marvel at the mindset of some people.  They’ve obviously never heard of the old saying “Penny wise, pound foolish”.

Perhaps the best way to describe this type of person is by giving an example.

Link building expert Danny Cooper recently released a report called the Blog Comment Blueprint in which he reveals his methods for building links via blog commenting.  It’s a powerful yet easy to use strategy that can quickly bring you thousands of free backlinks and a steady stream of traffic (which is exactly what so many of you are struggling with!)

Now I’ve seen at least a half dozen positive reviews of Blog Comment Blueprint and when I read through the comments after the review I see the same thing again and again…

“Sounds great!  It’s just not in my budget right now or I’d pick it up right away.”

“I really can’t afford to splurge on it.”

Now, I can understand that reaction if you’re talking about SpeedPPC which costs $397.  But Danny’s report costs just $9. 

Seriously.  You want to build a blog or website that earns thousands of dollars a month but you’re not willing to cough up a couple dollars for a report that can get you there a whole lot faster? 

If this is you then you have a shortsighted attitude and I boldly predict you will never be a success until you accept the fact that it takes money to spend money.  Your blog is doomed to failure. 

And I’m not telling you to go out and buy every ebook, script, and program you can find.  I don’t think its smart to waste your money…but you should be willing to invest a bit to increase your own knowledge and efficiency. 

Educational reports and tools that make you more productive will pay for themselves many times over if you take action.

So skip lunch at McDonalds one day this week and splurge on a copy of the Blog Comment Blueprint…you just might find that opening your wallet a bit helps you reach your goals faster than trying to go the freebie route.

Will You Get Sued For Something You Post On Your Blog?

Today I just want to give you a quick heads up that Mike Young’s Website Legal Forms Generator software is about to double in price, so if you want to grab a copy do it quickly before its too late.  And I’m not an affiliate so I have nothing to gain by promoting Mike’s product.  I just want to do what’s best for my readers. 

I recently purchased a copy of Mike’s software to create a new privacy policy, terms and conditions, and other legal disclaimers for this blog as well as my other web sites.  In today’s “sue everybody” society, I strongly recommend you do the same to protect yourself from frivolous lawsuits. 

Mike’s software is ridiculously easy to use.   Just fill out a few fields and ask a few questions and you’ll have everything ready in just a few minutes.  Mike says it takes 17 minutes, but it took me no where near that long unless you add in the time to purchase and install the software on my desktop.

Does having the proper legal disclaimer mean you can do or say whatever you want?  Of course not.  But it does give you a certain amount of protection. 

I know a lot of you don’t have much of a budget to work with, but for $47 you can’t go wrong.  Think about how much you could lose without it.  On December 8th Mike is raising his price to $97 so grab it now for less than half that while you still can.