Successful Blog

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How to Find Homes for Your Links

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It’s easy to get people to do what you want, just show them why it’s to their benefit to do it.

If what you want is a link from me, then your challenge is to persuade me. Show how it’s in my best interest and that of my readers to give your link a home on my blog.

Speaking of homes, you should also make sure that you want me to have your link. A link represents a vote from you. You want to find blogs with quality content, blogs with like-thinking writers who will value your relationship. Here’s how you might do that.

  • Get to know me and my blog.

    • Don’t become a stalker, but do make a project of finding out who I am and what I care about. Study my blog and my readers’ comments. A little reconnaissance and you’ll get a good idea of where or whether your link is a good fit.

  • Think about where your link would add value.

    • No one needs a link on their blogroll. Find a reason that I need your link. Do you have a post that ties well with one of mine? Do you expand on a topic that my readers have shown an interest in? Have you covered a subject I’ve missed, or does your content compliment mine, offering my readers a change they might enjoy? Once you’ve found a compelling answer to a question such as one of these, then you’re ready to talk to me.

  • When you talk to me, be personal and persuade me.

    • If you want my attention talk to me, not sir or madam, and let me know how you see your link improving my readers’ experience. That will surely get my attention. Persuade me. I want to feel there is a compelling argument for your link. That way I won’t see myself as someone who gives away links to anyone who asks. I’ll see myself as a person who was lucky to have met a clear thinker like you–someone who knew exactly how to improve my blog.

If I refuse you, you’ve lost nothing. You’ve probably picked up a few things by studying a blog. You’re not likely to research too long on a blog not worth linking to. If I agree, you’ve made a connection to quality content. Hopefully my blog will grow into old age with you. Then we can spend our days together complaining about those misbehaving young blogs.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Are You Up for a Posting Marathon?

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It’s a Marathon

The blogger at It’s So Fantastic has decided to do Darren Rowse’s list of 20 Blogging Post Types one better and do a marathon, posting one of each type for 20 days running. She’s invited all comers to post with her and leave a link to their posts.

Are you fit and ready? It’s a great way to make contacts, hone new writing skills, and get some links. You can find the details and the list of types at her site link above.

Good luck. If you participate, let us know how it goes.

As Darren said, “Great idea! Wish I had thought of it.”

ME “Liz” Strauss

SEO–The Value of Outlinks to MY Blog

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It started in the most natural way, someone read a post of mine and wrote one in response. I liked the response and respected the blog that it came from. I wanted my readers to know about it. It happened more than once. So I setup a feature called Two in a Row. It looked like this:

Two in a Row
Read this
Leaving a Guy a Place to Stand (the post on my site)

Then read this
Giving a Guy a Place to Stand (the post on the other site)

I had built an outlink. Later, when my post became archived, I transferred the outlink to the post.

On the surface, a cynic might say such outlinks only serve the receiving site, but I disagree on several points. Here’s my best thinking on it.

  • These outlinks serve readers and serving readers is why we’re here.
  • Outlinks to quality sites get readers to associate us with good information, which means they’re likely to return.
  • If I combine quality content with quality outlinks, the receiving blogs will be inclined to link back when the occasion arises. After all, they are already reading my blog, or the outlink would never have happened.
  • Outlinks connect my content to other quality content which underscores the relevancy of my content and that of the receiver.

All of these values add strength to the community. In terms of community, generosity is always good.

–Me “Liz” Strauss

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The rest of this week: More on Links and How Google Ranks Pages

Think Before You Intra-link

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You show your CD collection to a friend. She mentions that a certain CD is her favorite. You say, “If you like that, you ought to hear this. . . . ”

It’s the same when you’re writing a post, and you realize what you’re saying ties neatly with something you wrote last week, last month, or last year. You have to link to it. Your readers deserve to hear about it.

The Value of Intra-Links

Internal links or intra-links have three key values.

  • They offer readers more content on a subject they’re interested in.
  • They increase your page views when readers follow them.
  • When you use well-thought descriptive anchor text, they help search engines interpret the content of your blog.

Well-Thought Descriptive Anchor Text

Am I choosing for myself or for my readers? A random survey that I did shows that just about everyone could be better at anchor test. Text that says click here or this is not choosing for readers, nor is it well-thought, descriptive anchor text.

Well-thought anchor text states where the link goes so that when readers arrive, they’ll know they’re in the right place. The strongest anchor text uses keywords to show the relationship between this page and the next. The anchor text lets the reader and the search engine see the content connection–the relevancy–between the two documents.

Well-thought linking adds structure and context to how people and search engines see your blog.

Example 1: See my earlier post called “Think Before You Link,” which also talks about thinking through your link choices.

Example 2: You might also be interested in reading about using intra-links as blog promotion tools.

Intra-links draw readers further into your blog the same way they draw in search engine spiders. Readers become more involved and more a part of your blog with each link they follow. The involvement leads to a comfort-zone, a sense of belonging.

Who doesn’t want to look, when a friend says you have to see this?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

[via Aaron Matthew Wall, SEO Book]

SEO–Link Checking Tools

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Practical SEO for Every Blogger

Checking Backlinks

Backlinks are an exciting part of watching your blog grow. Each link is a statement, a vote, that moves your blog a bit higher in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). Here are some ways for finding out about your links.

Talk Digger
Duncan Riley introduced Fred Giasson’s Talk Digger in an article in the Blog Herald this summer and I’ve been using it since. It’s a quick way to check your links at Bloglines, Blog Pulse, Feedster, Technorati, Ice Rocket, BlogDigger, PubSub, MSN, and Google all at the same time. To quote Talk Digger: Talk Digger is a meta-search engine. It asks major search engines: “Who links that URL?” The results will then be processed and displayed on Talk Digger. This is a free web service developed by Frederick Giasson.

Who Links to Me
Another tool you may have seen around the web is WhoLinkstoMe. Paste the Who Links to Me linking code into your template. Click through the link to check your own or another site’s Google Page Rank, and links found by Who Links to Me, Blogrolling, Google, Yahoo, MSN, Technorati, and Icerocket.

Related Links
Nick Wilson at Performancing had this method to check what Google considers related links. Type in the Google search box: related: yourdomain.com . Then he suggests you review the links to see what kind of sites come up. You would want a strong theme to show through. Your goal would be to answer these questions with a “yes.”

  • Are most of the sites on same theme or topic as your blog?
  • Are there some authorities in your niche?

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THIS JUST IN:

Mark Wade of Blog Marketing, Blog Promotion for Newbies offered this addition to our list.

iWEBTOOL Backlink Checker

Ara Pehlivanian of the site of the same name offers this:

You might also want to check out the Firefox extension SEO Links by WebmasterBrain.

These should give you something to do while that turkey’s in the oven.
Happy Holiday if you’re having one. If you’re not, declare one.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles:
Check Google Backlinks Through Yahoo
SEO–Positioning Keywords for Readers and Search Engines
Don’t Buy that New Domain Name Yet
Checklist for Linking to Quality Blogs

About Success–What a Link Can Do

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Want to get someone’s attention?

Here’s how someone got mine–with a link. Not that she needs it.

Working last night, I stopped to check what was new with our links, and I saw a link from Sheila Ann Manuel Coggins.

Who is she? Sheila is the guide to the extensive resources at Web Logs at About.com. Some people know her as Shai. She was recently in the news when her blogging network AboutWeblogs merged with b5 media.

Here is how that link changed my thinking.

I often use About.com at my personal blog. I apparently had an unconscious perception about them. It never occurred to me that About. com would go deep in expertise and information on weblong things until Shai made that link, and I went exploring it. I found a passel of information worth sharing and probably will over time. For today I’ll leave you with one link and a picture I like a lot.

This link takes you to Shai’s article on Time Management. It’s really a link to a whole page of links on all kinds of weblogging things.

Warning: if you go to this page, you might find yourself following links all weekend.

While you’re there if you look in the right sidebar and down a little, you will see the picture that I like a lot.

About Menus

We’re in excellent company. Don’t you think? Thank you, Shai.

–ME “Liz” Strauss