Linkbuilding 101 - How to never be lost for links again

[JackPowers]

Ok, I know many of you reading in here feel frustrated with SEO and particularly linkbuilding.

Linkbuilding is THE most important thing you can do to get that profitable Google traffic (after on page SEO optimization, but that's another topic).

So why is it that so many feel like linkbuilding is such a chore?

I believe it is because most of you don't organize linkbuilding well enough. So you might say to yourself: "I'm going to spend 2 hours linkbuilding for my site", but then just stare at your screen with no idea of where to go. "Maybe I'll write an article or maybe I'll do some blog commenting".

That's not efficient at all. Face it, unless you outsource your linkbuilding, your success in the Google rankings come down to efficiency. How many and how good links can you get pr. hour?

The first thing you want to do if you're serious about linkbuilding is to actually be serious about linkbuilding.

That includes getting organized.

Set up your own Link Resource excel sheet

What you're going to do to begin with is open up Excel and make a workbook called Link Resources or whatever name you prefer. This spreadsheet is going to become your go to resource for linkbuilding.

What you're going to put in here is a list of all link opportunities that you find when you're linkbuilding or just browsing the web.

So you may make some titles for your columns like 'Website Name', 'URL', 'Page Rank', 'Notes' etc.

Then every time you come across a place to put a link, like a do-follow blog, forum with signature or forum profile, guestbook, niche article directory or other social site you put your link in that spreadsheet.

There are tons of tons of places not specifically mentioned on this forum, where you can get links.

So maybe I found a blog with the CommentLuv plugin installed which gives you a do follow link. I might not even be building links, but I'll take that url and put in it my Link Resource sheet and the next time I'm building links for a website I only have to look there and there's an instant link.

Over time, your link resource sheet will grow huge and you will find that you will never be lost for where to get a link.

Naturally, you'll want to organize the spreadsheet in a way that makes sense like Do-Follow Forums, Blogs etc or based on niche.

Look for footprints not websites

Footprints are certain phrases that can be used to identify good linking opportunities. It can be stuff like: "This blog is powered by Wordpress" or "This blog is CommentLuv enabled" or "Thanks for visting my site, please leave a comment in the guestbook below".

These innocent phrases hold a treasure of linking opportunities for the linkbuilder.

Why?

Because if you happen to come across a website that is do-follow because of a certain software or plugin, then you haven't just found one link opp, but likely thousands or even millions.

CommentLuv is a good example. This is a Wordpress plugin which shows the title of your blog commenters latest blogpost along with a dofollow link to their blogpost. CommentLuv have several footprints one of them being: "Commentluv Enabled". Knowing that information we can find thousand of relevant blogs to comment on just searching Google for:"CommentLuv Enabled dog training".

So when you're creating your linkresource spreadsheet, try to look for these footprints instead of just putting in individual sites. Then the next time you're looking for a link for your blog on Chicken Soup, you'll be able to take those footprints and just add your keyword and there you go. Lots and lots of places to get a link from.

Conclusion

Efficiency is key when building links. There are people out there building 1000's of links in the time it took you to build one. Fortunately, they are far between, so if you follow simple steps like the ones above and eliminate that fruitless staring at the screen, then you're one step ahead.

Remember to always be looking for link opportunities also when you're just browsing the net. Use a plugin such as Search Status to instantly see if a link is no-follow or do-follow.

[thebitbotdotcom]

Nice read. Obviously you take link building seriously as should everyone. Blog commenting is one of the easiest ways to get links if you don't spam. One thing you could do is get on the new post list and get an email every time they post and then try to be the first comment. Your links will be higher on the page and more likely to be seen and followed by others.

[marketingstatic]

Iv been trying to figure out this whole link buidling thing so thanks for sharing these concepts today-have a great weekened

[iresh]

here are people out there building 1000's of links in the time it took you to build one

Is this is about the automated softwares, are using of them is ok

[LarryHaywood]

Originally Posted by iresh

Is this is about the automated softwares, are using of them is ok

IMHO I believe you should mix both automated and manual link building. Even if the automated backlinks do not carry much weight, at least you are diversifying your incoming links.

[JackPowers]

Originally Posted by thebitbotdotcom

Nice read. Obviously you take link building seriously as should everyone. Blog commenting is one of the easiest ways to get links if you don't spam. One thing you could do is get on the new post list and get an email every time they post and then try to be the first comment. Your links will be higher on the page and more likely to be seen and followed by others.

Yeah definitely follow the blogs in your niche.

Blog comments are a great way to get backlinks for a .. blog! Your success rate with getting your comment approved is much higher when you're linking to a blog that isn't overly commercial.

A lot of times, people will make a comment, even a well written one, but will link to a shallow commercial site and then they wonder why their comment won't get approved. On the other hand, if you link to a 'legit' relevant blog, your comment can be 'great post' or whatever and will still get approved and you can get blogroll swaps very easy. Then you can link to your other pages from your own blog as you desire.

Much better way than just spamming blogs.

[JackPowers]

Originally Posted by iresh

Is this is about the automated softwares, are using of them is ok

Yes, using automated tools is not a problem if you know how to use them. You can get away with a lot more on a domain that already has trust and some age.

So for a new site I am going to go out and get some legitimate links, like from link exchanges or some of my own sites and then after a month or so, I'll start building links automatically.

When I say get away with a lot more, I mean you will get more benefit from automated link building methods once your site has matured.

I use automated tools all the time, but never let them be the only method on my own sites.

[JackPowers]

Originally Posted by LarryHaywood

IMHO I believe you should mix both automated and manual link building. Even if the automated backlinks do not carry much weight, at least you are diversifying your incoming links.

Exactly, best of both worlds.

[JSProjects]

Not a fan of using automated tools to create backlinks. However, I do use Scrapebox to sort through and organize URL's once I find a high PR, dofollow, blog to comment on. After a few days I can usually generate over 1,000 PR1+ blog pages to manually comment on.

If you're website is properly optimized for a low competition keyword, manual commenting on high PR pages is the easiest way to boost your website to the top, IMO.

[gekko2.0]

It definitely gets boring commenting on blogs but the effort is worth it

[jdooley13]

Great advice. I stumbled upon some similar advice this morning and have been searching out "footprints" and leaving blog comments all day. Commentluv and keywordluv sites are wonderful!

[VoiceBoat]

Great post. I can't tell you how much I use Excel for organization and efficiency. It is a crucial tool on any successful internet marketers tool belt.

[brett701]

Originally Posted by JSProjects

Not a fan of using automated tools to create backlinks. However, I do use Scrapebox to sort through and organize URL's once I find a high PR, dofollow, blog to comment on. After a few days I can usually generate over 1,000 PR1+ blog pages to manually comment on.

If you're website is properly optimized for a low competition keyword, manual commenting on high PR pages is the easiest way to boost your website to the top, IMO.

Do you still use these strategies? What do you believe is the best way to find do follow blogs that are high page rank?

[JSProjects]

Originally Posted by brett701

Do you still use these strategies? What do you believe is the best way to find do follow blogs that are high page rank?

I do. Although admittedly I've been using Scrapebox a bit more. (Pointing "automated" links to my tiers to help index them quicker or even give them a little boost.)

Commenting on moderated blogs can occasionally seem time consuming and frustrating, but I think it's still one of the easiest ways to get a dofollow, PR1+ backlink.

1. You need to find the blogs. This can be a little tough without the help of software. Scrapebox is the best tool for this, obviously. It can help sort out URLs by nofollow / dofollow status, PR, check to see if they're open for comments, etc. Without SB you're going to have a pretty tough time finding dofollow blogs since the % of blogs that are dofollow is pretty low. So it's a numbers game. (Although commentluv & keyworldluv blogs are a little easier to find. There's just a limited number of them.)

2. You need to make sure the blog is actually active. Are there any posts within the past month? Approved comments? If not, it's probably a dead blog.

3. Once you've determined that it's active, make a QUALITY comment on one of the more recent posts. If it's approved within a reasonable amount of time, save the blog for later. You can go back and make a few comments from time to time on posts with PR. As long as you're leaving good comments your chances of approval should be pretty high since you've already had a comment approved.

It sounds like a lot of work, but it's not too bad once you've gotten a system down. Even if 4/10 of your comments on PR1+ posts are approved, that's still 4 PR1 or higher, dofollow backlinks. And eventually you should have a pretty good list of blogs to choose from.

[Genycis]

Very nice read as I can admit that sometimes, I'm stumped on where else to go other than the same forums I frequent, or fishing for blogs to post on. I've been using Squidoo lately to create a bit of an a href on my post tying it to a keyword link.

One thing I notice with blogs though (and it may be my niche since it's music related) is that everything goes into "Awaiting moderation" and I tend to check back and the blogs don't seem to update anyone's posts. I write entries that pertain to the article, so I'm not really spamming like "nice read... by the way, check out my site at..." which I believe is something the automated blog entries tend to do.

Has anyone else come across the constant "Awaiting moderation from user" replies and checked back to see that your posts haven't posted? Or is it just me or maybe my niche that I see this happen 9 out of 10 times for?

Side note: I've been searching through Fiverr as well for some potential link building opportunities to buy, but not sure if there are any specific ones that any of you recommend. I obviously am not looking to invest $5.00 on a 10,000 posts in 24 hours type of gig.. that just doesn't flow naturally. Wondered if any of you knew some to recommend, and do you (as I assume) use the main keyword as the keyword to provide them that you want to increase in ranking?

One other side note: I've read on a WSO and other posts about creating a web 2.0 site, or Youtube video with a link back to my page, and then doing a Fiverr gig for lots of backlinks to backlink to let's say, the video or article on a 2.0 site instead of yours... and how that is supposed to drip and help increase pagerank as well as increasing your rank for that keyword. Is this true at all to anyone's knowledge?

Thanks in advance...

[ToneyCr]

Nice guide. Thank your for writing it!

[Andrew S]

Good footprints and a copy of Scrapebox can keep a manual link builder busy for years.