How
to jumpstart your link popularity
by "spying" on your competitors
This article
describes a simple technique you can use to increase your link popularity
by running link popularity reports on your competitors. This technique
shows you where your competition receives their traffic from and
lets you quickly find the best possible sites to approach for a
link. In many cases, it will also reveal your competition's best
'marketing tricks' - sites they sponsor or buy ads from and even
their best affiliates and joint venture partners.
Locating
qualified link prospects
Learning
how to find the right sites to approach is essential to increasing
your link popularity. Approaching the wrong sites can quickly sabotage
your efforts - selecting the right ones can help pave the way to
quickly and effectively increasing your link popularity.
Unfortunately,
it can be difficult and time consuming to find the right types of
sites to approach. First you need to find sites which are relevant
to your site. These are sites whose content is related to yours
or whose visitors are likely to be interested in your site. Of these,
many may not link to external sites. Others may not feel that your
site is relevant to theirs. Weeding out these types of sites can
be very time consuming. Luckily, there is a better way...
Insider's
Secret - running link popularity reports on competitors
How would
you like to be handed a list of web sites which are relevant to
your web site and have already demonstrated their 'link-friendliness'
by linking to a site very similar to yours?
This 'magic
list' is the list of web sites which already link to one of your
competitors!
For example,
let's say the webmaster of Papa John's Pizza wanted to engage in
a comprehensive link promotion campaign. He could spend days trying
to locate different sites which would be interested in linking to
a pizza company web page. Or he could run a Link Popularity report
on one of his competitors (Dominos.com or PizzaHut.com) and find
thousands of web sites who are related to 'pizza' in some way because
they already link to a national pizza company.
Why
it works
The
list of sites which link to your competitors is extremely targeted.
Since each of these sites already links to a competitor
of yours, it is highly likely that...
1.
These sites are relevant to your site.
2.
They are willing to link to external sites in your field.
With
this report in hand, you can quickly visit each of the sites
(to verify that it is a quality, relevant sites), then introduce
yourself to their webmaster and ask to be included on their site.
In most cases, you will want to write a personalized message and
mention that you noticed that they already link to sites in your
field. This highly selective, personalized approach is one of the
best possible ways to increase your site's link popularity.
Why
approaching the right sites is critical....
1.
Approaching the right types of sites will greatly improve your link
request response rate. Webmasters
who have an interest in your field are much more likely to be interested
in opening and reading your link request letter. The majority of
ignored or deleted link request letters are cookie-cutter messages
sent to poorly selected sites. By selecting only specific pages
which already contain very similar links, you will greatly increase
the chance that your message will be opened and viewed favorably.
2.
Relevant sites are much more likely to link to you.
Targeting the right sites is the best possible way to increase the
number of links to your site. If done properly, finding the perfect
sites to approach will be a win-win situation for both your site
and the sites you contact. Assuming you have a good site, you will
be doing webmasters a favor by pointing out an extremely relevant
site which may be of interest to their visitors. These webmasters
are much more likely to link to your site and in many cases will
thank you for taking the time to contact them.
3.
Once they link to you, the visitors they send you will be more interested
in your content. Since they are coming
from a relevant site, these visitors are more likely to be interested
in your content. They
may perceive your site in a better light and even be more likely
to do business with you since your site has been recommended (linked
to) by another trusted site (as opposed to found via a banner ad
or sponsored listing). Depending on the recommending site and the
description of the link, you may find that these special types of
visitors are much more profitable than your average visitor.
4.
Increasing the number of relevant links to your web site can dramatically
increase your search engine rankings. The
major search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing) reward sites which have
high link popularity. However, just getting hundreds of random web
sites to link to you will not help your search engine rankings.
The relevance of the sites linking to you is extremely important.
By focusing exclusively on gaining links from relevant web sites,
you will be giving yourself a tremendous advantage over sites who
take a more scattered, less effective approach.
Stay
one step ahead of your competition: By
analyzing who links to them, you can also determine...
1. Are they
currently engaging in a link promotion campaign?
2. Are they purchasing banner advertisements or sponsoring related
web sites?
3. Have they submitted their site to industry specific directories
and resources?
4. Who their affiliates and joint venture partners are.
5 . Are their customer's complaining about them?
Use this
information to gain new insight into your competition and give you
ideas to increase your own on-line marketing efforts.
Conclusion
Being aware
of who links to you competitors and using this information wisely
can help you quickly build your link popularity. Sites which link
to your competitors are far more likely to be relevant to your field,
interested in your site and willing to link your site. Visiting
and contacting these sites can dramatically increase traffic to
your site and improve your search engine rankings.
Next:
Run a Premium
Linkpopularity Report on your competition...
